Charlie Cochrane - Mysteries with a dash of slash, romances with just a pinch of spice

This was the only one if my stories which mentions the Queen of the May, although that passing reference would make no sense in an excerpt. So I'm carrying on from the last snippet from Awfully Glad, where the female lead in the WWI forces entertainment show turned out to be not so female...

“Lieutenant Samuel Hines, gentlemen. Female impersonator extraordinaire. And a very old friend of the family,” Corry added, maybe in case his officers thought he spent all his off duty hours hanging around with men wearing lipstick.
“Not so much of the old,” Sam replied in a voice which had gone down an octave since he’d last spoken. He began to wipe the make-up off his face. “Sorry to shatter any illusions,” he said, addressing Cole, who was clearly trying to give the impression he’d known all along. “Better you know now before we get to the estaminet. A bit of footsie under the table might have ended up with you getting your shins raked.”
Corry laughed. “You should have seen Sam on the rugby pitch. Usually played hard but fair, except when the ref wasn’t looking!”
“That’s the point of the game, surely?” Browne said. “Always used to be the point at Rosslyn Park, anyway.”



Always more excellent tidbits to be found at the Rainbow snippets group.

A little bit of Awfully Glad, which centres around the star of a WWI concert party.

“Sorry if we’re being forward, but we wondered if you would join us for a drink, afterwards? There’s a little estaminet…” Hampson’s words petered out under Madeleine’s piercing blue gaze.
“But of course. Once I’ve changed out of my working clothes.”
“Oh, yes. Come on chaps, let’s leave the lady to it.” Whether Hampson was in a hurry to leave the room to spare Madeleine’s modesty or hide his own blush, who could tell. The blush deepened to an ugly red at her reply.
“Oh, no need for that.” She favoured Corry with a wink. “Stay and keep me company.”
“I…ah…we…oh!” Hampson’s eyebrows shot up as Madeline unpinned her wig and removed it, to reveal short cropped hair, a couple of shades darker than his, dark auburn with sweat. She smiled, but not her usual coquettish smile; this one was masculine, the lines of the mouth suddenly hardened. The illusion had been broken.



Find more snippets over at the Rainbow Snippets group.

And as an opening offer, it's 10% off everything. Fancy a cut price Awfully Glad or Don't Kiss the Vicar?

Awfully Glad came out almost a year ago - where has 2014 gone?

To start the review of my releases of the past year, here's an exclusive snippet:

A knock on the door and the arrival of the tea eased them past an awkward, potentially mawkish, moment.
“We met. Out there,” Browne said, when the secretary had left, closing the door behind her. “You won’t remember, I suppose.”
Time to get the guard up again. “I thought your face seemed familiar, but I couldn’t pin down a place or a time. Not the same regiment, I think.”
“No. And no reason you should remember, either. You must have seen lots of us.” He tipped his head towards the
photo of Madeleine. “We only saw one of you.”
Guard reinforced. “Some people would say that was just as well.” What next? Ask Browne to be discreet? Or would that be taking the first step down the risky path towards exactly why he was hiding his full war record from his colleagues? No, play it light. “She’s hung up her corset, now.”
“Shame. No, I take that back.” Browne raised his hand in apology. “She was of her time, a great shining ray of light against a dark background. I can understand why she’s not for peacetime, but I hope you’d never feel ashamed of
her.”
Too perceptive by half.
“Not ashamed, no. In some ways they were the happiest days of my life. Band of brothers, pals all looking out for each other. But she doesn’t go with the image, does she? People here think she’s my cousin. I haven’t seen fit to put
them straight.” As near the truth as he wanted to go at present.
“Probably wise. People make the most stupid assumptions.” Browne didn’t expand on what those assumptions might be. “Still, I’m grateful to you. And my fellow officers would say the same, if they could. Unfortunately I’ll have to say it for them. Some will never be able to say it to your face.”
“Ah. Many a good man never made it home. I’m never sure whether to think I was lucky or accomplished to have
survived.” Luck, surely. The same luck which hadn’t blessed either Miles or Harry, the boy he’d loved at school
and the man he’d loved at university, now neither of them lying in his bed but both under the turf of France. And one
of them probably in myriad pieces, given that his body had never been recovered. That beautiful, lithe body seen by the
dappled golden light filtering through a magnolia and piercing a college window, back in the days when war seemed to be something which happened to other people.
Sam realized he was being spoken to and had no idea what had been said. “I’m sorry, could you repeat that? I was miles away.”
“No need to apologize. I was just saying that one of the lads I was with when I met you wasn’t so fortunate. Captain Corry made it home, although you’ll know that.”
“He always had the angels’ luck—or the devil’s.” The last number in the combination fell into place and the door to the mystery opened. “Of course, I remember now. Backstage at that god-awful place, near Saint-Quentin, was it? Corry had three of you in tow. One had the most astonishingly ginger hair.”
“That would have been Cole,” Browne said sharply. “Have you seen him since?”
“Not that I’m aware of.”
Browne still seemed on his guard. “How extraordinary that you remembered him then.”
“It was that thatch. Never seen anything like it.” He’d say nothing, of course, about the daydreams he’d had concerning two of those officers afterwards, especially as one of the pair was sitting not three yards from him. And
nothing about the note—maybe no chance, now, of finding who sent it. “Cole never came home?”
“No, he was the lucky one.” Browne’s eyes narrowed, as though in pain. “It was the other lad, Hampson, who didn’t make it into the next month. Sniper.” He reached towards his inside pocket, evidently feeling the need of a smoke, then stopped himself. “Sorry. I’m taking up your valuable time. I suppose you’ll send me a bill if I run over my allocated slot.”
“You know us too well.” Sam laughed.

"Charlie Cochrane is a quintessential English writer and I honestly don’t know of another author who could have written a story like Awfully Glad. I thoroughly enjoyed it and wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it to anyone who loves historical stories that make them think."

Read the rest at Mrs Condit Reads Books.

I was going to blog at The Novel Approach about "relationship marketing" in the context of readers as customers, but I ended up talking about how WWI has got me as a customer author. It makes sense, I promise. Come and see.

You can win a copy of Awfully Glad!

Sam's the hero of Awfully Glad and has a lot to say for himself over at the Romance Lives forever blog. I managed to get a word in edgeways, on issues like what made me the most happy/sad when I wrote about him.

I'm delighted to announce that Awfully Glad is available exclusively for early purchase via the BSB webstore.

WWI hero Sam Hines is used to wearing a face that isn’t his own. When he’s not in the trenches, he’s the most popular female impersonator on the front, but a mysterious note from an anonymous admirer leaves him worried. Everyone realizes—eventually—that Sam’s not a woman, but has somebody also worked out that he also prefers his lovers to be male?

When Sam meets—and falls for—fellow officer Johnny Browne after the war, he wonders whether he could be the man who wrote the note. If so, is he the answer to Sam’s dreams or just another predatory blackmailer, ready to profit from a love that dare not speak its name?

Excerpt:

Sam couldn’t resist unfolding the note; he’d had these sorts of things before and they were always good for a laugh. The invitations would range from the innocent to the knowingly experienced, although nobody ever suggested something entirely obscene—Miss Madeleine gave an air of always being above such things. This would probably be the usual "Might I buy you a drink? I know this little estaminet…"

It wasn’t.

“I’m awfully glad you’re not a girl. J.”

Sam read it again, not trusting the evidence of his eyes, but they’d been right the first time. J? Which of the officers had that been? Jimmy, Jeffrey, Jonathan…Sam had forgotten their names already, even if he’d been told them.

But when had the note been written? After he’d taken his wig off and burst the little lieutenant’s bubble, he supposed, although if he had no memory of the thing being lodged in its hiding place, he equally had no recollection of somebody scribbling the thing—there’d been very little time for it, anyway. And how much more courage would it have taken to do such a thing in plain sight? It wasn’t the sort of note which could be easily explained away if discovered.

He closed his eyes, trying better to picture the scene. There’d been Corry, whom he’d known since he was a lad. Not him. Not his writing, anyway. And the ginger-haired officer hadn’t been anywhere near those pots. So it had to be the quiet, dark-haired chap or the tow-headed one. He wouldn’t have said no to either of those if they’d met in a certain bar in London. Decent-looking lads, a bit of life about them, and clearly with some spark of interest that was more than platonic. But which of them had written it? And how to find out?

Isn't it pretty?

I've been sitting on my hands, desperate to blab about this, and now I can. Am delighted to say that Bold Strokes Books will be publishing my WWI romantic short story, Awfully Glad next year.

WWI hero Sam Hines is used to wearing a face that isn’t his own. When he’s not in the trenches, he’s the most popular female impersonator on the front, but a mysterious note from an anonymous admirer leaves him worried. Everyone realizes—eventually—that Sam’s not a woman, but has somebody also worked out that he prefers his lovers to be male?

When Sam meets—and falls for—fellow officer Johnny Browne after the war, he wonders whether he could be the man who wrote the note. If so, is he the answer to Sam’s dreams or just another predatory blackmailer, ready to profit from a love that dare not speak its name?