The Teacher Inside Me by Anthony Auswat

NEW RELEASE

Book Title: The Teacher Inside Me

Author and Publisher: Anthony Auswat

Cover Artist: Anne Channarong

Release Date: June 11, 2025

Tense/POV: first person, present tense, single POV

Genres: MM Dark Romance, Mystery/Suspense, Queer Psychological Thriller, Taboo, Coming-of-Age

Tropes: Student/teacher, forbidden love, power imbalance, age gap, first love, coming out

Themes: Obsession, power and control, desire vs. morality, reputation and ruin, queer identity, boundaries, masculinity

Heat Rating: 4 flames     

Length: 71 000 words/322 pages

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

Goodreads

Buy Links - Available in Kindle Unlimited

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A forbidden student-teacher obsession. 

A queer coming-of-age thriller. 

A story that lingers like a bruise you can't stop touching.

Blurb

Liam is just trying to finish high school and keep his secrets to himself. Mr. Hilton, his English teacher, is everything Liam shouldn't want—straight, married, and way off-limits—but possibly...interested. What starts as an innocent crush blurs into something more real, more intense, and more dangerous than either of them can control.

Because some lines should not be crossed. Some lessons can't be unlearned. And some desires come at a terrible price.

The Teacher Inside Me is an emotionally charged LGBTQ+ psychological thriller about longing, power, and the darkness within us all.

Originally racking up 2.6 million reads by a global audience on Wattpad before it was banned, this newly revised and completely uncensored edition invites you back into the shadows—rawer, deeper, and more haunting than ever.

This is the book they tried to bury—but The Teacher Inside Me is too disruptive to ever disappear.

Excerpt 

I can’t believe he’s wearing that cologne again. Today of all days. A test day. A day when we get handed an exam with a series of questions about the Anton Chekhov play, The Seagull. A day when we have to scribble answers in the form of short essays to prove not only that we read the play from beginning to end but also that we thought about it deeply. First line: “Why do you always wear black?” Last line: “The fact is, he’s shot himself.” And everything in between.

I’m sitting in the front of the classroom, dead center, because we all were randomly assigned seats at the beginning of the school year and I guess I happened to be unlucky. Never before have I willingly chosen to be this far up front, an open target for questions posed, stripped of the privilege of blending in. But in this class, I don’t mind all that much because it means I get to be close to Mr. Hilton, closer than any other student.

I can smell him from here, and it’s making me swoon. I know it’s an old-fashioned word, “swoon,” but that’s the best way to describe how I’m feeling. How am I going to make it through this test? The scent—his scent—has managed to crawl far up my nose. And that may sound like a complaint. But it’s not.

I’ve always been sensitive to smells. And when the smell is wafting from a man I find extremely attractive, a man in his early thirties who seems simultaneously young and mature, a man whose rugged stubble covers a boyish face, a man whose wavy dark brown hair is short enough to be considered clean-cut but long enough for someone like his wife to run her fingers through, a man whose slim blue jeans and red dress shirt reveal the contours of his fit body, a man who doesn’t belong in a quiet suburb of Los Angeles teaching English but does belong in between the pages of a men’s fashion magazine . . . well . . .

The room is spinning a little, the way it does when I sometimes get up out of bed too fast. A comforting warmth fills my entire head and melts down onto my shoulders and the rest of my body. My heart: is it beating faster? My stomach: is it tightening up? Down further: what?

To put it simply: his cologne is driving me crazy. Like I want to leap out of my chair, pin him against the chalkboard, and ram my tongue down his mouth so deep and so long that I could tell exactly what he had for breakfast. Gross, I know. But these are my thoughts. And if I can’t be honest in my thoughts, then life would suck even more than it does now. I mean, I can’t be honest in my words and actions. And that’s one of the reasons I can’t wait to graduate. To get out of this city, Point Liberty, where I was born and where I don’t want to die. I want to move to a place where nobody knows me and I can finally be myself.

About the Author 

Anthony Auswat is the author of hot and dangerous gay thrillers, including The Teacher Inside Me and Hunter’s Hidden Camera—which collectively racked up more than three million reads on Wattpad before being banned. He lives in Los Angeles, where he writes under a pen name to protect the guilty, hide from his bosses, and get away with murder.

Social Media Links

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The Hidden Heart by Patrick Bryce Wright

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Book Title:  The Hidden Heart

Author:  Patrick Bryce Wright

Publisher:  JMS Books

Cover Artist: Written Ink Designs

Release Date:  April 26, 2025

Tense/POV: third person, past tense, single POV

Genres:  Sweet MM Contemporary Romance

Tropes:  Co-worker to boyfriend, silver fox, age gap, May-December, size difference, boss-employee, workplace romance

Themes: Wounded guy finds love, found family

Heat Rating:  1 flame

Length:  20 000 words/ 60 pages

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

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Ellis Isaacs falls in love with his new boss, silver fox Richard Quillen, but worries Richard will find him inaccessible or cold. Will the older man see Ellis’s true heart and return his feelings?

Shorter blurb

At the Kissinger-Mann detective agency, the mystery of love is solved just as often as crimes. When detective Ellis Isaacs joins the agency, he falls in love with his silver fox of a boss, Richard Quillen. But Ellis worries Richard will find him inaccessible or even cold. Will the older, wiser man see Ellis’s true heart and return his feelings, or will Ellis’s heart remain hidden?

Longer Blurb

At the Kissinger-Mann detective agency, the mystery of love is solved just as often as crimes. When detective Ellis Isaacs joins the agency, he falls in love with his silver fox of a boss, Richard Quillen. However, Ellis faces two big problems: He tends to fall for straight men, and even when he doesn’t, Ellis’s ex-boyfriends claim he is inaccessible or even cold. Also, he has no idea how Richard will react to the age gap between them.

As Ellis works hard to spend time with Richard outside of work, problem after problem unfolds. Is Richard straight, or is he already dating a male co-worker? Is the age gap a problem, or is the issue Ellis’s reputation for being cold? Will this older, wiser man see Ellis’s true heart and return his feelings, or will Ellis’s heart remain hidden?

Excerpt 

Ellis steeled himself and headed across the hallway to Richard’s office. On the strength of the single donut he had eaten on the way there and half a cappuccino, Ellis paused in the doorway and gathered his nerve. It was time to ask the man out for coffee. 

Richard was already seated at his desk, wearing a dark gray suit and a maroon bowtie. He read over papers that filled a manila folder. As expected, he was breathtakingly handsome. 

Ellis took another sip of cappuccino for courage and then spoke. “Sorry to interrupt you, but I have a question.”

Richard glanced up. “Hm?” He met Ellis’s gaze and gave him a smile. “Not at all. What is it? I’m always here to help.”

If only you could help in the way that I wish you would. “I’d like to get coffee with you sometime this week. At lunch, maybe? Or tomorrow morning? We could even go after work, if that’s better timing.” Ellis’s heart pounded. He always hated this part: setting himself up for rejection.

“Well, sure,” Richard said. “Be glad to. We could get some coffee tomorrow morning if you’re an early bird like me, or we can have lunch. I know a café not far from here that has great sandwiches and decent coffee.” He looked curious, one eyebrow lifting, although he didn’t ask any questions.

“Lunch is perfect,” Ellis said. “Let’s shoot for noon today.” This was the closest he had ever gotten to asking an older man out on a date. Despite his miserable track record with men in general, he’d managed to go on dates with men his own age. That was how he knew he wasn’t interested in getting serious with any of them. At securing a lunch with Richard, Ellis felt a smile threatening to overtake his face, and his heart still raced. “We can always leave a couple of minutes early or late depending on how our mornings go.”

“True,” Richard said. “All right. As soon as you’re ready for lunch, stop by. I’m just doing paperwork today.” There was a kind twinkle in his eyes. 

“Great!” Ellis headed up to the third floor to his office, his dour Monday morning officially turned around. I asked a silver fox out for coffee, and he actually said yes.

About the Author 

I’m a quirky English professor with tattoos, piercings, and an addiction to supernatural thriller, horror, fantasy, and science fiction. I'm proudly neurodivergent, third gender, and a trauma survivor, all things often reflected in my novels. I have degrees in both English and psychology, both of which inform my writing. In my free time, I enjoy hiking, off-road biking, and pyrography.  

Author Links

Blog/Website  |  Facebook  |  Instagram  |   Medium.com  

Newsletter Sign-up/Substack  |   Blue Sky

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Forbidden Lust by Oliver Takely

NEW RELEASE

Book Title: Forbidden Lust

Author: Oliver Takely

Cover Artist: Emily’s World of Design

Release Date: June 6, 2025

Genres: Contemporary MM Romance

Tropes: Forbidden love, age gap

Themes: Insta love

Heat Rating: 4 flames

Length: 33 000 words

Each book in the Sinful Knights series is a standalone and can be read in any order.

It does not end on a cliffhanger.

Goodreads

Buy Links - Available in Kindle Unlimited

Universal Link   |  Amazon US  |   Amazon UK 

Two hearts, one secret connection: will lust turn to love?

Blurbette

Josh meets Daniel, a successful lawyer twenty years his senior. Their passionate weekend blurs the line between lust and love. When it is revealed Daniel’s best friend is Josh’s secret father, he must choose between financial security and the chance for a future with the man of his dreams. Will this forbidden love conquer the odds? 

Full blurb

In the City of London, Josh works tirelessly to provide financial security for his younger sister, following the tragic deaths of his parents. He longs for a connection with his birth father who doesn’t want Josh to wreck his perfect life. Mature beyond his years, Josh craves the love and stability of an older man to anchor him.

Daniel, a wildly successful lawyer, works hard and plays even harder. His heart is closed to love after the betrayal of his ex-husband, until he meets Josh, twenty years his junior, and the executive assistant of one of his clients. Their chemistry ignites during a passionate weekend, initially driven by lust, awakening feelings Daniel never thought he’d experience again.

But fate has a cruel twist in store: Daniel’s best friend is also Josh’s birth father, making their love utterly forbidden. With a tempting offer on the table from his father to walk away, will Josh choose financial security or take a chance on love? And can Daniel convince Josh that the only choice he needs to make is to follow his heart?

Excerpt 

The warmth of the coffee shop was a welcome relief from the biting cold of January. The UK weather was always unpredictable, but it was guaranteed January and February would be ball-freezing cold.

“Good morning, Daniel,” said Jakub, the owner.

Daniel had moved to Hampstead three years ago after selling the marital home and finalising his divorce. He’d been coming to this independent coffee shop ever since. Jakub knew him well, and he raised a questioning brow when Josh was looking the other way. All Daniel could do was smile and act like it was nothing. The fact was, in all the time he’d lived in this area, he’d never brought another man to his favourite little coffee haunt.

“Morning, Jakub. My usual please. Josh, what would you like?”

Josh was in his own world, looking at the eclectic décor of the coffee shop. If you knew Jakub, it was very him – chaotic yet calm. A mishmash of different chairs and tables packed in, with nothing matching. Calm pastel colours on the walls, with a variety of art from local queer talent.

“Josh.”

Daniel put his hand on Josh’s shoulder, causing him to startle a little. He turned and smiled, looking a bit embarrassed. Daniel loved how much he blushed, because it made him look even more adorably cute. 

“What would you like to drink?”

“Oh, erm . . .” 

Josh looked up at the menu board, looking uncertain about what to choose. Jakub had a great place here, but the choices were limited to the staples. Daniel was getting irritated – not at Josh’s indecisiveness, but at what had happened to the assertive, needy boy who’d begged for his cock earlier.

“You can’t go wrong with one of my cappuccinos,” said Jakub, picking up on the awkwardness.

Josh let out an audible sigh of relief and nodded at Jakub. He shot a “what the fuck” look at Daniel as he steered Josh to a table. The coffee shop wasn’t too busy; it was past the lunch rush. After their breakfast, and morning fuck, they’d had another nap before showering together. Then he’d dropped to his knees and sucked another load out of Josh. Oh, to be twenty-five again.

“Are you okay, Josh?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“Tell me if I’m overstepping here, but you seemed overwhelmed when you were ordering your coffee.”

“Oh, that’s just how I am.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m indecisive when there are lots of choices. That’s why I love my job with Oscar. He’s very clear in what he wants. No room for ambiguity. Life’s easier that way, don’t you think?”

It was hard to argue with his logic, but life just wasn’t like that. It was constant ambiguousness and second-guessing. Intuition was essential for survival, and he wasn’t sure if Josh went with his gut very often.

“Is there anything you’ve got going on now that you’re struggling to decide about? Maybe I can help, as a neutral observer,” he smiled.

“Spoken like a true lawyer.”

Daniel chuckled. He wasn’t wrong there, but what he really wanted was for Josh to open up to him and share what was bothering him, because something was.

“I guess . . . well . . . please don’t take this the wrong way . . .”

About the Author  

Oliver Takely is a passionate MM romance author who revels in dark, edgy stories featuring complex, flawed characters. With years of writing experience and a creative day job, Oliver Takely is also an avid reader of MM romance, consuming 300 books in both 2023 and 2024. His favourite trope is enemies to lovers, but is also a sucker for a feel-good Christmas romance.

Originally from the north, Oliver now resides in the south of England with his husband and their beloved fur baby, who is treated like a princess, living their own happily-ever-after straight out of a romance novel. When not writing or reading, he enjoys holidays and indulging in lots of good food, because who doesn’t love a delicious combination?

Author Links

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Death and Maia by A.C. Jolly

BOOK BLAST

Book Title: Death & Maia

Author and Publisher: A. C. Jolly

Cover Artist: Alyssa Winans 

Release Date: April 24, 2025

Tense/POV: first person, present tense, single POV.

Genres: FF Dark Fantasy, Historical, Paranormal

Tropes: Fated mates

Heat Rating:  4 flames 

Length:  Approx 35 000 words/184 pages

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

Goodreads 

Buy Links - Available in Kindle Unlimited and Paperback

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Can love truly conquer death when mortality stands in the way?

Blurb 

A lush, sapphic romantasy.

In the shadowed streets of plague-ridden Athens, Maia lies on the brink of death. When the grim reaper appears to claim her, Maia makes a bold request: a kiss.

Ancient and enigmatic, Lady Death has guided countless souls into the unknowable afterlife. But Maia is different. Her resilience and humour—and that kiss—awaken a desire that Death has never known. What begins as a moment of terrified curiosity deepens into a passion as tender as it is consuming. 

Excerpt 

There’s death and sheaves of hyacinth beside me in the chamber. The body of the other girl lies on the floor. I can see her in the darkness like a misshapen pale rock in a shallow puddle. I want to swim to her.

I was with her when she died. I didn’t know her name, but I told her mine.

“My name’s Maia,” I said. I don’t think she heard me. Her thin breath was drowned out by the music coming from the street below. A festival, the Anthestreria by the sounds. But I knew that she was still alive, and as long as she lived, I might. My wrists were tied above my head to a bracket on the wall.

“I’m here,” I said. “I’ll wait with you.”

But she drowned to death, or burned, or something. I didn’t know her name.

And now there’s only me, and the party downstairs is finished, and the street outside is quiet. Dawn has come and it finds me dying, too. I was working in a different neighbourhood with the other girl, who was so, so pretty. “Follow me,” I remember saying to a passerby, some young guy with an absent look and fancy laundered clothing. He smelled good. I took the pretty no-name girl by the hand because I wanted her with me, and the guy followed us down a narrow street to a doorway strung with many-coloured ropes.

After that I don’t remember much until the neighbourhood, below us, below our chamber, got fired up with the festival and its lights purred orange on the back wall. And then the music died and the sun rose, just about enough to see the flowers on the step beside the shuttered door, no doubt to cover up the smell of the body of the pretty no-name girl.

It’s hot in the chamber. I sit with my back against the wall, a rag across my stomach. I couldn’t tell you how many days I’ve been here. I’m starting to think that the fires and the music and the shouting in the street may not be festive at all, unless many months have passed since that pretty afternoon with the girl, the guy, the doorway with the many-coloured ropes. Unless the music that I’m hearing is carried to me from a far, far different quarter of this city or the next one over. I think about home. My cabin. I miss it. My tiny little cabin where I keep my only thing, a patterned clay horse figurine, on a stool beside the mattress.

The dim light fades. Maybe it’s another evening. And I’m still not dead. The hyacinth is failing at its job. It’s night again and I can’t remember what it’s like to have arms—well, what it’s like to feel them. They’re not actually tied to a bracket on the wall. That’s just fucking nonsense. They’ve fallen at my sides and don’t move.

The chamber fills with cooking-fire flakes and the music blares. I open my eyes, which rasp with dryness, and black smoke falls from the long, high slit of window at the top of the opposite wall. And if my nose wasn’t telling me otherwise, I’d think it wasn’t smoke at all but a river of perilous dark hair that runs down the wall, sinks down the wall, and starts to fill the chamber, flooding round the body of the pretty no-name girl, and I panic, thinking, Shit, she’s gonna drown!

But she’s dead already.

And this evening Death has come again, for me.

She kneels in front of me, a woman dressed in subtle linens. In her right hand she holds a moist and I assume human heart with fronds of cypress growing out its ventricles. She has the pale face of a barbarian and jet-black hair and dark eyes, not black but glorious brown and shot with other colours, whirling blue and green, each eye a round of deep sky reversed on a field of white moon.

She says, “You may ask something small of me, if it is reasonable.”

And although I’ve never actually heard her voice, I kind of already know it. You would too, if you came from my neighbourhood. And right now, in this moment, I’m determined not to ask her for a thing, but I know that won’t last. She is unspeakably lovely and ancient, and I’ll definitely crumble. But I play it out, anyway. “You took your time,” I say, because the truth is I should have died eight years ago, when a dated version of this fever took my parents and uncles and baby brothers, or five years ago, when my master and his favourite slaves were murdered by his business partner, or just a month ago, when a wild wolf-dog came down the alley and through the empty canteen where I was drinking down my supper.

She smiles briefly and her teeth are white and perfect. That smile makes me sure this is the way she prefers it done. I mean, if I was her, I’d enjoy the rude ones a lot more than the simps.

“My name’s Maia,” I say. “What should I call you, Lady?”

“My name is Death.”

Alright, so now I’m scared. My split lips sting with salt from tears and sweat. And I’m so fucking angry at myself because there’s no point in that, there’s no point in crying, because I have no choice. “I promised myself I wouldn’t cry,” I say, and my breastbone cracks as the breath coils, blooms, inside my body.

“Why promise that?” says Lady Death.

And she’s not holding the cypress heart anymore. Instead, a column of fine red dust drops from the funnel of her hand.

“I wanted to defy you,” I say raggedly. “You know how it goes.”

“I do,” she says. “But why waste time? Remember, you may ask something small of me, if it is reasonable.”

I take a breath.

“A kiss,” I say, because why not. “Is that reasonable?”

“Aye,” says Lady Death, and I suppose she’s granted this same favour a thousand million times before.

She has to come to me because I can’t move. She holds my face in her hands, and they’re warm like fire but do not burn, and her lips meet mine gently, and they’re soft and cool like mist but do not chill. Her tongue tastes of sweet apples, and peppery, exactly what I’d hope for from the wildest, freshest, most inspirited of oils. I keep my eyes shut tight because the final thing I want to see on earth is her mouth as she handed it to me.

I keep my eyes shut tight and say, “Who knew Death would be so beautiful?”

About the Author 

I'm a writer from New Zealand, and now live in the UK with my wife. I wrote Death & Maia, which is about a romance between Lady Death and a mortal woman, after watching the TV series Agatha All Along and being a bit disappointed with the (lack of) backstory.

Author Links

Instagram: @acj.olly 

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The Man in Black by L.R. Liverpool

BOOK BLAST

Book Title: The Man in Black

Author: L.R. Liverpool

Publisher: Black Cab Productions / Texas Poetrope

Cover Artist: Gabriel Sanche

Release Date: November 22, 2022

Tense/POV: First person, past tense, single POV

Genres: MM Historical Romance/Thriller

Tropes: Enemies to lovers, forbidden love, dangerous environment, solving mysteries

Themes: Old West, outlaws, mysterious pursuer, hurt/comfort, murders, emotional traumas, scary dreams

Heat Rating:  4 flames

Length:  897 pages in Kindle format

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

Goodreads

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Smashwords  |  Google  |  Apple  |  Kobo

Indigo  |   Angus& Robertson

Who will be safe when a dream figure becomes real?

Blurb

Naive dreamer Fenimore James goes west to become a famous outlaw, but his fantasies of glamorous robberies quickly evaporate when he joins the Red Evans gang, finding himself caught in a strange and bloody game, where gang members are suddenly being murdered one-by-one at the hand of a mysterious pursuer, who leaves cryptic signs scarifying their bodies. As his nights become plagued by a bizarre dream figure––the Man In Black, he also begins to question his sexuality, falling for a fellow male gang member, whom he feared just recently. 

Excerpt 

Sometime later I had a strange dream, which I still remember in great detail, as if I only saw it yesterday: I’m sitting in a hut by a frost-covered window and watching a stagecoach arrive in the yard. It seems to me that my new friends are also somewhere in the house, but this is more of a feeling, because I don’t really see them anywhere. I get up and walk outside. The door does not open into the house, but outward––so I force it hard with all my weight, because there is one hell of a snowdrift on the porch. After a couple of violent shoves, it finally swings open. Everything is white all around––continuous snowy expanses and a snow-covered forest are in front, blackened with tree trunks. And some sort of mountains. I look at the stagecoach and notice that it is also all black, and the horses are black too. Even before I have time to call out to the intruders, the coachman climbs down off the beam and walks in my direction. A tall––very tall––man in a tattered black coat with fluttering hemlines and a worn black hat. He stops a yard away from me and says he’s looking for Red Evans. I answer that Red is in the house and inquire who’s asking for him. “He knows,” the man replies in a low, hollow voice, as if speaking from underwater. I keep trying to see his face, but I can’t. The twilight is still light, and the whiteness of the snow illuminates everything all around. But the man’s face is still not visible in the shadow of his wide-brimmed hat and high collar. I feel goosebumps rise, and I want to run for the hills––from this figure in black––without stopping. But I nod, go into the house to search for Red and find him sitting with Monty and Doug in front of a bright fireplace. The color scheme of the entire dream is black, white, and blue; and only the fire is blood red. I tell the boss that so-and-so, some guy arrived and announced that he was an acquaintance. Then Red reluctantly gets up from his place, and we all go outside. We go out of the house, but there is no stagecoach anymore. No stagecoach, no mysterious guest. Here, of course, they ridicule me, and I scream, convincing them that I saw everything with my own eyes, heard the creak of wheels, the clatter of hooves.

“Maybe,” I suggest, “the guest has already left?”

To which they ask me, “Where are the tracks then?”

And indeed there are no tracks either. Only an endless cover of pristine snow and the prints of our own boots from the doorstep. I remain alone in the yard and continue to stand in the deepening twilight and stupidly stare at the sparkling snowdrifts, trying to understand what happened. And, it seems, there was nothing special in this dream. However, it left an unpleasant feeling in my soul for a very long time.

About the Author 

Lily has been writing short stories to entertain her friends since her teen years, and before coming to pen her own novel, she helped her writer friends with research for their fiction and non-fiction. She is a collector of all things dogs, and Balto & Togo, an animal shelters volunteer, a history buff, a vintage trinkets and toys enthusiast.

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