GUEST POST with GIVEAWAY: Drama Queen by Joe Cosentino
Drama Queen
by Joe Cosentino
A Nicky and Noah Mystery
Blurb
It could be curtains for college theatre professor Nicky Abbondanza. With dead bodies popping up all over campus, Nicky must use his drama skills to figure out who is playing the role of murderer before it is lights out for Nicky and his colleagues. Complicating matters is Nicky’s huge crush on Noah Oliver, a gorgeous assistant professor in his department, who may or may not be involved with a cocky graduate assistant…and is also the top suspect for the murders! You will be applauding and shouting Bravo for Joe Cosentino’s fast-paced, side-splittingly funny, edge-of-your-seat, delightfully entertaining novel. Curtain up!
Guest Post
A NEW GAY MYSTERY SERIES IN THE WACKY WORLD OF ACADEMIA
by Joe Cosentino
I’ve been a college theatre professor for over twenty years and a department head for ten years. Though I love my job, it requires an enormous amount of creativity, energy, and diplomacy. I have also met the most amazing students, faculty colleagues, staff, and administrators. It occurred to me one day that a college campus with its numerous buildings, around the clock access, and diverse personalities is the perfect place for a mystery series.
Mystery novels have always been my favorites, in particular those in a series that includes humor and romance. However, I was unable to find many gay mystery series along that line. So I decided to create my own. Since the mysteries I like are of the cozy variety, I set my series in the quaint, fictitious, New England college town of Treemeadow, named after its original founders, gay couple Tree and Meadow. Edwardian buildings, stone fireplaces, and hot chocolate are in abundance. At the center of the series is Nicky Abbondanza, Professor of Directing, and Noah Oliver, Professor of Acting. It’s up to Nicky and Noah to use their theatrical skills like role play to figure out whodunit and why. Complicating matters is the fact that in book one Noah is the top suspect. As Nicky and Noah embark on one hysterically funny escapade after the next, they fall in love with each other, and hopefully the readers fall in love with them.
In Drama Queen, Nicky and Noah have to uncover why college theatre professors are dropping like stage curtains while Nicky directs the college play production—a murder mystery. In Drama Muscle, Nicky and Noah have to find out why musclemen are dropping like weights in the Physical Education department while Nicky directs the Student Bodybuilding Competition. In Drama Cruise, Nicky and Noah go on a cruise to Alaska, and discover why college theatre professors are going overboard like lifeboats while Nicky directs a murder mystery dinner theatre show onboard ship.
I enjoy mysteries with strong clues, enticing red herrings, plot twists and turns, reversals, and a shocking yet earned and satisfying ending. The characters I enjoy are larger than life, witty, and loveable with healthy sex lives. Plots need to move quickly, and the unexpected is always welcome. So my mystery series incorporates all of those things.
I hope everyone will welcome Nicky and Noah into their libraries and into their hearts. There’s nothing better than a good laugh, a tantalizing romance, and a clever mystery.
Excerpt
With the student actors and technicians sitting in the front of the theatre (obliviously texting on their phones), my student stage manager, SuCho, screamed for everyone’s attention, and for me to come to the front of the theatre house to give them my notes. This thankfully sent David off to his office in a huff.
After I had given my first few notes, I noticed Noah Oliver standing in the back of the theatre. Noah is tall and lean with curly blond hair, blue eyes, and the sweetest smile I have ever wanted to kiss in an Assistant Professor. While I teach Theatre History and Play Directing, Noah is our department’s specialist in Acting, and for good reason. Noah is a terrific actor, a creative and passionate teacher, and a wonderful colleague. More importantly, I have had a crush on him since the moment he made his entrance into our humble campus three years ago. Noah is single, gay, and seems to really like me. Why don’t I ask him out? Noah is twenty-eight years young. As a junior professor in my department in need of my vote for tenure this year, if I make a pass at him it could be considered attempted coercion on my part.
It was difficult for me to concentrate on giving my notes to the students since Scotty Bruno, my graduate assistant and Assistant Director of the play, was talking, laughing, and obviously flirting with Noah in the rear of the theatre. I had reason to be concerned. Scotty has bleached blond hair, contact lens turquoise eyes, ultra-white bonded teeth, and muscles as if sculpted by Michelangelo, housed in multi-colored, stuffed shorts and tank top (in winter) that were not unnoticed by Noah. Unless I was becoming nearsighted, I could have sworn that Scotty whispered something into Noah’s ear then handed Noah a box. What the heck is in it? Love letters? Condoms? My heart on a silver platter?
Buy Links
Lethe press: Paperback
Smashwords (ebook)
Amazon (Kindle eBook)
Giveaway
Post a comment below about why you love mysteries. One lucky reader who leaves a comment, will be randomly chosen to receive a free copy of Joe’s February hit release ebook novella, AN INFATUATION.
Entries close 22nd June.
About the Author
Joe Cosentino is the author of An Infatuation (Dreamspinner Press), Paper Doll the first Jana Lane mystery (Whiskey Creek Press), and The Nutcracker and the Mouse King (Eldridge Plays and Musicals). He has appeared in principal acting roles in film, television, and theatre, opposite stars such as Bruce Willis, Rosie O’Donnell, Nathan Lane, Holland Taylor, and Jason Robards. His one-act plays, Infatuation and Neighbor, were performed in New York City. He wrote The Perils of Pauline educational film (Prentice Hall Publishers). Joe is currently Head of the Department/Professor at a college in upstate New York, and is happily married. His upcoming novels areDrama Muscle the second Nicky and Noah mystery (Lethe Press), A Shooting Star (Dreamspinner Press novella),A Home for the Holidays (Dreamspinner Press holiday novella), and Porcelain Doll the second Jana Lane mystery.
Where to find Joe
Web site: http://www.JoeCosentino.weebly.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/JoeCosentinoauthor
Twitter: https://twitter.com/JoeCosen
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4071647.Joe_Cosentino