#romanceblr

The Guardian is a smutty M/F paranormal romance set in a haunted small town in South Carolina.

It features

a bi woman (who has finally built a life she loves)

her devoted guardian demon (who only kills people occasionally)

her friends (who have become her family)

mall swords, casseroles, and awkward parties

a few horror elements

some dom/sub dynamics and sexual tension

a very inconvenient infernal job promotion

It does not feature

AI. At all. At any point in its creation.

If any of this sounds like your thing, consider supporting an indie writer through any of these links!

Ko-Fi (ebook and signed paperback)

Amazon (ebook and paperback)

Apple (ebook)

Barnes & Noble (ebook and paperback)

Kobo (ebook)

Smashwords (ebook)

I'm blazing this in hopes of finding a few people who might like to read it (?) but reblogs are welcome!

Sofia is on her back on the bed, and Maya is watching. The scene has been circling Sofia’s reticence about being seen the whole chapter. She is good at deflecting attention, good at controlling where eyes land. Here she stops deflecting.

"You just watch now," she says, and the line comes low out of her own throat. Not a dare. Not a command. A statement of permission she is issuing to herself as much as to Maya.

She touches herself. Her fingers start slow, tracing a familiar path. She is making herself come in front of Maya. The word "my clit" spoken aloud , she has never said it out loud before, not like this, not in this room. Her breath hitches, and she feels the heat rise in her chest. Maya’s gaze is steady, heavy, but not demanding. Sofia’s own hand moves faster, and she lets herself make a sound. Then the internal finish: I came. Two wins, paired. The external act of saying what she is doing, and the internal acknowledgment that it happened. The scene is not about heat. It is about claiming. About letting someone watch you arrive. The tension in her jaw releases. Maya’s eyes soften.

The body often reveals what the mind is not yet ready to say. A character can talk around her desire for pages, can hold her cards close in dialogue, can deflect with a joke or a change of subject. But when the clothes come off, the hiding becomes harder. The body doesn’t lie the way the voice does. The flush, the tremor, the way she holds her breath before letting it go , these are not choices. They are the truth of the moment rising.

This is why the scene matters. Not because of explicitness. Because it is the rawest expression of who the character is under the performance of daily life. The genre that excludes or diminishes the sex scene is excluding a primary site where the interior reveals itself.

I understand the impulse toward closed-door romance. Some readers prefer it. Some writers feel it protects their characters or their readers. There is nothing wrong with closed-door. But the argument that open-door is simply more heat, or that closed-door is more literary, misses the point. The question is not how much skin is on the page. The question is: what does this scene do for the character?

For Sofia, the scene does what no conversation could. The chapter has been building toward this reveal, her fear of being seen mid-act, of being watched while she is most herself. The sex scene is the place where she finally lets that happen. She is not performing. She is not pleasing. She is arriving on her own terms, by her own hand, with Maya as the witness she chose. You cannot write that reveal in a summary. You cannot cut to the next morning and still earn it. The scene is the event.

What Maya does in the scene matters too. She does not reach for Sofia. She does not talk. She watches, and her watching is not a taking but a receiving. Her hand is on her own stomach, palm flat. She makes a sound, not a word, just an acknowledgment. The intimacy of being watched without being reached for, without being guided or shaped, is what Sofia needed. The scene is not only Sofia showing up. It is Maya showing up as the kind of person who can hold that space.

You there!

Do you read books? Does the following list contain things you enjoy in your books:

A ragtag group of diverse fantasy beings undertaking a big heroic quest (a la Monstrous Regiment)

A slow-burn friends-to-lovers storyline based on spending quality time together (a la It's In His Kiss)

A big ol' D&D vibe (a la Legends & Lattes)

Sex (3.5 chillies out of 5)

If you answered "yes", then The Real Treasure Was The Boyfriend We Made Along The Way is the book for you!

Nimya Koehtil needs a change from the impersonal hustle and bustle of The Capital. But her new home in the village of Tolethorpe proves to be more work than she was expecting. Thankfully, she finds a friend in the local Adventure Guild leader, Farel Brightsword. The more time the pair spend together, the more that Nimya begins to develop a crush. But right as she is about to tell to Farel how she feels, he asks her if she would join him on a quest to save a princess from an arranged marriage!

So now Nimya's trying to keep her cool while proving herself to her crush! Can she save the day and get the guy?

The Real Treasure Was The Boyfriend We Made Along The Way is currently seeking a publisher, so be sure to follow along!

Another cute, quick 'monster' romance (he's an alien!). It was exactly what was advertised (I found this through MDK, I think?); cinnamon roll LORGE hero, low angst, happy ending. My preferred romance, honestly. I love me some big, loving, cinnamon roll monsters.

This line made me laugh: "'You are a—a cunning female!' Rupex stopped halfway down the corridor to insult her."

I never thought of "cunning" as an insult? Use a better insult, Ru.