The usual suspects are all present: cowboys, outlaws, and sheriffs. There’s plenty of dust, tumbleweeds, horses, and cattle on the range, but there are also magical gems, automatons, elementals, airships… even dinosaurs and genetically modified insects. Roaming among the buffalo and coyotes, you’ll encounter skinwalkers, mad engineers, mythical beings cloaked in darkness, and lovers who stay true to their oaths… even beyond the grave. On this frontier are those at the mercy of their own elaborate devices as well as men whose control of time and space provides a present-day vision of the West. There might even be a dragon hidden amongst the ghost towns and wagon trains.If you like your Westerns with a splash of magic, a touch of steampunk, and plenty of passionate romance between men, these genre-bending tales will exceed expectations. Hold on to your hats, cowboys and cowgirls. The West is about to get weird, and you’re in for a hell of a ride.

    Lost, alone, battered, and broken Shelby finds comfort in the local bar called Deacon’s Place. Week after week, he finds himself drawn to Deacon’s for the beer, for the atmosphere, for the solace and for Deacon himself. Deacon can no longer deny the desire he feels for the man he calls Thursday. When Deacon wants something Deacon is a hard man to resist. The problem is, Deacon never planned to lose his heart. Especially to a man who could be destroyed by an unexpected night of forbidden passion.

    But sadly, Killian walks away. He doesn't do physics professors. In fact, he doesn't do humans, because Killian is the most powerful male witch in 10 generations and, though gay, he's expected to save his declining race by reproducing.He can't even have sex with Blaine, because he's been taught that sex with humans depletes his power. But if that's true, why can young human, Jimmy Janx, dissolve spoons with a thought? Somebody's a lying witch.With his powerful cat familiar, Aloysius, on his shoulder, Killian brings the lightning against deceit and greed to save Blaine from danger and prove love is the greatest power of them all.

    Especially not his mouthwatering roommate, Shannon. When their ride share drives off the side of a mountain, the two young men find themselves deep in an uninhabited forest searching for their missing friend. Wandering the famously cursed grounds of Dudleytown, Alex figures something truly unholy must be at play, because only insanity could tempt him to break his cardinal rule.

    It is the first in a series of gothic m/m romance anthologies called gothika. The stories in this volume are:Made For Aaron by Sue BrownAs a teenager, Aaron Fox was sent to an asylum by his parents because he was gay, leaving him emotionally fragile after the treatment. However it gave him Damon Fox, the nurse he later married. For over twenty years, Damon’s devotion and strength has never faltered. When Damon is killed in a car accident, Aaron’s devastation soon gives way to confusion when he is shown Damon walking away from the hospital. Despite a desperate search, Damon isn’t seen again, and if Aaron can’t live with Damon, he may not want to live at all. But forces beyond Aaron’s understanding work behind the scenes, and if he can find the courage to unveil the secrets, he might get a second chance at happiness.Watchworks by Jamie FessendenHarland Wallace made his name as one of the premiere watchmakers in Victorian London, so he isn’t surprised when a handsome young gentleman named Luke Prescott comes to his townhouse to hire him for a repair job. He is apprehensive when he discovers it is not a watch Mr. Prescott wants repaired, but a complex prosthesis he has in place of a hand.As further repairs are needed, Harland begins to wonder how much of Mr. Prescott is real and how much is mechanical, but he cannot deny the growing attraction he feels toward him. When he learns Prescott’s household servants pose a threat to the man they see as a monster, Harland must choose between what his culture tells him is wrong and what his heart tells him is right.The Golem of Mala Lubovnya by Kim FieldingIn a small, 17th-century Eastern European town, a rabbi creates a man of clay—a golem—to protect the Jewish people from the threat of pogrom. Awaiting a call to duty, the golem spends a long time confined to an attic, lonely and sad. His only joys are watching the stonemason at work across the street and listening to a lovely voice singing prayers. When the golem meets the mason, Jakob, the two become friends, and Jakob names the golem Emet. But devout Jakob struggles with his attraction to Emet, and Emet dreads being used as an instrument for violence. Though Emet’s name means truth, honest love between a faithful man and a golem will only survive if they risk everything for a miracle.Reparation by Eli EastonOn the harsh planet of Kalan, weakness is not tolerated. When young spore farmer Edward suffers an carriage accident that kills his mail-order bride and his factory manager, Edward has little chance of survival, until Knox—an enormous “reconstitute” labor slave—plucks him from disaster. Recons are part machine, part human remains from executed Federation prisoners. But Knox is different from other recons. He can read and has flashes of brilliance. With no one else to rely on over the bleak winter, Edward forms an alliance with Knox, and against social taboos, they become friends. Edward struggles against his growing lust for the large humanoid, and while Knox thrives in his new life, memories of his past torment him.A twist of fate brought Knox and Edward together, but there will be a price to pay in blood when they learn how deeply their lives truly intersect.

     A noted scholar of ancient literature and spellcraft, Lord Ashcroft "Andrea" de Bourbon, finds his world shaken when the new science of mechanical animation becomes the talk of high society. In response, Andrea takes to the presses gaining notoriety for his scathing critiques of mechanical animation and its founder the Marquis de la Marche. Then one night Andrea comes face to face with the Marquis de la Marche and discovers he is nothing like Andrea expected. Leon Gregory de la Marche VI, Marquis de la Marche is handsome, brilliant, and charming. While their clashes on paper have become legendary in person they are even more explosive. As passions rise Andrea knows there is no backing down ...

    It was supposed to be a routine inspection, after all. Surely he can find a way to use it to his advantage, right? With a little ingenuity and a lot of help from friends, he strives to reassure his wolf shifter beloved and offer him the perfect Christmas present.

    Along with the half dozen or so novels he's started, only to abandon mid-way through, his love life could be best described as a series of drive-bys. Boone has spent the past week staying at a ski lodge in the tiny mountain town of Summit City. He's been using his time alone to write while waiting for his boyfriend to join him for their anniversary. What happens to Boone when he winds up dumped on the eve of his one-year anniversary and ends up at a bar having one too many cocktails? Wade Walker.previously published in the anthology Melting the Slopes

    It’s not life in the fast lane, but he takes it very seriously, and his first missing-child case is eating him alive. When his own boss sends in a psychic to help with the case, he’s gutted – he’s a level-headed copper who doesn’t believe in such things, and he can’t help but think that the arrival of clairvoyant Lee Tyack is a comment on his failure to find the little girl. But Lee is hard to hate, no matter how Gideon tries. At first Lee’s insights into the case make no sense, but he seems to have a window straight into Gideon’s heart. Son of a Methodist minister, raised in a tiny Cornish village, Gideon has hidden his sexuality for years. It’s cost him one lover, and he can’t believe it when this green-eyed newcomer stirs up old feelings and starts to exert a powerful force of attraction. Gideon and Lee begin to work together on the case. But there are malignant forces at work in the sleepy little village of Dark, and not only human ones – Gideon is starting to wonder, against all common sense, if there might be some truth in the terrifying legend of the Bodmin Beast after all. As a misty Halloween night consumes the moor, Gideon must race against time to save not only the lost child but the man who’s begun to restore his faith in his own heart.

    But in the ten years since graduation, their contact has dwindled to nothing, and it’s all Keith’s fault. If he hadn’t tried to kiss Parker under the mistletoe at the winter formal their senior year, Parker wouldn’t have bolted. At their ten-year reunion, Keith intends to do everything in his geeky power to make amends.Parker should have known that scheduling the reunion the day before Christmas Eve was a recipe for a headache of monster proportions. But when Keith sends a text that he’ll be attending, the evening doesn’t look so bleak. Can an unnecessary makeover, a nostalgic breakfast, an abortive shopping trip, and a whole lot of mistletoe culminate in a long-overdue first kiss?

    Things get worse when his high school bully, captain of the football team and meathead extraordinaire, Ric Saunders, shows up for an appointment at the chiropractic clinic where Alex works. Things go from bad to worse in a comedy of errors that leaves Alex's head spinning. Has Ric turned into a crazed stalker, ready to pick up the bullying where he left off eight years before? Or has Ric got something else in mind this time?

    He’s got this.Christmas wishes do come true with a little magic, after all.Tags:Tropey tropes a lot, fated mates, dragon shifters, mages on a quest, because North’s finding a dragon, that’s happening, European road trip at Christmas, found family, true acceptance, twinks and makeup, shopping montage, steamy makeout session, because dragon fire, get it?, someone needs to fire the author, winter snuggles, poor Gunter had to put up with them, licking, not mpreg

    Lloyd loves to make them. Wesley loves to break them. What happens when their roles are reversed? Find out in this rule-bending romp! * ~ * ~ * Gemini Rules Capricorn is a 4000 word sexy short story following Signs of Love #3 Complimentary copy available on the author's site.

    All he has to do is convince the dragon to give up one of his magical scales. Lies, deception, seduction—nothing is off-limits. It should be easy. But it isn’t. Especially not when said dragon is so alluring in human form. It’s not long before Deven starts to want something way more valuable than a scale from his beautiful beast. But how do you convince a dragon to give you his heart when your entire relationship was built on deceit?Fiora is cursed. Love can kill him. Literally kill him. So keeping his mind (and hands) off the devilishly handsome Deven shouldn’t be a challenge. But it is. Deven’s entirely too warm, too attractive, too…everything to resist. And spending time with the lovable human makes Fiora question what’s more frightening—the curse, or the possibility of a life without Deven by his side.If they want a shot at happily ever after, Deven and Fiora will need to break the potentially deadly curse and overcome all the secrets that stand between them. Easy, right?They wish...This book is an explicit M/M romance with an absurd cloak worn during the summer, a dragon who hoards—well, it isn’t gold, and some extremely angry parents who can breathe fire.

    Tall, broad, and über-masculine, he’s the epitome of the dominant top—in appearance at least. When they discuss their sexual fantasies, Duncan confesses to a secret desire that surprises Tyler. Luckily for Duncan, Tyler’s happy to oblige and is determined to give Duncan a night to remember. Length: 9666 words