Hi, and welcome to the Burnt Toast B&B blog tour! We’re Heidi Belleau and Rachel Haimowitz, the authors of the book, and we’re so thankful to have you along for the ride, and thankful to our hosts, [blog title], for having us here today!

Normally on a blog tour, we like to share all kinds of behind the scenes goodies to do with the book: inspiration images, glimpses into research and plotting, deleted scenes, conversations about our process, character bios, etc. For this tour, though, we’re doing something a little different, but we hope you’ll still find it worth your while.

When Heidi first pitched The Burnt Toast B&B, it was as an opposites-attract story centring around the world’s worst B&B . . . and an M/M romcom where one of the lead guys just happened to be transgender. Writing solo, she’d done a trans book before, but that was very much a Trans Book, all about exploring gender identity, defining who you are, and coming out to your friends and loved ones. This book . . . isn’t that. It’s the story of an optimistic hipster stuntman and a pessimistic lumberjack who learn to make espresso, fix up a failing B&B, and generally butt heads in between loads of laundry.

Ginsberg, our hipster, is much like many of our other favourite M/M heroes: he’s funny, resilient, romantic, and sexy as hell. He’s also transgender; secure in his identity, his body, and his

sexuality; and working in a career he loves. But his life isn’t without hardships. Ginsberg made his own family after his biological one turned out to be too toxic to live with. He scrimped and saved and borrowed to pay for the medical care he needed to be happy and healthy. He found a roof over his head as a “considerate couchsurfer,” living with friends and acquaintances on a temporary basis when money got tight. In Derrick and his failing B&B, Ginsberg finally finds an opportunity to have a real home, if only he can convince Derrick to keep the place open.

Ginsberg’s background of financial hardship and lack of family support is all too common among many people who, like him, are trans and trying to live happy, fulfilling lives as their true selves. As such, we the authors, our publisher Riptide, and our generous blog tour hosts will be using the next few days to highlight the personal fundraisers of real trans people in need. We hope that if you’ve got a little extra money this month, you’ll consider donating, and if money’s tight, maybe you can help by spreading the word, too.

For our part, Rachel, Heidi, and Riptide will be giving donors a $5 Riptide credit code for every $10 in donations you make (up to $50 in codes per person, up to $5,000 in codes overall)–just email your donation receipt(s) to info@riptidepublishing.com with the subject line “Burnt Toast Tour Donation,” and Riptide will send out all $5 codes a week after the tour ends. (It’s totally cool, by the way, to spread your donations across multiple fundraisers if you’d like; we’ll add up all your receipts sent in a single email and base your credit vouchers on the grand total.)

We’re also hosting a special contest for people who donate: every dollar in donations to any of these fundraisers will earn you an entry into a drawing for a full paperback set of Riptide’s current Bluewater Bay lineup, OR two signed paperback copies of The Burnt Toast B&B. We’ll draw one week after the blog tour ends. Every dollar helps, and every dollar counts!

Lastly, we’ll randomly select three commenters from all the tour stops and donate $50 apiece in each winner’s name to the trans charity or fundraiser of their choice. (Please be sure to leave a way for us to contact you if you win!)

Today’s featured fundraiser is for Züleyka Cherry, a trans woman of color saving for tuition to Oxford, where she’s been accepted for a Masters program. You can find it at http://www.gofundme.com/transwomanoxford. And here’s Züleyka 🙂

Züleyka is a twenty-eight-year-old trans woman of mixed black/Turkish/white race, who has faced a multitude of prejudice throughout her life: racism, classism, and gender prejudice. She began transitioning at the age of eighteen, and earned her undergraduate degree (with a perfect 4.0 grade average!) via scholarships. She is the first in her family to have earned her bachelors degree, and now dreams of earning her masters and campaigning for parliment, where she hopes to affect progressive social changes. You can learn more about Züleyka and help this young woman to achieve her goals and make lasting changes in the world at her fundraiser page, http://www.gofundme.com/transwomanoxford.

Thank you so much for following our (slightly unconventional) blog tour! Be sure to leave a comment on this or any of our other tour stops for a chance to have $50 donated in your name to a trans-related fundraiser/charity of your choice. And if you choose to donate to any of the fundraisers we’ve highlighted over the course of the tour, don’t forget to forward proof of your donation to info@riptidepublishing.com with the subject line “Burnt Toast Tour Donation” to claim your $5 coupon(s) and enter your name in the extra special drawing!

Lastly, if you or someone you love is transgender and going through a difficult time, please check out the Trans Lifeline, http://www.translifeline.org/. This crisis helpline is staffed entirely by trans volunteers and runs at least twelve hours a day, seven days a week, in the US and Canada. If you’re in crisis, please call them. If you’d like to support this nonprofit, please visit http://www.gofundme.com/translifeline.

Ginsberg should have caught a cab or bummed a ride. That much was obvious now. Hard to think straight, though, when he was still smarting from losing the use of his bike. But standing here on the rickety whitewashed porch of Bluewater Bay’s Worst B&B—as voted by the internet—soaking wet and shivering, had a way of rearranging one’s priorities.The guy coming up the driveway now didn’t look too happy to see him, scowling out from under his jacket’s hood, but he hadn’t gone full redneck and shouted Get off my property! either.

Ginsberg forced his frigid lips to smile.

“The hell are you thinking, dressed like that?” Grizzled and Grumpy scolded, but still stooped to pick up Ginsberg’s bag for him.

Ginsberg shrugged. This wasn’t exactly the time or the place to defend his carefully curated fashion choices. “Vanity?”

His host snorted. “Well, get inside and I’ll start a fire. Get you warmed up.”

When he opened the door, though, it seemed there was already a fire going somewhere, because the smoke alarm was wailing, and the front hall of the house was filled with a haze of blue smoke.

“Fuck!” Ginsberg’s host stormed inside, boots trailing mud.

Wherever the fire was, it obviously wasn’t in the fireplace where it belonged. Ginsberg chased him inside.

“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fucking oven! Fucking stove! Fucking breakfast!”

The kitchen, then. Ginsberg followed the sound of cursing into a smoke-filled kitchen, where his host was struggling with a dusty fire extinguisher. Across from him, a pan on the stove top and the oven door were billowing smoke. A mess if Ginsberg had ever seen one, but nothing warranting a 911 call, either.

“Give me that,” he commanded, loudly to be heard over the alarm, and snatched the fire extinguisher from his host’s hands. A quick check of the pressure gauge, and he pulled his sopping wet undershirt over his mouth and nose, yanked the extinguisher’s pin, took aim at the stove’s burners, and pulled the trigger. As Ginsberg neutralized the fire on the stove top, his host dragged a footstool to the center of the room, where the smoke alarm was mounted on the ceiling, and knocked the battery free.

Sudden silence, and a thick blanket of white powder coating the stove top. Ginsberg kicked the smoking oven shut. Turned the whole damn thing off.

After setting the fire extinguisher down, he gave his forehead a swipe with his good arm. Didn’t know whether he’d wiped away rain or sweat. “Well, that was fun.”

His host blinked at him in shock, coughed, then headed for the kitchen’s small window to open it. “Good thing you were here. I got no idea how to use one of those things.”

“I’ve got a fair amount of experience with fire,” he said, scrutinizing the extinguisher’s paper tag. “We’re lucky it even worked. The thing’s expired.”

“I didn’t know they did that.”

“I guessed as much.” He put out a hand. “I’m Ginsberg, by the way.”

“Derrick Richards.” The other man took Ginsberg’s hand in an easy, powerful shake.

“So how about that fire?” Ginsberg asked, forcing himself to let go of Derrick’s big hand. “The one you were planning on setting on purpose, I mean?”

***

They hung around the kitchen a few minutes more, just until Ginsberg was sure the fire in the oven was completely smothered and Derrick deemed it safe to replace the battery in the smoke alarm, and then they headed through the B&B’s cluttered but quaint dining room and into a similarly decorated sitting room.

Derrick may not have been handy with putting out fires, but he clearly had a knack for getting them going, because after a couple minutes crouched in front of the fireplace, a cheerful little blaze was already warming the room. Ginsberg, not wanting to ruin the dilapidated old sofa with his wet jeans, sidled up close to the flames and peeled off his coat, laying it out flat on the hearth to dry. He bent his head toward the fire and scrubbed his hand through his hair, sending water droplets flying.

“I’ll . . .” Derrick muttered, “I’ll just go get you a towel, then.”

“Thanks.”

Ginsberg stayed close to the fire—where he was simultaneously too hot and too cold, shivering and steaming—while he waited for Derrick to return. He sure hoped the guy had a room available, because while the fire was definitely a nice thought, the sooner he could get out of these wet jeans, the better. A hot shower with a plastic bag to wrap his cast in wouldn’t go amiss, either. Or a cup of coffee. And since he was already standing here wishing for things likely not to be provided by Bluewater Bay’s Worst B&B, why not add a back rub, a shot of whiskey, his very own pony . . .

He was still chuckling to himself about his unflagging optimism when a threadbare towel dropped on top of his head, partially obscuring his vision.

“Thanks again,” he said, towel-drying his hair before moving on to his shoulders and arms. “Do you have a blow-dryer, just on the off chance? My hair’s . . . particular. I cringe to think of what it looks like right now.”

“Rooster,” Derrick replied.

The guy’s expression was totally flat. Ginsberg had no idea whether he was joking or not, and it kinda felt like the social equivalent of a mouthful of metal fillings and tinfoil. He cleared his throat, draping the towel over his shoulders, suddenly glad he hadn’t taken his tank off. It might be completely see-through and sticking to his skin, but it was a layer of something between him and this inscrutable, hulking man.

Derrick cleared his throat too, studiously looking at anything that wasn’t Ginsberg. “So, Giiiiinsberg. Seattle, or LA?”

“Huh?”

“Which is it? You’re obviously not from around here, so are you from Seattle, or LA?”

“Oh! Neither, actually. I—”

“So you didn’t hitchhike here?”

Ginsberg shook his head.

“And you’re not one of those Wolf’s Landing people, either?”

Yikes. He’d read that this guy didn’t have the best customer service, but this was getting downright uncomfortable. “Would that be a problem if I was?”

Derrick shrugged. “Their money’s as good as anyone else’s, last I checked.” He paused, peering at Ginsberg through eyes narrowed nearly to slits. “You do have money, don’t you? Well, you’re not a hitchhiker, so you must.”

“I am so lost right now, dude. I feel like I’m missing an entire line of thought from you here.”

“That’s how I feel about your hair. What is that, some new kinda mullet? How come it’s long on top but shaved on the sides? Your razor run out of batteries?” He gestured to his own utilitarian hairstyle.

Ginsberg ran his hand self-consciously through his ’do and spat out, “Hardi-har-har. That’s rich coming from you, Mr. Lumberjack chic.”

“I am a lumberjack.”

“A lumberjack who also runs a B&B?” Ginsberg teased, and realized he really was teasing. He liked this guy.

“Would that be a problem if I was?” Derrick mimicked, his imitation of Ginsberg’s voice all high and squeaky.

Okay, maybe “liked” was a bit premature. Ginsberg scowled. He didn’t have to take this shit. He wasn’t homeless . . . at least not exactly. He still had options, anyway.

“Sorry,” Derrick said, and he did have a genuinely chastened expression on his dumb rugged face. “I’m pretty bad with people.”

“Says the man working in the hospitality industry . . .” Ginsberg sighed. He turned, pointing the soggy denim sticking to his ass toward the heat of the fire. “But apology accepted.”

“Okay, well, the way I see it is, you’ve got a pretty, uh, distinct look. I figured you were either a crusty hitchhiker type, from Seattle in other words, or that this whole thing—” he gestured vaguely at Ginsberg, which Ginsberg took as a reference to his sense of style “—is some kind of ironic fashion statement. Which would mean you were here working on Wolf’s Landing. So, Seattle or LA,” he concluded.

“That’s a pretty common misconception, actually. A good portion of the production staff hasn’t even seen California. Me, I’m from all sorts of places—”

“So you are one of those Wolf’s Landing types.”

“Well, yes.”

“Why didn’t you say so in the first place, then?”

“I dunno. You were giving off those ‘kill all outsiders’ vibes everybody on the crew’s always complaining about.”

“Oh for God’s sake.” Derrick rolled his eyes. “Just because we don’t like your big-city fair-trade all-organic diet fads and your packs of wild paparazzi roaming our streets doesn’t mean any of us wanna kill you.”

“That’s what I’m always trying to tell everyone else working the show. You know, stop acting like an outsider, and people will stop treating you like one. That’s my philosophy.” His chest had puffed up like a preening bird at that last bit, and he coughed, embarrassed. “But the way you were looking at me there for a couple minutes, I was starting to wonder if I was wrong.”

“Well, you’re not. So you gonna check in, or what?” For a second, Derrick’s suspicious expression switched to wide-eyed and startled—almost adorably open—but then he shook his head and everything was back to normal. Except for the little bit of ruddiness in his cheeks. “Whole place is empty as of this morning, so you got your pick of the rooms.” He seemed almost mad now, but Ginsberg got the sense it wasn’t with him. Well, who wouldn’t be mad about having a failing business? “Price is sixty a night, but I can do two-fifty a week or six hundred a month if you’re looking for something long term.”

Which was exactly why Ginsberg had moved out of his roommate’s chic, pricey downtown loft and come here instead. Bad reviews or no, the Bayview B&B was a cheap, local roof over his head until he could get this cast off and back to work . . . if his job would even still be available to him then.

“And you’ll cook me breakfast every morning?” he asked, trying to make his voice optimistic in the hopes that the rest of him would follow.

“Be careful what you wish for,” Derrick replied darkly.

“Does that apply to my wish for a hair dryer, too?”

Derrick’s reaction surprised him: the morose looking guy cracked a smile. “Don’t worry your fluffy duckling head, kid. I’m sure my mom has one lying around here somewhere. Curling iron too, if you want one.”

Ginsberg, feeling infinitely more comfortable with Derrick by now, just stuck out his tongue.

For our part, Rachel, Heidi, and Riptide will be giving donors a $5 Riptide credit code for every $10 in donations you make (up to $50 in codes per person, up to $5,000 in codes overall)–just email your donation receipt(s) to info@riptidepublishing.com with the subject line “Burnt Toast Tour Donation,” and Riptide will send out all $5 codes a week after the tour ends. (It’s totally cool, by the way, to spread your donations across multiple fundraisers if you’d like; we’ll add up all your receipts sent in a single email and base your credit vouchers on the grand total.)

We’re also hosting a special contest for people who donate: every dollar in donations to any of these fundraisers will earn you an entry into a drawing for a full paperback set of Riptide’s current Bluewater Bay lineup, OR two signed paperback copies of The Burnt Toast B&B. We’ll draw one week after the blog tour ends. Every dollar helps, and every dollar counts!

Lastly, we’ll randomly select three commenters from all the tour stops and donate $50 apiece in each winner’s name to the trans charity or fundraiser of their choice. (Please be sure to leave a way for us to contact you if you win!)