Birthday Bash Day 28 - Lisabet Sarai

And now, help me welcome my second guest, Lisabet Sarai! Also, don't forget to check out my first ever guest post on her blog, Beyond Romance!

PuPu Platter

by Lisabet Sarai

Let me begin by wishing my favorite Tiger-Chick a hugely happy twenty first birthday! I love to see someone celebrating in style, and a whole month of guests and prizes certainly falls into that category. And speaking of prizes, I'll be giving away an autographed print book from my back list to one lucky reader who comments on this post.

Emily asked us to share our own twenty first birthday memories, but to be honest, I don't remember anything special at all about the day I turned twenty one.  Cut me some slack, please – that was nearly forty years ago! However, I do recall my eighteenth birthday. My mom took me out to dinner at a local Chinese restaurant and we shared a “PuPu Platter”, washed down with my first legal glass of wine.

Do any of you remember those pseudo-Polynesian appetizer assortments, complete with the fiery wrought-iron cauldron in the middle to heat up all the finger food? Do they still exist? When I went searching for images on my favorite stock photo site, I came up with zero hits. Are PuPu Platters totally passé? Have they gone the way of granny glasses and lava lights?

Indeed, the world has become a good deal more sophisticated from a culinary perspective since I was a teen. Now you can select a Szechuan or Mandarin or Cantonese restaurant – as opposed to simply “Chinese” - as well as Thai, Vietnamese, Japanese, and maybe other oriental flavors. Furthermore, you're unlikely to find tiki masks decorating the restaurant walls and paper umbrellas in your drinks, the way I did the day I turned eighteen.

Modern concerns with healthy eating have also probably played a role in the platter's demise. It's difficult to imagine a more fat-and-cholesterol intensive repast than the traditional fried wonton, crispy egg rolls, barbecued spareribs, battered giant shrimp, cheese-filled crab puffs, and all the other delicacies that might show up ranged around the flaming Sterno. One PuPu Platter can undo weeks of toil at the gym.

But God, how I loved them, back then! Indeed, looking further back into my past, I recall that on my first real date my companion (with whom I was highly enamored) ordered us one. This may explain my lingering fondness – PuPu Platters are somehow mixed up in my mind with sex. (Not that I had sex on my first date, of course, but a teenager's hormones color everything in her world). And there are some similarities, after

all. A PuPu Platter is decadent, all luscious flavor with little food value. You devour the components with your fingers and lick off the juices afterward. And you can't eat one all by yourself. PuPu Platters are made to be shared.

The final attraction is variety. A taste of this, a hint of that, never enough of any one dish to be bored – that's what I love. Diversity is my ideal in life. I want to sample a wide range of different experiences, rather than being forced to choose one dish, one path, even one person – although I have been married to the same guy for more than thirty years. (He likes variety, too.)

Given my love of diversity, it's not surprising my writing is all over the map, from a genre perspective. I write both romance and erotica, in pretty much every combination of genders. My backlist includes BDSM, suspense, historical, science fiction, steampunk,  paranormal, multicultural and interracial fiction, even a bit of humor. And I've never written a series, because, to be honest, I'm worried that I'll get bored.

I guess you could view my collected work as a PuPu Platter of erotic fiction – though hopefully it's a bit more nourishing than the Polynesian variety!

I could regale you with endless snippets, as varied as the different delights on the platter. However,  since Emily loves M/M books, I settled on sharing a bit from my gay paranormal erotic romance novel Necessary Madness.

Both power and love can lead to madness.

Nineteen year old Kyle sees visions of disasters, visions that tear his world apart. Everyone assumes that he is schizophrenic, but Rob, the cop who picks him up off the street, knows better. Rob's own experience has taught him that psychic powers are real, and potentially devastating.

Since his telepathic sister's brutal murder, Rob wants nothing to do with "gifted" individuals like Kyle. Yet he can't deny his attraction to the beautiful, tortured young man – an attraction that appears to be mutual. When a brilliant, sadistic practitioner of

the black arts lures Kyle into his clutches, Rob faces the possibility that  once again he may lose the person he loves most to the forces of darkness.

Excerpt:

Rob thought he’d go crazy if he had to wait any longer.

First, there had been the hospital, where they were treated for burns, scrapes, cuts, contusions, exposure and possible poisoning. Jez had been admitted for observation. Rob and Kyle were released.

Next came the visit to police headquarters, where they’d made statements and answered endless questions. By unspoken agreement, neither he nor Kyle said anything about psychic powers or magic rituals. Rob handed over the voice recorder, which hopefully had captured Stefan’s gloating about the bank jobs. He also suggested that interrogating Jez, once she recovered, might throw some light on Mary’s brutal murder.

There were phone calls to be made, to Elspeth and to Gina, who had heard that Rob had been kidnapped and was waiting up anxiously for news. And they had to eat something—Kyle had been trembling with hunger by the time the guys at the station had brought in the pizza.

It was all necessary, Rob knew, but it had taken hours. It was past midnight by the time Bill Rausch dropped them off at Rob’s apartment. Rob’s shoulder joints were still too damaged for him to drive safely.

Kyle fished in Rob’s pocket for the door key. “Somebody’s hard,” he teased as he let them in. “Must be the effect of the drugs.”

Rob flattened Kyle against the wall as soon as the door closed. “You’re my drug, baby. I’m completely addicted.” He tore open Kyle’s shirt, scattering buttons, and cupped the slight swell of his breast, flicking the nipple. He played with the taut nub while he devoured Kyle’s mouth, loving the way the boy shuddered under him. “I’ve got to have you or I’ll explode.”

Rob’s fingers travelled down his lover’s chest to his belly then snaked into his trousers to capture the rigid shaft hiding there. Kyle’s cock seemed to leap into his hand, eager for his touch. He stroked it once or twice then grew frustrated with the constraints of clothing. With a growl, he used his other hand to unzip Kyle’s jeans and yank them down to his knees. Kyle’s rod sprang to attention, Rob’s fist clutching its base. Rob sank to the floor and swallowed the whole length.

“Oh, Rob,” the boy breathed, as Rob swept his tongue along the velvety skin. Kyle tangled his fingers in Rob’s hair, holding tight while Rob consumed the cock he’d been imagining all night.

Thanks for joining me on a (greasy) walk down memory lane! Remember to leave a comment if you're interested in winning a book – please include your email address so we can find you!

And once again, a hearty Happy Birthday to you, Emily!

About Lisabet:

Lisabet Sarai became addicted to words at an early age. She began reading when she was four. She wrote her first story at five years old and her first poem at seven. Since then, she has written plays, tutorials, scholarly articles, marketing brochures, software specifications, self-help books, press releases, a five-hundred page dissertation, and lots of erotica and erotic romance – nearly fifty single author titles, plus dozens of short stories in various erotic anthologies, including the Lambda winner Where the Girls Are and the IPPIE Best Erotic Book of 2011, Carnal Machines. Her gay scifi erotic romance Quarantine won a Rainbow Awards 2012 Honorable Mention.

Lisabet has more degrees than anyone would ever need, from prestigious educational institutions who would no doubt be deeply embarrassed by her chosen genre.  She has traveled widely and currently lives in Southeast Asia with her indulgent husband and two exceptional felines, where she pursue an alternative career that is completely unrelated to her creative writing.

For more information about Lisabet and her writing, visit her website or her blog Beyond Romance.