Blog Tour Stop, Guest Blog & Contest: Riptide Publishing’s O Come All You Kinky Anthology

Thank you for joining us on the O Come All Ye Kinky virtual book tour! For two weeks, anthology editor Sarah Frantz and her merry band of authors will be stopping by some of your favorite blogs to spread kinky holiday cheer! How, you ask? Well, if you don’t know what candy caning is yet, pick up your copy of O Come All Ye Kinky from Riptide Publishing today and see how these authors get into the holiday spirit.

Whether you’ve been naughty or nice, follow our tour for the chance to win one heck of a stocking stuffer—a $100 gift card to The Stockroom, where kinky dreams come true! Leave a comment on the post below by Dec. 16 and you’ll be entered to win. Check out the complete tour listing to see all the places we’ll be stopping by to chat about BDSM, the holidays, and all eight steamy stories, and comment on each post to earn more entries.

*Holds up mistletoe* Look at that—our lovely host today is under the mistletoe! You know what that means—a big kiss from the entire O Come All Ye Kinky group for hosting us today! We hope everyone enjoys today’s post from Ava March.


“Holiday Shopping: A Lesson Learned the Hard Way” by Ava March

When it comes to holiday shopping, there are those who shop early, those who buy at a steady pace throughout December, and those who procrastinate & find themselves at the local CVS drugstore at 10pm on Christmas Eve, thinking Sally would love a new 6-pack of batteries in her stocking this year. I usually fall somewhere between the last two options, procrastinating until about a week before the holidays and then frantically rushing from store to store to get everything on my list.

This year though, I decided to not be a procrastinator. My grand idea was to do some door-busting shopping on Black Friday, get a lot done then. A few stores were opening at 9pm on Thanksgiving and I thought, “oh, they won’t be busy, who shops on Thanksgiving evening?”

Yeah, I was really wrong.

So as I was standing outside the store in the longest line evah (seriously, it wound almost all the way around the outside perimeter of the very large store), on a windy night in the cold sprinkling rain (gotta love the Midwest), I got to thinking about the Christmas Season. I’m totally of the twenty-first century—I love my cell phone, lurve the internet, and have a fondness for long hot showers and Poptarts. While I write Regency romances and love the time period, I have no desire to go back in time and live during the Regency. But while waiting in the longest line evah, I had a moment when I was longing for the simplicity of a Regency Christmas.

“’Twas the Night,” my story in the O Come All Ye Kinky anthology, takes place during Christmas night in 1820, during the tail end of the Regency Era. Then, the Christmas holiday season did not have the huge commercial focus that it has today. The focus was more on spending time with loved ones. Traditions included lighting the Yule log on Christmas Eve, attending church services on Christmas morning, and a lavish dinner on Christmas with family and friends. Christmas trees weren’t even popular. That tradition wasn’t embraced by the masses until the Victorian Era. It wasn’t as if they did not decorate at all, but the decorations were simpler. Think evergreen or holly sprigs. And gifts were more commonly along the lines of a new toy given to a child than a mammoth pile of presents.

I did eventually get through the longest line evah, filled my cart, and then waited in an even longer line to check out. I got some great deals and kidlet should be geeked come Christmas morning. But I learned my lesson. No more 9pm Thanksgiving night/Black Friday shopping. Next year, I’m going to try to be a steady-pacer and do more online shopping.

So what kind of holiday shopper are you? Did you brave the Black Friday lines, have you already discovered the joys of online shopping, or are you a procrastinator extraordinaire?


Title: O Come All You Kinky by Ava March, Alexa Snow, Elyan Smith, Jane Davitt, Joey W. Hill, Katie Porter, Kim Dare, L.A. Witt
Publisher: Riptide Publishing
Genre: M/M, F/F, BDSM, Contemporary & Historical, Romance
Length: 317 pages/Word Count: 89,000

Summary:

Here’s the blurb for Ava’s story, ’Twas the Night.

Percival Owen yearns for the nights when he can kneel before his lover, even though no self-respecting gentleman willingly submits to another. Michael wants his first Christmas with Percy to be perfect, but is frustrated by Percy’s inability to ask for what he wants. The gift Michael offers Percy—and that Percy offers in return—is the best Percy could ever hope to receive: his will to submit.

And here’s what you can expect to find in the anthology as a whole:

Christmas is a time of love and joy, and the New Year is a time of renewal. But they are also times of stress and strife, family drama, pressure and heartache—a potent mix of high expectations and conflicted emotions. Add in power exchange relationships, kinky gift swaps, and unconventional love in a sometimes unforgiving world, and you have a formula for a sizzling anthology of stories that tug at your heart.

From Ava March’s forbidden Regency love between men, to Katie Porter’s scorching hot contemporary tale of two women discovering holiday happiness, everyone will find a favorite here. Pervertible toys abound: Lambda Literary Award finalist L.A. Witt’s candy cane, Jane Davitt’s wrapping paper and tape, and Alexa Snow’s Christmas candles all please and delight. Newcomer Elyan Smith and fan favorite Kim Dare both celebrate New Year’s Eve with romantic flair and kinky fireworks, while bestselling author Joey W. Hill’s poignant story of discovery and commitment will lead you home.

Whatever your desires, we invite you to explore new fantasies and old with these eight kinky tales of holiday happy endings.

20% of all proceeds from O Come All Ye Kinky will be donated to the Domestic Violence Project of the National Leather Association–International. (If you buy the book, digital or print, from Riptide’s website, more money goes to the charity because we’re not paying third-party vendor fees.)

You can find out more about the anthology and all the stories here.


About Ava March:

Ava March is an author of smoking hot M/M historical erotic romances. She loves writing in the Regency time period, where proper decorum is of the utmost importance, but where anything can happen behind closed doors. You can find Ava at her Website, her Blog, on her Goodreads page, on Facebook, and on Twitter.

25 Comments

Filed under Blog Tour, Contest, Guest Blog, O Come All You Kinky Anthology, Riptide Publishing

25 Responses to Blog Tour Stop, Guest Blog & Contest: Riptide Publishing’s O Come All You Kinky Anthology

  1. Andrea

    I love the idea of a Regency era Christmas but I’m very stuck in the 21st century too.

  2. Cornelia

    Love online shopping also HEA books.

  3. I am a bit asocial, so the least people in the shopping center, the better I am. I always try to shop when there isn’t too many shoppers at the same time…
    Also, I read your story last night, and it was really great… I loved it…
    MC
    Contact at mchoule dot com

  4. Sherry

    Love shopping online! So much easier.

  5. By the time Thanksgiving rolls around, I’m usually done (having started finding things in August), so Black Friday has nothing to offer me 🙂
    I’m starting this particular story tonight having finished the first story in the anthology this morning. I love Regency and can’t wait.
    And, I’m thrilled about the donations being made to the NLA’s Domestic Violence Project!

  6. Trix

    I’d rather be in an era with modern medicine, but the Regency does look kind of interesting sometimes. I can’t face Black Friday, so I’m in the thick of it now (not too bad, though I’m sure I’ll remember people I forgot to shop for shortly)…

  7. Timitra

    Ava like you I’m also in between the last two categories.

  8. Alexandrea Ward

    For me, it’s a combination of both online and store shopping. But it depends on who I’m getting gifts for that year. Some of my friends love homemade gifts and others like meaningful gifts that’s an inside joke between just us.

  9. So far, no other crazy Black Friday shoppers but me. Hum, I think that’s telling 😉

    And thanks, Kathy, for hosting my stop along the tour!

    • Book Reviews & More by Kathy

      You’re welcome. I am a big fan of yours so I was thrilled you were today’s guest poster :D!

  10. Jason

    I would rather shop online than fight crowds any day! 🙂

    Vslavetopassionv(at)aol(dot)com

  11. Urbanista

    Nothing worse than a shopping mall! I was on amazon the day it opened, there are so many more online choices now. Hallelujah!

  12. Amanda

    I try to do most of my shopping online, I really dislike crowds!!
    peanutty222@hotmail.com

  13. I am, sadly, definitely a last minute, approaching that drugstore scenario Christmas shopper….. The worst part? I always end up with the crafty gift being made as the sun’s coming up Christmas morning….lol!

  14. Michelle (MiMi)

    I’m ususally running around on the 24th…I just can’t decide what to get anyone ’til I’m under pressure 🙂 …Thanks for the opportunity, chellebe(at)gmail(Dot)com

  15. Penumbra

    I shop online 🙂

    penumbrareads(at)gmail(dot)com

  16. Annette

    No Black Friday shopping this year. Didn’t see anything good enough to make me brave the crowds. Looking forward to reading all the stories in the anthology. Kudos for donating the proceeds to a worthy cause.

  17. Historicals are always good in theory, not so much in practice, lol.

    I’m one of those people who shops all year round, pretty much. I have 90% of my Christmas shopping done by Thanksgiving, and I typically do that last 10% online to avoid the insanity. I *used* to be one of those who went out on Black Friday, because it’s hard for me to resist a deal, but now that most shops are doing cybersales, too, well, who can say no to that?

  18. Fedora

    Like others, I definitely prefer on-line to in person–the stress of the crowds negates any discounts! Looking forward to this anthology–what a fantastic collection of authors and tales!

  19. Kassandra

    I can not remember the last time I did any of my non grocery shopping in a store. I LOVE online shopping!!

    Kassandra
    sionedkla@gmail.com

  20. While I enjoy a lot of the technology (not to mention, oh, medications, hygeine, etc.) of the 21st century, I do lament the lack of simplicity. It seems like this year when everybody’s belts are tight, people in my family feel badly that they can’t buy the endless piles of junk that they might have in the past. Instead of appreciating that we’ll all be together, have roofs over our heads and great food for our giant guts, people are worried that they can’t afford presents that we don’t need anyway. It’s sad.

    I do buy a few simple gifts for everyone — but I’m an online shopper, so I sort of spread things out.

    Heather