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BlaqJaq #1
Steel Sleet
On the run through a hostile future underworld, off-world assassin Nickerson and his young, beautiful guide BlaqJaq are consumed by mutual desire. But they must first survive before they can fulfill their erotic destiny. [Publisher's This book contains explicit sexual content, graphic language, and situations that some readers may find Anal play/intercourse, male/male sexual practices, masturbation, violence.]
87 pages, ebook
First published December 1, 2007
About the author
Eric Del Carlo
115 books18 followers I was born during the Vietnam War, in the city of San Francisco. I retain a gauzy childhood memory of the Watergate Trials interfering with my afternoon cartoon viewing. From early days I was enthralled by reading; no accident, this--we were a house of readers. Books everywhere. My mother read endless stories to me. My father, Victor, had an extensive collection of thrillers and science fiction, all those lurid book covers, that wonderful choking scent of paper and print in the house's basement. Did I read those books? Oh, yes, I did. And, of course, it wasn't much of a drastic leap from consuming all this fabulous fiction--and it was all fabulous to me, all of it--to wanting to create it myself.
I started selling short fiction to small press magazines in my early twenties. The stories were earnest, arguably a bit literarily overwrought, but were genuine expressions of the kind of emotional work I wanted to produce. I probably most enjoyed selling to late lamented Figment magazine, whose editors Barb and J. C. Hendee have gone on to a successful joint writing career. I was swinging blind with my work, writing absolutely whatever I felt like, following any mood or impulse. It was hit or miss, sale or rejection, but the sheer giddy joy of that process was very valuable to me.
I moved fairly often. Without any higher education or anything resembling marketable job skills, beyond a willingness to submit to bottom-rung clerking gigs, I was free to go wherever I liked. I lived in Santa Fe, New Mexico; twice in New Orleans; spent time in the U.K.'s London. I wrote throughout, but it hardly qualified as a career. During my second stint in New Orleans, living in the fabled French Quarter and again eking out a just-above-the-poverty-line existence, I met Robert Asprin. My soon to be wife, Samala Ray, brokered the encounter. Asprin frequented a few of the Quarter's overabundance of drinking establishments; Sam had bumped into him one night. I knew Asprin as a name writer of science fiction and fantasy, though I'd never read his work. Neither had I been to many conventions, and so had never come in contact with anyone famous in the field. Bob Asprin was--this is predictable, if you're familiar with his humorous fiction--a funny guy, with jokes aplenty to put anyone at ease who might be a bit starstruck to find himself sitting on a barstool adjacent to someone who had achieved fame when I was still banging out awkward disjointed fiction on a manual typewriter in grade school. A friendship formed, and collaboration loomed, and we produced two novels of non-humorous fantasy, the Wartorn books. When Bob died, my wife and I had long since fled New Orleans, getting out a day in front of Hurricane Katrina. I had only been back once, to retrieve what we'd left behind in our apartment. I saw Asprin then; and two and a half years later he was dead. I had gotten a chance to publish on a greater scale than I ever had before. I saw my own name rendered in Cyrillic on the covers of the Russian editions of the Wartorn novels. I will always be grateful to Robert Asprin for those experiences.
Now I live in California again, in wine country, in the quiet and predictability of a small town. I don't work day jobs anymore. I do what I've wanted to do since sometime around the age of seven: I write, I write, and I write; and the words do not stop.
I started selling short fiction to small press magazines in my early twenties. The stories were earnest, arguably a bit literarily overwrought, but were genuine expressions of the kind of emotional work I wanted to produce. I probably most enjoyed selling to late lamented Figment magazine, whose editors Barb and J. C. Hendee have gone on to a successful joint writing career. I was swinging blind with my work, writing absolutely whatever I felt like, following any mood or impulse. It was hit or miss, sale or rejection, but the sheer giddy joy of that process was very valuable to me.
I moved fairly often. Without any higher education or anything resembling marketable job skills, beyond a willingness to submit to bottom-rung clerking gigs, I was free to go wherever I liked. I lived in Santa Fe, New Mexico; twice in New Orleans; spent time in the U.K.'s London. I wrote throughout, but it hardly qualified as a career. During my second stint in New Orleans, living in the fabled French Quarter and again eking out a just-above-the-poverty-line existence, I met Robert Asprin. My soon to be wife, Samala Ray, brokered the encounter. Asprin frequented a few of the Quarter's overabundance of drinking establishments; Sam had bumped into him one night. I knew Asprin as a name writer of science fiction and fantasy, though I'd never read his work. Neither had I been to many conventions, and so had never come in contact with anyone famous in the field. Bob Asprin was--this is predictable, if you're familiar with his humorous fiction--a funny guy, with jokes aplenty to put anyone at ease who might be a bit starstruck to find himself sitting on a barstool adjacent to someone who had achieved fame when I was still banging out awkward disjointed fiction on a manual typewriter in grade school. A friendship formed, and collaboration loomed, and we produced two novels of non-humorous fantasy, the Wartorn books. When Bob died, my wife and I had long since fled New Orleans, getting out a day in front of Hurricane Katrina. I had only been back once, to retrieve what we'd left behind in our apartment. I saw Asprin then; and two and a half years later he was dead. I had gotten a chance to publish on a greater scale than I ever had before. I saw my own name rendered in Cyrillic on the covers of the Russian editions of the Wartorn novels. I will always be grateful to Robert Asprin for those experiences.
Now I live in California again, in wine country, in the quiet and predictability of a small town. I don't work day jobs anymore. I do what I've wanted to do since sometime around the age of seven: I write, I write, and I write; and the words do not stop.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
May 22, 2011
Review as I read, this book has ten chapters:
Chapter 1: Is Nickerson's POV and is really really confusing and being confused made it quite boring and just seemed like a waste of time reading it, I kept wondering if this was going somewhere. The whole chapter was just N running from unknown hunter's and was repetitively boring. Don't like the writing style
Chapter 2: Starts off from BlagJag's POV and is equally confusing possibly more confusing. I thought he was about to rape someone but then he had the thought "I know he wants this, I wouldn't force sex on anyone" or something like that so instead of rape it was just random sex in the alley. To be fair once the sex started the other guy never said no or if he did BlaqJaq didn't hear him... After the random sex it is just BlaqJaq running also way too many pages of just a character running. By the end he has ran into Nickerson (yes they will run together in chapter 3)
Chapter 3: Seriously this is where the book should have started, it is back to Nickerson's POV and guess what they summarize what happened in chapter one. This is 23% into the story and seriously the first 23% was pointless. I wanted to stop after chapter one. In this chapter the two MC's meet, they help a little girl, then they start running together. I am still confused what is going on
Chapter 4: back to BlaqJaq's pov and they are still running whole chapter. Still cinfused they stopped running long enough to kill something small and unarmed like a child but called something. Also while running had a flash back to chapter 2. Yeah this book should have started with chapter 3 if you're gonna flash back to those chapters anyway
Chapter 5: still just running from unknown hunters for unknown reasons. But stopped to rest for a minute in this one and mcs talked a few sentences each
Chapter 6: still running but they stop and say they have no time but somehow still managed to find the time for a sloppy handjob. Still don't know why they are running or who the hunters are or is there a point to this?
Chapter 7: stopped running started crawling. Page after page of two guys crawling around. Then something attacks BlaqJaq's shoulder so they stop crawling to get it off. Oh and they fall through a hole. Sure is exciting what will happen next??
Chapter 8: BlaqJaqs leg is hurt from fall in previous chapter. Has to hobble now instead of running. Very end of chapter they discus who and why might be hunting Nickerson. Mildly interesting but too late in the story. At this point I am just happy I am still reading it
Chapter 9: Stopped running, now waiting/hiding for hunters to come. Almost done and still nothing has happened. They have now captured the hunter and are now running from a gang. When the can they will interrogate the hunter to see who sent him. At this point I don't care just happy it's almost over
Chapter 10: they get the answers, it's funny how Nickerson didn't know it was "the hunt of nine" since he knew it was a tradition of his employers to do it every three years. So they figure out how they are being tracked, remove the chip he knew he had in him, and have boring sex the rest of the chapter. Sex without lube or spit or any kind or prep and no pain, and he was human
I can't think of anything I liked about this book and don't see myself reading the next one
Chapter 1: Is Nickerson's POV and is really really confusing and being confused made it quite boring and just seemed like a waste of time reading it, I kept wondering if this was going somewhere. The whole chapter was just N running from unknown hunter's and was repetitively boring. Don't like the writing style
Chapter 2: Starts off from BlagJag's POV and is equally confusing possibly more confusing. I thought he was about to rape someone but then he had the thought "I know he wants this, I wouldn't force sex on anyone" or something like that so instead of rape it was just random sex in the alley. To be fair once the sex started the other guy never said no or if he did BlaqJaq didn't hear him... After the random sex it is just BlaqJaq running also way too many pages of just a character running. By the end he has ran into Nickerson (yes they will run together in chapter 3)
Chapter 3: Seriously this is where the book should have started, it is back to Nickerson's POV and guess what they summarize what happened in chapter one. This is 23% into the story and seriously the first 23% was pointless. I wanted to stop after chapter one. In this chapter the two MC's meet, they help a little girl, then they start running together. I am still confused what is going on
Chapter 4: back to BlaqJaq's pov and they are still running whole chapter. Still cinfused they stopped running long enough to kill something small and unarmed like a child but called something. Also while running had a flash back to chapter 2. Yeah this book should have started with chapter 3 if you're gonna flash back to those chapters anyway
Chapter 5: still just running from unknown hunters for unknown reasons. But stopped to rest for a minute in this one and mcs talked a few sentences each
Chapter 6: still running but they stop and say they have no time but somehow still managed to find the time for a sloppy handjob. Still don't know why they are running or who the hunters are or is there a point to this?
Chapter 7: stopped running started crawling. Page after page of two guys crawling around. Then something attacks BlaqJaq's shoulder so they stop crawling to get it off. Oh and they fall through a hole. Sure is exciting what will happen next??
Chapter 8: BlaqJaqs leg is hurt from fall in previous chapter. Has to hobble now instead of running. Very end of chapter they discus who and why might be hunting Nickerson. Mildly interesting but too late in the story. At this point I am just happy I am still reading it
Chapter 9: Stopped running, now waiting/hiding for hunters to come. Almost done and still nothing has happened. They have now captured the hunter and are now running from a gang. When the can they will interrogate the hunter to see who sent him. At this point I don't care just happy it's almost over
Chapter 10: they get the answers, it's funny how Nickerson didn't know it was "the hunt of nine" since he knew it was a tradition of his employers to do it every three years. So they figure out how they are being tracked, remove the chip he knew he had in him, and have boring sex the rest of the chapter. Sex without lube or spit or any kind or prep and no pain, and he was human
I can't think of anything I liked about this book and don't see myself reading the next one
Read
April 10, 2009First Question: is it a romance? Mmm, I don't know. Well, yes define a romance is always difficult, and usually the only common points I can find are: two main characters, a love between them and an happily ever after. And with these parameters, Steel Sleet is a romance. But I can feel in this book that writing romance is not the mainly work of Eric Del Carlo.
Nickerson is a genetically shifted warriors. He lives Off-World, patrolling the Earth colonies on space and preventing the earth criminals to bring their business up there. But then he is sent again on Earth and he finishes in a trap. Now he is on run for his life and he finds a companion in BlaqJaq, a streetmuscle, a type of mercenary who has a moral code, he only works for the goods. And now he is drawn by this man, double his age, but handsome and with a gentle touch he is not used.
The story is mostly about their run amond the underwolrd tunnels to avoid the hunters who are after Nickerson, and only in two brief moment we can taste the passion between the two man, so this is my concern in classify it as a romance. But if you want to read a good fastpacing novella, this is your book.
The book is pretty good even if a little short (less then 90 pages). And I have the feeling (and hope indeed) that this is not the final point of this story, cause even if it has the HEA, it's also an open ended story, so I really want to know what happend next.
http://elisa-rolle.livejournal.com/20...
Nickerson is a genetically shifted warriors. He lives Off-World, patrolling the Earth colonies on space and preventing the earth criminals to bring their business up there. But then he is sent again on Earth and he finishes in a trap. Now he is on run for his life and he finds a companion in BlaqJaq, a streetmuscle, a type of mercenary who has a moral code, he only works for the goods. And now he is drawn by this man, double his age, but handsome and with a gentle touch he is not used.
The story is mostly about their run amond the underwolrd tunnels to avoid the hunters who are after Nickerson, and only in two brief moment we can taste the passion between the two man, so this is my concern in classify it as a romance. But if you want to read a good fastpacing novella, this is your book.
The book is pretty good even if a little short (less then 90 pages). And I have the feeling (and hope indeed) that this is not the final point of this story, cause even if it has the HEA, it's also an open ended story, so I really want to know what happend next.
http://elisa-rolle.livejournal.com/20...
November 17, 2010
BlaqJaq is streetmuscle, like a regulator or an equalizer, in the under city. Nickerson is an off-world agent chased from up-top by hunters. To fulfill a debt to Nickerson, BlaqJaq guides Nickerson deeper into the under-city as they are being chased by relentless hunters. Who is hunting Nickerson and why are questions that are beginning to be more important than the constant running.
I rated this 4.5 and dropped it down to 4 because of the difficulty of understanding the opening scene. Maybe I was tired and my mind wasn’t catching on because of it. I actually stopped in the middle of the action sequence and put it down for several weeks. You are dropped in the middle of a chase scene and that was fine. But there was no explanation of were you were or why Nickerson was being chased, what Nickerson’s goal was, and then dealing with unfamiliar terminology. It is still not clear to me what Steel sleet means…denied…unidentified…you’ve got a laser on your butt so you better move….who knows, obviously not me.
Re-reading the start the second time around was easier. When BlaqJaq was introduced, the picture of this world became more clear and sharpened in to this rich, multilayered underworld. The growing relationship between Nickerson was not force but had an easy nature flow to it.
I was not happy that it ended. I think indignant is the word for it. The story was just getting started and boom…their done. If the other two books in the series weren’t already out, I would have had to write a letter to the author. As it is, now I have to squeeze the rest of the series in between my challenge books somehow because I cannot wait until the end of the quarter to pick them back up!
I rated this 4.5 and dropped it down to 4 because of the difficulty of understanding the opening scene. Maybe I was tired and my mind wasn’t catching on because of it. I actually stopped in the middle of the action sequence and put it down for several weeks. You are dropped in the middle of a chase scene and that was fine. But there was no explanation of were you were or why Nickerson was being chased, what Nickerson’s goal was, and then dealing with unfamiliar terminology. It is still not clear to me what Steel sleet means…denied…unidentified…you’ve got a laser on your butt so you better move….who knows, obviously not me.
Re-reading the start the second time around was easier. When BlaqJaq was introduced, the picture of this world became more clear and sharpened in to this rich, multilayered underworld. The growing relationship between Nickerson was not force but had an easy nature flow to it.
I was not happy that it ended. I think indignant is the word for it. The story was just getting started and boom…their done. If the other two books in the series weren’t already out, I would have had to write a letter to the author. As it is, now I have to squeeze the rest of the series in between my challenge books somehow because I cannot wait until the end of the quarter to pick them back up!
February 8, 2010
The world the author tried to pull us into was very difficult to get in. Lots of confusing things that weren't explained, too many even. And it all felt much too rushed. Might have been better if he had taken the time to describe a few things instead of just throwing us in a high-tech futuristic world and leaving us to figure out what was what.
Even now I'm not even sure if I understand what it was all about besides the fact that a 40 yo assassin with cat genes (don't ask me how that came about, I have absolutely no idea) is running from hunters that want to kill him and while he's running he meets a street muscle for hire less than half his age that shows him the way in underground pathways....
Narurally they're both horny for each other instantly, and even though they're stuck in a duct vent with some weird monster after them, they still take the time to take themselves in hand.
The ending leaves the possibly for a sequel.
First book I read by Eric Del Carlo.
Even now I'm not even sure if I understand what it was all about besides the fact that a 40 yo assassin with cat genes (don't ask me how that came about, I have absolutely no idea) is running from hunters that want to kill him and while he's running he meets a street muscle for hire less than half his age that shows him the way in underground pathways....
Narurally they're both horny for each other instantly, and even though they're stuck in a duct vent with some weird monster after them, they still take the time to take themselves in hand.
The ending leaves the possibly for a sequel.
First book I read by Eric Del Carlo.
Read
October 7, 2013Happy sigh. There aren't nearly enough gay scifi books in my opinion, and there are far too few gay scifi audiobooks. This one was a pleasure to listen to, and it was real scifi - not just a romance with a few scifi trappings. In fact, I expect a lot of people will feel the romance is a bit scanty.
Please see the rest of this review at Booklikes:
http://charming2020.booklikes.com/pos...
Please see the rest of this review at Booklikes:
http://charming2020.booklikes.com/pos...
June 17, 2017
Very enjoyable.
January 22, 2021
This was my 2nd or 3rd time reading Steel Sleet. I found I still really like this book. I enjoyed the fast paced action and the world-building. We only get a taste of the state the colonies and earth are in, as this is not a very long book.
Two more books left in the series to reread. :)
Two more books left in the series to reread. :)
August 8, 2013
Nice piece of... sci-fi. I recently narrated this and had a great time doing so. I think having lived in New Orleans I found the dystopian hellscape easy to sink into and really understand the Undercity. Now living in NY, the Overcity and it's sanitized authoritarian brutality is easy to envision as well. The love scenes were well crafted and just explicit enough to be edgy and considering all the pursuit and running around Blackjaq and Nickerson were doing, they were mercifully sparse on details pertaining to scent. All in all a fun romp.
May 25, 2012
2.5 stars
Confusing and a bit hard to follow at the beginning but overall a nice sci-fi story. While there is sex involved I wouldn't call this one a romance, perhaps book two will have the romance factor in it. The answers to who/why Nickerson was being hunted just opened up more questions for me...
Confusing and a bit hard to follow at the beginning but overall a nice sci-fi story. While there is sex involved I wouldn't call this one a romance, perhaps book two will have the romance factor in it. The answers to who/why Nickerson was being hunted just opened up more questions for me...
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews