Rating: NA

Publisher: Smoking Teacup Books 

Genre:  Gay Romance

Length: 860 Pages

Reviewer: Kazza

Purchase At: amazon

Blurb:

Love Is Magic!

Fifteen authors, fifteen chances to fall in love this holiday season…

In this enchanting, out-of-this-world MM paranormal and urban fantasy collection, you’ll find unexpected demons, gallant vampires, pining alphas, shifty ravens, magic galore, and so much more, with a satisfying happy ending to every love story.

Read original, exclusive stories by:
Grae Bryan
Kai Butler
Kiki Clark
MM Farmer
Eliot Grayson
Alessandra Hazard
Sheena Jolie
Lissa Kasey
L.A. Lambert
Ashlynn Mills
Mere Rain
Colette Rivera
Cora Rose
Spencer Spears
Remi Varlow

This limited-time anthology will only be available for three months, from November 27, 2025 through February 24, 2026.

All profits will benefit SantaCan, a non-profit organization that provides holiday gifts to foster children in the Los Angeles area. Thank you for spreading some holiday cheer this season!

~Reviews~

This anthology is for a great cause, SantaCan, while you get to check out some of your faves as well as potentially new-to-you authors. I’m reviewing the stories I can get to but I’m not rating anything because it’s hard to stack these up against much longer books. Some stories worked for me more than others. We all have our own tastes or quirks. You’ll get my general vibe about the stories I give a short review to. The author’s names at the top of a review in orange takes you to their individual website or author page. 

I have to stop right now because this is over 800 Kindle pages and I’m busy. I’ll add to the reviews over the next week but I wanted reviews up on the blog.

The overarching theme within all the these stories is Christmassy, a gift, relational loneliness to hope. 

The Wrong Doorstep – Grae Bryan

I’ve never read anything by Grae Bryan before but I do know they have amazing covers on their books and I’ve nearly bought a couple off the back of those covers.

This was a sweet Christmas story about Ben, the accountant from 3B, who gets a present he knows is meant for the neighbour above him in 4B. Ben is shy and lonely and flustered by the ‘sexy and you know it’ Atlas, especially as he discovers his 4B neighbours name. It figures. After all the banging going on up there. 

Of course, Atlas could smell what the gift was. Panties. Preworn. How naughty. 

There is a quick connection, Atlas likes his ‘little mouse’ neighbour and his ability to make him blush. There’s some sex, an unusual gift, and Ben can’t resist ALL of ATLAS. This is a short PNR story that is nicely put together. 

A Gift for Winter’s Eve – Kai Butler

August is a werewolf English teacher looking for a new place to settle down. Somewhere he’s not discriminated against. Kind of like the werewolf agenda he’s experienced before. He’d like to be thought of as cool, not a bad influence on his pupils. Maybe he could be like Stanley Tucci? He’s attracted to his punk rock playing next door neighbour who won’t take the cookies August made for him. The same neighbour who’s weird about giving his name. But he has an aura. In the meantime, some of Ben’s students are sleeping during class and seem… off, he wants to know why. One of them tells him about the San Amaro hills. How other teenagers go there and they glow. San Amaro is the Fae epicentre for the entire universe, and Rowan – August finally did get his name – helps August and August is actually cool and brave. This needs a novella or book.

“Why are you helping me,” I asked.

“You offer me your name, August Bright, as though it is not a gift. But I see it for what it is. It is a treasure beyond measure.” His words were low, and they made something shiver inside me.”     

This was such a good short story. I’ve read a couple of the San Amaro Investigation books so I knew the detective who August talked to, his partner, the Fae courts, and who the Windrose was. Not that these things matter for this story. It just took me back and reminded me I need to play catch-up on some more of the series.

Spellbound – Eliot Grayson

If ever a story needed to be longer, this is it. It ends with all the questions. Ones I’m interested in. It has the anthology’s requisite Christmas loneliness and longing brief with an out-of-the-blue connection that forms between two MCs who knew each other before. I really liked the characters, Finian and Rob. Both of them needing connection so much, I felt it loud and clear through the (Kindle) pages. I was a sucker for them and I know I’d love them entirely with more page count. There’s an interesting history to explore. However, I do like some good old longing or pining in my fiction. I got that.  

There’s a teensy tie-in to the amazing Mismatched Mates series. It reminds me just how much I miss that world – especially the hilariously crazy Armitage pack and their bespelled things. It has plenty of sex. Stalkery – skirting dubcon lines – sex. I’m always here for the stalkery and the dubcon. It’s PNR with a werewolf shaman and a Grayson special – an alpha male who knots like a pro and has a humongous dick… er, that would be Rob. There’s also some dirty talking and the writer’s trademark humour. 

Instead he’d left me for twenty years, and now I had him on top of me, his cock and knot lodged inside me. Tied together inextricably, at least for the next few minutes. Ironic might or might not be the right word I’d have to ask Alanis.

Heh! Loved the Ironic reference. Jagged Little Pill FTW! 

My Christmas wish? Please make this into a novella/novel, EG.    

A Professor for Christmas – Alessandra Hazard 

This one didn’t work for me, primarily because it was way too short for the setup required to do it justice. A professor believing that his twenty-one-year-old student was really a thirty-six-year-old who had come back in time. That needed more backstory and depth. This could be awesome with more wordcount. In the meantime,  there is some well written – definitely pushy – sex. 

The Duellist’s Heart: An Infinite Arcana Short Story – Sheena Jolie

I thought this might just be my cuppa because I love a vampire but, for a short story, I felt it got bogged down in the minutiae of someone or the shop. It may have been my level of tiredness at the time of reading, so I may come back to this one.   

Grave Tides – Lissa Kasey 

A Fae queen’s jewel, a curse, a merman, a human/cat variant, their family not really understanding them, fated mates. The turbulence of a picture, art being something more. The concept of this story was a good one.

I did feel like I was dropped into a world where there is a slightly different take on shifters, and secondary characters who I felt I should have known more about. However, it was a longer short than the others before it and the author made use of the wordcount. It was interesting reading.

Somewhere between a shared slice of cake and the sound of the waves, I had given him my heart without a second thought. 
And now, I would fight for his. 

The Cranberries very powerful, exceedingly poignant anthem that was a ringtone in this book – it’s Zombie, not Zombies. It’s the cultural significance of that song needing to be correctly named. As always, RIP, Dolores O’Riordan.

Meadow – L A Lambert

This was verryyy sweet and I’m more of a stabby, edgy gal but sometimes I just like to nibble at something sugary, it’s a mood thing, and this story delivered that.

“Are you comfy?” His voice was so pretty and soothing, relaxing me the tiniest bit. I’d never met anyone like him, and if I had, they sure as hell had never been on my couch, pressed up against me. 

Mind you, mum needed to calm her desperate farms, and one best friend, Alan, needed to not be so intrusive and possessive. Apart from that, one static cling monster finding another was a delight. A virginal human desperately seeking someone to love and drink hot chocolate with was achieved. Or, a Fae finding his human mate. 

Up in the Air: A Monster Match Spin-Off – Ashlynn Mills

This wasn’t bad. But it’s definitely aimed at people who have already read the existing Monster Match book and know Franky and Nova.   

What the Demon Brought – Mere Rain

This was random AF. It had a demon-activating artefact, action, body-wearing demons – meat suit! –  the dew/daeva, a demon hunter, and an academic who doesn’t believe in much… until he has to. 

Reason’s dialogue was jaded or dry. Siya, the hunter, had quiet humour and respect for Reason’s job. The banter was definitely quirky.

“Reason. I stole that car. And this car.” His glance was both amused and chagrinned. “Is that terrible? Are you horrified?” 

“We stole candy,” I blurted, I guess trying to level the ethical inequality brought about by his confession. “My sister and I. When we were little. We weren’t allowed sweets, so we… yeah. Crime.”  

This story, like the others before it, fit the gift and holiday season criteria while delivering some tongue in cheek fun. 

When Fate Gives You a Demon – Colette Rivera

My favourite part of this short was the gift that Milo didn’t check on first that ended up with him losing his job. This is why you always check the gift you’re giving someone first.*Shakes head.  However, magic is in the air and Milo gets a job at the local mall wrapping gifts when he meets his surly but imposingly put together boss, Zeke. He may seem surly, but he’s as soft as a marshmallow for his mate, even if he is stalking him. Zeke sees no problem stalking Milo, even if Milo isn’t exactly sure about that.

But Zeke wasn’t done. He tangled his fingers in Milo’s hair, holding him close. “Fate brought us together, and I’m going to keep you. Care for you. Claim you and look after your soul for eternity.”

Anyway, Milo gets onboard with the whole fated mates and eternity because Zeke happens to be a sweet demon who fell to earth searching for a mate. Did I mention he can fly? Tada! Yeah, Milo is your man, Zeke.

Bite of Opportunity – Cora Rose  

My blog partner, Cindi, reads and enjoys Cora Rose’s books. I’ve never read one so the author is brand new to me.

This story is told in dual POV – Jamie is twenty-five and a gift to a vampire. He turns up on his doorstep in rain within a disintegrating giftbox and not much else on. Evander is turning four-hundred. Not that he’s celebrating. It’s his friends who’ve organised Jamie. What do you get a vampire that pretty much has everything? A sexy young guy whose blood type, A, happens to be said friend’s favourite drop. 

My dead heart thumps in my chest. “I liked it.”
“You did?”
“Yes. You taste…” I smack my lips together and squeeze my dick as I remember it. “… like dessert.”

So Jamie is is a sodden mess when Evander lets him in to his home. He’s also nosey. He pries because he’s never seen a vampire before, what do they have around their homes? Evander finds Jamie an irritating human… until he finds him to be just the right gift. And Jamie gets to know what it’s like to have sex and be bitten by a sexy-arse vampire which, while not having a HEA as such, alludes to this pair having met their mate by story’s end.

There’s a smidge of pathos and plenty of sexiness given the short wordcount. I was impressed. I’d like to see more of Jamie and Evander. 

~I haven’t finished this anthology. I shall return!