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Weekly Spotlight
November 24, 2023
Sven Kolczynski
25, Polish, amateur car thief… and apparently unkillable.
Being a hero can be painful and seriously hazardous to your health. What can I say? I’m not a smart man. It’s been two weeks since I started following the brown-haired, cheery little puppy. There’s nothing special about the guy. He’s a mechanic, hangs out with a bunch of scary-looking dudes, and never seems to stop smiling. Like seriously, how can one man be so happy all of the time? Okay, fine, the guy is kind of cute, and that smile can make a man weak in his knees. But tell me, is a cute face really worth becoming someone’s next target? Not to mention, this dude's creepy brother keeps threatening to dismember me if I do anything to hurt his little brother. Like, seriously. What’s wrong with this family?
Oliver O’Maley
29, mechanic, and little brother to Patrick, the crew’s… “information extractor”, which is also a nice way of saying, “scary dude who will unalive you if you don’t do as he says”.
Arg. Who knew that having Patrick as a big brother was going to result in me having to live my life in a protective bubble? Seriously! Everyone on the Crew treats me like their kid brother and won't let me do anything even remotely dangerous! All I want is a chance to prove myself. A chance to show the guys that I’m more than just Paddy’s little brother. All that changes when some big Polish dude saves my life. Now, suddenly, we are both being hunted. I’m having to fight off assassins in the dark and make sure that nothing happens to my would-be protector or family. That includes stopping my overprotective big brother from murdering the rest of the world in retaliation. We’re a close family. We take things personally.
This is an MM dark romance filled with plenty of heat, steam, violence, and mayhem.
Highlighted Authors
From the Ashes
by Denver Shaw
Can true love rise from the ashes of heartbreak?
Myles
After suffering the tragic loss of my wife, my lone goal was to raise our son to be a man she would be proud of.
Romance was the furthest thing from my mind, and unfortunately cooking was not on my mind either.
When Christmas dinner goes up in flames, a firefighter who looks like he stepped right off a calendar bursts through my door and all my priorities change in an instant.
New feelings emerge as I find myself attracted to a man for the first time.
But Tristan is a much younger man who thrives on no-strings-attached hook-ups.
How can I risk my heart, and my son’s, by bringing someone into our lives knowing he's going to leave?
Tristan
I don't believe in labels, or denying myself sexual pleasure with a consenting partner, regardless of gender.
Want to hook up with a hot firefighter?
I’m your guy.
But relationships aren't my thing… until a fateful Christmas Day fire brings Myles into my life.
I thought I could ease the widower into the dating scene and guide him through his bi-awakening.
Yet as soon as I see him dating other guys I realize this is no fling.
I want him all to myself.
The Hitman's Guide to
Codenames and I'll-Gotten Gains
by Alice Winters
Leland
Stopping a robbery was only the beginning—to fun, action-filled mayhem. Jackson’s afraid that I’m running headfirst into trouble (again), but I’m not… I’m running gun-first into it. When one of the robbers who’s really just a kid comes begging for my help, I definitely have no choice but to help him.
The kid is convinced his brother has been wrongly accused, and while Jackson My Love might be over there going, “You were hired to look into it, not to go undercover, sink a boat, and hunt down a gang,” I feel like he’s simply confused… because I’m gonna hunt down TWO gangs (and is that a car chase I see?).
Jackson
A simple “Whodunnit” turns into us being targeted by multiple bad guys as we run after them instead of away from them, dragging Cassel and Henry—and some others—along for the ride. I really can’t be the only one who sees the issue here, but… as I watch them race into danger, I’m starting to think I am.
Loving Leland comes easy, but keeping him safe doesn’t because there’s someone trailing Leland who might want to hurt him. The problem is that as Lucas strings us along and tales begin to become tangled, it’s hard to tell who is right and who is wrong.
Contains: Lifejackets used to protect all the wrong things (Leland: all the RIGHT things), the greatest tragedy of ALL TIME (involving The Fence)(even if Jackson doesn’t think so), and the kind of friends that make you realize you don’t need enemies.
Freefall
by Roe Horvat
When his parents try to coerce him into a marriage with an obnoxious, snobbish alpha, Ansel escapes to his granddad’s off-grid cabin. There he can gather the courage to make some tough decisions. After an unusually stormy night, Ansel ventures out to investigate the damage, and finds…a dragon. An actual, live dragon that crashed into the forest. Ansel fully expects to become the beast’s breakfast. Instead, the creature politely greets him before transforming into a naked man and inviting himself over for tea.
At almost forty, Pascal would like to think he’s not reckless anymore. But when he goes flying without checking the weather first, crashes during a storm, dislocates a shoulder, sprains a wing, and lets a human see him in dragon form, he realizes he’s made a colossal mess. To top it off, his dragon-side decides that the little omega must be his mate. A nineteen-year-old sophomore! It’s pure luck that Ansel doesn’t study at the college where Pascal teaches, or he wouldn’t be allowed to even look at him.
A young dragon mate before his first heat is a fragile being, and Pascal needs to tread carefully. Overbearing parents and an evil ex are going to be the least of his problems.
Freefall is the third book in the Dragons of Ardaine series. The slow-burn age-gap romance features a protective dragon shifter, his sweet mate, and a satisfying HEA.
Defending Freedom
by T.S. Ankney
Two stubborn men. One crazed killer. Zero chance of smooth sailing ahead.
Eternal optimist and ex-SEAL Makani Reed started Guardian Alliance to help train civilians to survive dangerous situations.
Ambitious, cynical podcaster Freedom Lopez becomes a client at Guardian Alliance to search for his next hot story. The two butt heads from the start, yet as training progresses these polar opposites give in their undeniable attraction.
But when a series of questionable deaths points investigators to Mak’s security firm, the two must set their differences aside and work together to find the real killer before it’s too late…
Just a Bit Captivated
by Alessandra Hazzard
A toy for a sheikh.
That's who Aiden Gates is: a straight guy sold to one of the richest men in the world.
What he isn't is besotted with the cold-hearted, cynical bastard who bought him like a thing.
Aiden hates that man. Utterly abhors him.
But before long, Aiden's obsessive hatred starts turning into an obsession, pure and simple--and then into something far worse.
Wanting that bastard is bad enough.
Needing him is sickening.
His feelings aren't real. He's a pretty bird in a gilded cage. A dirty little secret.
But when the cage is eventually broken, can he learn to live without it? Without him?
This book contains steamy MM content, dubious consent, power imbalance, internalized homophobia, two men absolutely obsessed with each other--and a happily ever after. Book 14 in the Straight Guys series, but it can be read as a standalone.
Ball Boy
by Raquel Riley
There’s no crying in baseball, unless you want the one thing you can’t have… your coach.
~Austin Healey
It all started with a kinky video about a baseball player and his coach. A coach who happened to look just like mine. Now, I can’t get Coach Wolfe off my mind. He’s all I can think about.
Teaching me, touching me, praising me for being the good boy I am. Unfortunately, he won’t do any of those things, not as long as I’m his student.
But I’m eighteen and about to graduate.
~Marcus Wolfe
I would love to have a boy of my own again. A boy who is honest, loyal, obedient, and generous. A boy just like… Austin, who happens to be too young, and completely off-limits. But Austin doesn’t understand limits. He is determined to make a conquest of me. My defenses are wearing thin.
I’m only a man, and a man can only take so much.
Ball Boy is an MM baseball sports romance with an age gap, power imbalance, and praise kink. This coach/student pairing can be read as a standalone but contains characters from the already published Family Sins Duet.
Planes, Trains, and Hurricanes
by Eli Easton
Joe knows where he is going in life. But one crazy road trip just might change everything.
Joe Blankenship knows where he’s going. He’s on track to marry the boss’s daughter and become heir apparent to a multi-million dollar medical supply business. The financial security he never had growing up is within his grasp along with a glitzy Manhattan lifestyle. All he has to do is get to New York by Christmas Eve for his engagement party.
Joe didn’t count on getting grounded in Florida thanks to a hurricane. He couldn’t have anticipated having to rent a broken-down car for the long drive north. And he certainly never foresaw being stuck with a passenger like Remy Guidry, a sweet-natured Cajun boy, social worker at a children’s home, and free spirit. Remy is the opposite of everything Joe has worked for. But he just might teach Joe, not only the spirit of Christmas, but what’s truly of value in life.
Planes, Trains, and Hurricanes is a Christmas road trip, forced proximity, opposites attract romance.
Perfectly Normal
by Zachary Steele
For sixteen-year-old Nate Alexander, music is more than sound. It's a symphony of color, vibrant and beautiful, a blessing and a curse. For all that he may love about living with Chromesthesia, however, the added weight of undiagnosed autism clutters his life daily, turning school into a trial of his oddness, social encounters into a jumble of confusion, and leaving him on uneven footing with a father determined to make him more "normal."
The arrival of Julian Mack, an openly gay new student quickly gaining the attention of bullies, draws Nate into a friendship that tests the limits of what he can endure. Absorbed by the need to please Julian, Nate is quickly at odds with his best friend Michelle and her efforts to protect him. As Nate struggles to find what meaning music has in his life, rumors about him swirl around school, leaving him to decide between defending Julian and his reputation or the safety and comfort of his haven of music and color.
Written with deep sensitivity and the rare ability to bring the little-understood to life, Perfectly Normal is a resounding work of fiction that might bring new color to your world.
Turkeys
by Lucy Lennox and May Archer
Hunter Jackson’s Sage Advice for a Happy Thanksgiving
When your turkey-thieving, town-abandoning, former childhood friend reappears in Licking Thicket after fifteen long years, looking like a snack and smelling like all your favorite treats put together, it might be tempting to, well, dig in.
Don’t.
And when your plan to teach the man a lesson goes spectacularly awry, becoming less of a wattle-wearing walk of shame around the Thicket’s Thanksgiving festival and more of a sexy turkey-twerk in a skin-tight bird costume featuring the hottest pair of drumsticks the town’s ever seen, you might think it’s time to get over your feud and, well, take a bite.
Resist.
But when Charlton Nutter finally shows you the sweet, pure heart he’s hiding under all his fine, big-city feathers, and you realize, thanks to the town’s meddling matchmakers, that the man is hungry for the kind of love and belonging that only the Thicket can provide, you might decide that both of you have been acting like a pair of turkeys, and in that case you should…
Gobble. Him. Up.
Eight Dates
by EM Lindsey
With a brother like this, who needs enemies?
Ben Weiss is perfectly fine on his own, thank you very much. After his last failed relationship, he doesn’t need the drama. But his brother has decided to play matchmaker this year and has set him up with eight blind dates, one for each night of Chanukah.
And with eight in a row, there has to be one decent guy in the lot…right?
With Ben’s luck, apparently not. From a date that bites, to one rude to the server, to the guy who brought along his mom, every single one has been a nightmare. Ben’s ready to give up on love for good, adopt a cat, and call it a day.
But there’s one bright light in Ben’s week he hasn’t expected in the form of Nova, the adorable, kind-hearted bartender who’s come to his rescue every time a date has gone wrong. And while Ben’s not sure he believes in holiday miracles, he’s starting to think that each bad date has brought him closer to the happily ever after he was always meant to have.
Can someone fall in love in eight nights? In Ben’s case, during a wild string of bad luck, the answer might still be yes.
Eight Dates is a stand-alone friends to lovers, swoony, spicy holiday romance featuring terrible blind dates, rooftop espionage, the merits of fine hot chocolate and crispy latkes, and finding love where you least expect it.
Cute as Cats
by Suki Fleet
Meet-cute in a cat cafe, but oh no! there's a storm and they're trapped together...
Zu has spent his life wishing he wasn’t so big and awkward and always making a mess of things. When he gets stood up by his date at a cat café one rainy Christmas eve, it turns out to be the best thing that could have happened to him. He finds himself exchanging flirty glances with Kiitan, the café’s slender pudding chef. But when they start to talk, Kiitan tells Zu he’s deaf and Zu’s shyness get the better of him, and his worry about messing up makes him do just that.
Gathering his courage, Zu vows to wait until the end of Kiitan’s shift to make it up to him. But as the streets around the café start to flood, the café closes early to make sure everyone can get home, and Zu thinks his chance is gone. Until he sees Kiitan is staying behind to protect the café’s cats. Ignoring all the ways things could go wrong, Zu does the only thing that feels right—he takes a chance and offers to help him.
This contemporary Christmas short story has gay, pansexual, disability rep and a HEA.
An earlier version of this story was available as part of the Rainbow Christmas Advent in 2022. This is an extended and updated version of that story.
Only for the Holidays
by Shannon O'Connor
Lynn:
Going home for the holidays is the last thing I wanted.
Wasn’t I old enough to stay home, watch Netflix and eat those snowman sugar cookies raw?
So I lied to my parents, thinking they’d never know the truth.
I was staying home to visit with my girlfriend’s family, it was foolproof right?
Until they show up on my doorstep with every intention of meeting the girlfriend that doesn’t exist.
Sophie:
My family means well, I know they do.
But I’m tired of trying to be set up by my parents.
This holiday season the last thing I want to do is go on another blind date with a man my parents set me up with.
So when my friend with benefits jokes about pretending to date for the holidays,
To keep our parents at bay, it seems like the perfect plan.
Until we start to blur the lines between mistletoe kisses and something real.
Will we become something more or will our fling be just for the holidays?
Featured Authors
Boys on a Train
by Amy Coomer
Despite the distance that divides them, fate sees these two sharing more than just a train to school.
Set against the concrete jungle of Brisbane, Australia, we follow 17-year-old Eddie as he navigates his final years at Greenview High, and the coming of age he always feared was coming.