opposites attract

If you leave… #SnippetSunday #SnipSun #WeekendWritingWarriors #EroticRomance #RomCom #MFRWAuthors

November 12, 2023 by Adriana Kraft

Welcome to Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday, the weekly hop for everyone who loves to write – and read!
Click on the graphics to travel to the other snippets.

If you’re not signed up for the Secret Santa party, head on over and join the party Facebook Group – over 350 authors giving away books, swag, gift cards.

Join the party room so you’ll be all set: https://www.facebook.com/groups/DangerouslyDarkDarlings

BLURB

Home and Garden assistant manager Evie Strand has painstakingly embroidered a set of seven thongs as a gag gift for her best friend—only she brought the wrong box to the store Christmas party, and now Adam Grant from Automotive is holding them up for everyone to see: Kiss my…, Tight Fit—could things get any worse? Adam may seem like a total rake, but he can tell Evie’s deeply embarrassed, and he resolves to make it up to her. Who knew where a simple dinner date would lead?

EXCERPT

Continuing from last week at the store Christmas party, Adam’s still opening the gift Evie brought by mistake…

More hoots and hollers followed. The powder-blue Monday thong had been more shocking, probably because it was the first one Adam had held up, or maybe because it said “Don’t Dribble” across the front.

Evie pushed her chair back from the long banquet table where she sat with her fellow Grafton Department Store employees. Leslie grabbed her wrist. “Don’t let him get the best of you. Mistakes happen. At least half the people here think you did this on purpose to get the rake’s goat. If you leave, they’ll know you screwed up.”

Evie gulped and nodded at her department manager. She drew in a deep breath. “All right.”

REVIEWS

Five Stars at Amazon:

“A Gift for Adam is hilarious and a refreshingly new take on the old “opposites attract” formula. I have to admit that laughing until my eyes water and then immediately squirming in my seat from the “heat” of the next scene is a new experience for me…a powerfully good read… truly brilliant comedic rhythm and delivery.

This was an awesome fun and exciting book. A definite must read!

A hot Christmas read – “A Gift For Adam” by Adriana Kraft was one short sexy, funny with a lots of humor Christmas novel. Hard to put down

BOOK INFORMATION

Genre: Erotic Romance
Themes: Holiday, Gift Exchange, Opposites Attract, Comedy
ASIN‏ : ‎ B00RC2X77C
Publisher‏ : ‎ eXtasy Books
Publication date‏ : ‎ December 21, 2014
Length: 70 pages, 14,000 words

BUY LINK

Universal Buy Link

https://books2read.com/u/47gjK7

“Would you like a little help?” #MFRWSteam #EroticRomance #RomCom #HolidayStory

November 7, 2023 by Adriana Kraft

Welcome to the MFRW Steam Hop,
where the authors of Marketing for Romance Writers
entice you with steamy excerpts from their erotic romance stories.

Scroll to the end for more of this week’s tempting excerpts.

My daughter-in-law and my granddaughter have an ongoing argument about whether Christmas starts after Thanksgiving (DIL) or after Halloween (granddaughter). I’m in between – I love hearing Christmas music in November, but I’m not a fan of the decorations taking over the stores even before Halloween.

That being said, I have five Holiday stories in my back list, and if I don’t start now, I won’t get through them all before the holiday.

Speaking of which – If you’re not signed up for the Secret Santa party, head on over and join the party Facebook Group – over 350 authors giving away books, swag, gift cards.

Join the party room so you’ll be all set: https://www.facebook.com/groups/DangerouslyDarkDarlings

Today’s Steam is from A Gift for Adam

BLURB

EXCERPT

Toweling herself, Evie watched Adam doing the same, making no attempt to hide his rampant erection. “You seem to have awakened,” she teased. “I thought you were going to fall asleep in the tub a few minutes ago.”

“No chance. I was just resting my eyes wondering what you were planning for us once we got out.”

“Looks like he’s expecting more than going downstairs for dinner.”

Adam dropped the towel to the floor and encircled his cock. “He can be a hopeful fellow.”

Evie wet her lips as Adam skimmed his fingers over his length. “We wouldn’t want to disappoint the fellow.” She let her towel fall to the floor and backed up to sit on the foot of the bed. She delighted in watching his eyes follow her fingers as she toyed with her pussy. “This girl,” she explained, “will need a little attention first. A drawback of a hot tub is she gets a little dry.”

“Would you like a little help?” Adam asked, advancing toward her.

“Thought you might take the hint. A little tongue might help a lot.”

“Just any tongue will do?”

She glanced at his raised eyebrow. “Yours is the only available tongue in the room.”

“I should let you hang for that overwhelming vote of confidence, but we should have you dripping again in a moment or two.”

She lay back as he draped her legs over his shoulders and began to apply his tongue to her labia to achieve their joint goal. His tongue slithered up one side of her pussy and down the other.

Evie twisted her fingers in his hair as he separated her pussy lips and slid his tongue along her slit. She whimpered and flinched as he began probing her depths.

He paused. “I swear I believe we’re going to strike a sweet flow here.”

“You keep that up,” she moaned, “and I know you will. But I’m supposed to be doing you a favor.”

Adam paused again. “And you don’t think this is?”

He was back probing deep in her channel before she could come up with a response, and then she decided why bother? She reached for her clit and tapped her heels against his back.

His tongue dove in and out faster. Her fingers strummed her clit. One of his fingers tapped at her back door. “She’s coming,” she said through clenched teeth.

His muffled chuckles soon became lost in her crashing in on herself. She pulled away from him and curled into a ball. She lost awareness of Adam. He’d served his purpose.

Slowly, she regained awareness enough to know that from time to time he planted a kiss on her butt cheeks. She sighed and turned to crank an eye open to see a purely triumphant male ego. Maybe he did get as much out this as she did.

“No wildcatter ever hit a bigger gusher,” he said with pride.

She shook her head at him as she moved to kneel on her hands and knees. “I think I prefer being seen as a classic car rather than an oil well. It’s your turn.” She grinned and winked at his sudden intake of breath. She waggled her butt. “I do enjoy being submissive now and then.

REVIEWS

Five Stars at Amazon:

This was an awesome fun and exciting book. A definite must read!

A hot Christmas read – “A Gift For Adam” by Adriana Kraft was one short sexy, funny with a lots of humor Christmas novel. Hard to put down

BOOK INFORMATION

BUY LINK

Universal Buy Link

https://books2read.com/u/47gjK7

CLICK ON THE LINKS TO TRAVEL TO MORE STEAMY EXCERPTS

She might’ve gone over the top…#SnippetSunday #SnipSun #WeekendWritingWarriors #EroticRomance #RomCom #MFRWAuthors

November 5, 2023 by Adriana Kraft

Welcome to Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday, the weekly hop for everyone who loves to write – and read!
Click on the graphics to travel to the other snippets.

That being said, I have five Holiday stories in my back list, and if I don’t start now, I won’t get through them all before the holiday.

Speaking of which – If you’re not signed up for the Secret Santa party, head on over and join the party Facebook Group – over 350 authors giving away books, swag, gift cards.

Join the party room so you’ll be all set: https://www.facebook.com/groups/DangerouslyDarkDarlings

First in line is A Gift for Adam

BLURB

EXCERPT

How could Evie be such an idiot? She’d wrapped so many Christmas presents late last night, it had never occurred to her that the two packages looked so similar on the outside.

To her dismay, she’d drawn Adam Grant’s name for the annual gift exchange. She hadn’t given it much thought once she’d decided to give him a tie.

Evie blinked as he rummaged through his gift. “No,” she muttered softly, when he held up a second thong – this one, like the last, had hand-stitched lettering.

She should know; she’d painstakingly hand-lettered seven thongs for Christie, as a joke. She doubted Christie would actually wear any of them, but they’d each gone out of their way during the past six seasons to surprise each other with something that was outlandishly sexy. She had to admit this year.

Adam held high the pink Tuesday thong. He could hardly read it aloud for breaking up with laughter. “Tuesday: Wish you were…?” The question mark below the lettering left little room for confusion about the intent—it would nestle comfortably over the wearer’s mound.

REVIEWS

Five Stars at Amazon:

This was an awesome fun and exciting book. A definite must read!

A hot Christmas read – “A Gift For Adam” by Adriana Kraft was one short sexy, funny with a lots of humor Christmas novel. Hard to put down

BOOK INFORMATION

BUY LINK

Universal Buy Link

https://books2read.com/u/47gjK7

Blog Tour: A Case of Madness by Yvonne Knop @yvonne_ponk #ContemporaryGayRomance @gaybookpromo

April 18, 2023 by Adriana Kraft

BLOG TOUR

Book Title: A Case of Madness (Or the Curious Appearance of Holmes in the Nighttime)

Author: Yvonne Knop

Publisher: Improbable Press

Cover Artist: Ksenia Spizhevaya

Release Date: March 20, 2023

Genres: Adult Contemporary M/M Rom-Com

Tropes: Opposites attract, Emotional scars, Grumpy/sunshine

Themes: Coming out, friendship, mental illness, love

Heat Rating: 2 flames

Length: 82 000 words/272 pages

It is a standalone book and does not end on a cliffhanger.

Goodreads

Buy Links

Publisher | Amazon US | Amazon UK

A world-weary Sherlock Holmes scholar loses his job and his sanity when the great detective materializes in his flat to help solve a mystery that involves a handsome male stranger. What ensues is a thrilling adventure in literature, London, and love.

Blurb

Andrew Thomas just got sacked. He’s permanently drunk. He’s got cancer. Is inescapably gay. Was hit by a bus. And he’s fallen in love with a stranger whose life he saved.

As a newly-unemployed Sherlock Holmes scholar, Andrew knows only Holmes can help him untangle the madness his life has become, but Holmes isn’t real. Except he absolutely appeared in Andrew’s house, told him he’s in love with a man he just met…and then in a fit of pique Andrew sent him away.

Sure Holmes is probably a hallucination or a specter or a ghost, but now Andrew desperately needs his help. So to find the answer to his case and the man of his dreams, Andrew takes to chasing a fictional character through London with his very own Watson.

Excerpt

While strolling amid the students and scholars rushing into the University of London, I ignored the urge to check my pocket watch.

If there was ever a day to dawdle, it was today. The first day of summer that actually felt like the season it claimed to be. And the day of my personal disaster.

It wasn’t a ‘this train will split at the next station and you just sat down with your meal deal’ disaster, but it was equally inconvenient. After decades of laboring in academia, I was about to become involuntarily unemployed. Apart from that – and this might be even more important – I was also going to die.

To delay the confrontation a bit longer, I looked for a shaded place to smoke and then took long, luxurious drags on my cigarette. A cough struggled to tear itself free from my chest, but I suppressed it. Not now. Focus.

Few people knew my name or my publications. But some such people existed – people who were as fascinated by a very specific man as I was, and who seemed to value my works more than I did. The man I wrote about lived in Baker Street, and he was partly to blame for my situation. Though I liked to think of myself as a charmingly anachronistic gentleman, I increasingly felt I was just a dafter in a fine suit who lurked around public buildings. Instead of engaging in modern life, I was immersed in the world of Sherlock Holmes and all things Victorian, with the natural effect of many acquaintances leaving or going extinct. It wasn’t that I didn’t like the company of others; it was that I struggled in the company of others. And they struggled in the company of me.

You see, the fact that I knew my dearest detective had appeared on-screen in over two hundred and twenty adaptations did not give me much hope I would find out what people did for fun. But what of fun? What about achievement? Holmes is the most filmed novel character of all time – among humans, at least; Dracula has been filmed even more often. This connection filled me with joy, and I believed it could be combined in a curious way. Dracula Holmes: he investigates at night because he’s not just a detective, no – he’s also a vampire. Greedy for blood and knowledge.

I finished my cigarette and stepped from the shadows only to immediately collide with a young man in the most colorful trainers I’d ever seen. In a split-second knockout victory, he fell to the ground covered in the flyers he had been holding in his hand just seconds before.

I bent down immediately to help him. “I’m so sorry,” I said, quickly picking up his flyers from the pavement. At least those which hadn’t fallen into the grey puddle right next to us.

“It’s okay,” he said, and he looked at me. His blue eyes seemed friendly though his gaze was intense.

I quickly looked down again. To my surprise, the flyers weren’t gig announcements or takeaway adverts. In fact, they were promoting something very dear to my heart. “I like theater,” I said, handing him back a few of the flyers. “I thought theater was dead for young people.”

He smiled. “Most young people get run over by perfect strangers.

That’s why so few make it to the stage. Anyway…I’m still alive.”

That he was. Alive, handsome, and holding a slim stack of remaining flyers. Slightly crumpled.

“I’m far from perfect,” I remarked, thinking of the trouble I had caused him.

About the Author

Yvonne is a bi and nonbinary writer who dedicates their free time to extending the secret Gay Agenda – in part through their debut novel A Case of Madness.

Although born and raised in the north of Germany, Yvonne’s passion for Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Who, their sassy humor, and aversion to talking on public transport made them suspiciously British from early on.

As a natural matter of cause and effect, Yvonne moved to London in 2014 and started to write (a novel for the drawer). No word was written until 2017 when the sudden question of ‘What if I could talk to Sherlock Holmes?’ came up to them.

Conducting PhD research in the world’s most extensive Sherlock Holmes collection, located in Minneapolis, USA, was a great help for answering that question. The result was not a PhD, but their debut novel A Case of Madness, originally written in German and in a bold move translated by the author themselves when nobody in Germany understood a word they were saying.

Author Links

Blog/Website | Instagram | Twitter

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Release Blitz! Sweet as Pie, by Beth Bolden @beth_bolden #GayRomance #SmallTown #Giveaway

April 17, 2023 by Adriana Kraft

RELEASE BLITZ

Book Title: Sweet as Pie

Author and Publisher: Beth Bolden

Cover Artist: Morningstar Ashley Designs

Release Date: April 13, 2023

Genre: Contemporary MM romance

Tropes: Grumpy/sunshine, opposites attract, small town

Themes: Family responsibilities, necessary change, unexpected love

Heat Rating: 4 flames

Length: 80 000 words

It is a standalone story.

Goodreads

Buy Links – Kindle Unlimited

Universal Link | Amazon US | Amazon UK

Blurb

Luca Moretti is grumpy—and he wouldn’t have it any other way.

Wrangling six—Italian—siblings and the family’s restaurants would make anyone cranky. But when his mother requests that he save his aunt’s struggling Italian deli in charming, picturesque Indigo Bay, he has no idea that he’s about to overdose on sweetness.

Luca expected his aunt’s stubbornness—she’s a Moretti, isn’t she?—and his cousin’s resistance to actual work, but the last thing he expected is the absolute ball of sunshine known as Oliver Billings.

Oliver loves Indigo Bay. Loves owning his small artisan bakery, Sweetie Pie’s. Helps nice old ladies cross the street. Even volunteers for the local Sweethearts Festival.

Sweet isn’t really Luca’s style, or so he thinks. But when he discovers Oliver can be a little spicy too, his prickly exterior begins to crumble like a well-baked crust.

If Luca isn’t careful, he’s going to develop a taste for sweets—and a particular baker’s pie.

And one or two servings will never be enough.

Excerpt

“Ah, they sent the fixer out.” Oliver sounded amused again. “I can see it. You’re definitely more of a fixer than a baker.”

Luca shrugged. “I run my family’s four restaurants. They do not typically need fixing.” Don’t be arrogant, don’t be arrogant. “But Nonna’s Deli here, it is . . .an investment of ours. Not directly under my control. So I’m not here to order changes but to . . .suggest them. Nicely.”

“Which is how they’ve managed to underperform all these years,” Oliver said with another of those smirks. They shouldn’t have been so frustratingly attractive. But Luca felt them deep down, stirring him up in a way he hadn’t expected.

Oliver was definitely a very attractive package, one he’d love to unwrap.

Would he be as sweet as promised? Or a little salty too? Maybe even a bit spicy?

“You could say that,” Luca said. “Part of the proposed changes are aligning the menu more directly with our other restaurants. And that includes fresh bread, daily. Nonna’s here doesn’t have the staff, the resources, or the equipment to do this, but you do.”

“I do,” Oliver conceded. “My schedule’s already pretty packed, but I suppose I could fit you in. French bread? Sourdough bread? Focaccia? Rolls? Loaves? How many dozen per day?”

Luca liked every part of Oliver he’d seen so far. He was charming and sweet and undeniably adorable. Then there was how goddamned sexy he was when he got down to business.

“I’m not sure yet,” Luca said. “In fact, they may not need any at all. Giana and Enzo have my proposed changes, but they are not required to accept all of them—or any of them, actually.”

“You must hate that, not being able to actually impose your control over them.” Oliver said it casually, like a true control-freak business owner, like he understood.

How did Oliver know how much he hated it? Was it that obvious? Was it written all over his face that he’d love nothing more than to march down the street and tell Giana and Enzo exactly what to do?

“Yes,” Luca admitted.

“Nonna’s isn’t just an Italian affectation, is it? Was there actually a Nonna?” Oliver asked.

“My grandmother.”

“Ah, well, there you go.” Oliver leaned back, grinning. Luca wanted to chase him, but he stayed on his side of the table, with what he thought was pretty admirable restraint.

“So why does Enzo dislike you so much?” Luca asked.

“That’s a long story. And I’ve got to tend to these rolls. If they overproof . . .” Oliver shrugged. “I’m a perfectionist, what can I say?”

“If he supposedly turns against you every chance he gets, what’s he going to say,” Luca said, deploying the most persuasive smile in his arsenal, “when he finds out I want to hire you to bake our bread? I need the insider info. Need to be able to convince him it’s a good idea.”

“It’s not going to help you, and you’re not going to like it,” Oliver said. “Though, you sorta look like there’s plenty of things you don’t like.”

But I like you. “You’re not wrong.” It was hard to admit it, but there it was. He was particular, okay? Particular and more than a little arrogant about his particularity.

Maybe it was good Oliver knew that now, even if all they ever had was a date and a night—though even that was still up in the air.

“We dated,” Oliver said. His watch beeped, and he stood, just as he’d left Luca speechless for another long moment. “Well,” he amended, with a cute little shrug. “It was one date. But still. He wanted to continue. I did not. And that’s the story.”

“That wasn’t a very long story,” Luca managed, and was he trailing after Oliver in his own bakery like a lost puppy looking for his owner? Yes, he was, a little.

About the Author

A lifelong Pacific Northwester, Beth Bolden has just recently moved to North Carolina with her supportive husband. Beth still believes in Keeping Portland Weird, and intends to be just as weird in Raleigh.

Beth has been writing practically since she learned the alphabet. Unfortunately, her first foray into novel writing, titled Big Bear with Sparkly Earrings, wasn’t a bestseller, but hope springs eternal. She has published over forty novels and novellas.

Author Links

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