Orc Cowboy Romance

Tusks and Saddles is, in all the best ways, like the love child of a Dungeons and Dragons campaign, a Western romance and the movie Tremors.

It is two novellas about a couple of orc brothers, one a paladin and one a cleric, finding love with strong, take-no-prisoners women in the frontier town of Irongarde.

Lizzie Strong's part of the story follows Boone, the paladin orc, as he fills in for his best friend on a cattle drive. He's been in love with Willamina, his friend's older sister, for ages. And dodging rustlers and terrifying sand slithers while keeping 500 head of angry moo alive certainly has a way of bringing people together. Boone is the steadfast and loyal presence that the fiery, stubborn Will needs in her life.

Azalea Crowley's part of the story follows Welborn, the younger of the orc brothers. He's been tasked with going to Irongarde to help open the new temple to the god he worships. But when he gets there he finds out that the High Cleric in charge of the new temple has gone missing. He gets the help of the enigmatic and tough-as-nails Beatrix Eaves, a gunslinger to find the High Cleric, because Miss Eaves can't in good conscience let the naive cleric wander off into the wastes on his own.

Welborn is written as autistic and seems to be on the asexual spectrum, because he's never experienced attraction to another being before he meets Miss Eaves. Their romance is pretty fast burn, but it works well for the characters and with the pace of the story.

Tusks and Saddles was a lot of fun to read and the epilogue where the brothers finally reunite is perfect. I really enjoyed advance reading it and I hope there are more collaborations between the authors in the future.

Alien Reality TV

Alien Jeopardy is a hilarious sci-fi rom-com. This funny, spicy story centers around an earth woman, Ellison, and an alien, Ka-Rexsh.

Prior to the events of the story, earth is taken over by a race of aliens called the Roth. But even though there was a brutal invasion, once things settle down, life goes on as normally as it can afterwards. Ellison is stuck in a dead-end, terminally boring office job. After a particularly mind-numbing day, Ell and her friends gather at Ell's house for drinking, snacking and a sleepover. Before the night is over Ell finds herself (and her friends) being abducted to participate in an intergalactic reality show. Because of course the thing that aliens like best about earth culture is reality TV. 🤣

Ell is partnered with the winged and horned Ka-Rexsh in a competition called Mated and Afraid. The show is part dating show and part survival contest and the winners will be set up with a cushy new life on a colony planet. To survive (and hopefully win) Ell and Rex have to fight terrifying alien creatures, battle rugged terrain and complete various challenges all while fighting mating urges that keep growing stronger the more time they spend together.

Language and culture differences lead to some amusing misunderstandings (like Earth idioms not translating properly, causing much confusion) and halfway through the competition a plot twist throws all the rules out the metaphorical window.

If you like fast burn romance, doting, protective MMCs, FMCs who find themselves to be stronger than they believed and forced proximity, Alien Jeopardy delivers on all counts.

If Men In Black were a Rom-Com

Last year I read my first Mallory Marlowe book: Love and Other Conspiracies. I loved it so I jumped at the chance to advance read her upcoming book. I didn't think it was possible, but I love Love at First Sighting even more than Love and Other Conspiracies!

Love at First Sighting is like if Men in Black were a rom-com instead of an action comedy. El is an influencer who gets her very own Man in Black doing a bit of if government sanctioned stalking after she has a close encounter while out taking photos for her next promotion.

The Man In Black in question is Carter, who specifically requested the assignment because El's close encounter mirrors one he had 15 years prior.

El and Carter soon find themselves uncovering a real conspiracy while falling in love and discovering who they really want to be outside of government agency and influencer jobs.

I love how El was shown to be so much smarter than her curated influencer image. And Carter was a total cinnamon roll, who always wanted to see the best in everyone, whether they deserved it or not.

So if you love rom-coms, unexplained aerial phenomena, and Men in Black, give Love at First Sighting a chance when it releases on August 12, 2025.

A Dark Fae King Walks into a Small Town...

That's not a joke. It's the beginning of an adorably cozy and spicy story that hits all the right notes. Cozy romantasy? With a morally gray shadow daddy MMC? And a kind competent FMC? Yes please!

Hannah is the mayor of a small town that is slowly dying. She also recently found out that she's a witch, but can't figure out what her magic is.

Then Severin, king of the shadow fae and a former bad guy (now in his redemption era), shows up one day promising Hannah that he will help her bring businesses and tourism back to her town as well as protect it. All she has to do is marry him for a year and agree to let the shadow fae stay in earth. Oh, and win the fae bride contest.

Their romance, though starting out as fake, quickly becomes more and more real, with Severin realizing that for the first time in his life he is caring for someone other than himself and Hannah seeing the good man that has been hidden for years under the mask of terrifying warlord.

If you love:
-shadow daddy fae
-competent and kind FMCs
-magic lessons
-cozy small towns
-smallfae hijinks
-adorable fox familiars
-grand gestures
then you will adore Faking with the Fae King.

Love Is a War Song

This is the first NetGalley ARC I have received that made me shout with joy when I got the acceptance email.

It's purely coincidental that I am reviewing Love is a War Song so soon after that absolutely vile/heinous anti-Indigenous tweet was posted by a certain far-right talking head (I started reading it the day before that wretched woman tweeted).

Now, back to the good stuff.

Avery Fox is a former child star-turned-rising pop star whose career is imploding due to taking bad career advice. Her Muskogee heritage is being questioned and online denizens are lobbing threats her way, so her mother/manager's solution is to ship her off to her estranged grandmother's failing horse ranch in Oklahoma and to wait for everything to blow over.

Floundering in unfamiliar surroundings, Avery eventually convinces the ranch hand Logan to teach her what it means to be Muskogee, because Averey's mother never taught her anything at all about her heritage. Avery finds herself falling in love with her new found family, her new community and with Logan.

All too soon Avery is faced with a difficult choice: will she go back to her old life as a vapid pop star now that the storm of bad press has passed or will she fully embrace her new life in Oklahoma?

I usually don't gravitate towards cowboy/small-town romances because I have known far too many problematic cowboys/small-town residents IRL, but I am so glad I read this one. Viewing a small-town through the eyes of an Indigenous author made me remeber all the things I really did love and miss about growing up in a small, close-knit community. And that's as big a part of this story as the romance is: Avery learning about and becoming a part of a community that she had been deprived of her whole life.

Ruthless Devotion

"...his soul and mine were cut from the same shimmering fabric, hewn from the same rock, dipped from the same pool. Wherever souls come from, we share the same source. I am Heathcliff, and he is me. Anger and arguments, terror and tragedy, chaos and pain — none of that will change what we are to each other."

Ruthless Devotion is the 3rd installment in the Gilded Monsters series by Rebecca Kenney. It's her southern gothic take on Wuthering Heights and takes place a short while after the events in Charming Devil. She takes the dangerous, obsessive love between Cathy and Heathcliff and gives it a happier ending.

Cathy has never felt like she belonged in her insular, cultish South Carolina community. Her banshee heritage has made her a pariah, a threat to everything her community has stood for. Nobody understands her until he shows up: Heathcliff, brooding, powerful, tempting.

Rebecca Kenney really ups the dark Southern Gothic vibes of the Gilded Monsters series in Ruthless Devotion. Horrific monsters of myth are deftly woven together with insular communities, tortured souls and desperate romance to create a completely captivating tale.

Laugh Out Loud Sapphic Novella

Have you ever read a story so perfect yet so ridiculous you just want to kick your feet and giggle? No? Do you want to? If so, have I got the book for you!

A F*ckery of Fae and Fate by AJ Braun is a such a fun novella. Rhema is a grumpy lesbian bounty hunter. Her latest job is to rescue a princess who has been kidnapped by the fae. With her trusty (singing and butter obsessed) dragon companion Benny, Rhema crashes the wedding of the princess and her kidnapper. A quick round of axe-swinging Hulk-smashery and the damsel is rescued. But before Rhema and Benny safely deliver the princess back home, they have to figure out WHY so many fae men are obsessed with the princess and why they're all claiming she's their fated mate!

It is a gloiously hilarious romp, reminiscent of a bonkers (and hella queer) Dungeons and Dragons campaign, with a pinch of Monty Python absurdity and Princess Bride-esque humor sprinkled in. Benny the dragon steals the show, singing butter inspired tunes as he BBQs the dumb-as-rocks, and violently horny fae men trying to re-kidnap the princess.

If you love chaotic adventures, LGBTQ+ rep, hilarious banter, and are deeply curious about why exactly fae men are always sooooooo much older than their fated mates, this is the perfect novella!

Benny and Rhema crashing the wedding by flavulousart on IG