Emerjas

The titular story of the series, and also the one that made up the bulk of the 2 books, focused on Roi, a black goat spirit, and Xiu, the fire god he served. The two met when Roi was attacked by humans and about to be burned alive. Xiu saved him and gave him a human form, and the two had been together ever since as master and servant.

This was definitely not a cute and fluffy romance. Aside from their first meeting involving Xiu saving Roi from being burned alive after being beaten, shot with arrows, and stabbed, Xiu burned Roi alive when he got angry with him and Xiu's confession of his feelings to Roi is accompanied by him hitting him to the point of blood coming out so that when they have sex for the first time, Roi's face is covered in bruises and blood. That's all in the first chapter. I was honestly surprised at how brutal it was. The book instantly stopped that after the first chapter and didn't have anything like that between the two of them again until the end of the second book with a two page "funny" story about how any time Roi would try to grow a beard, Xiu would burn it off his face. I could have down without that.

Outside of those two sections, I enjoyed them as a couple, even if I just kept wishing they would simply talk to one another. They both had severe self esteem issues and thought the other would leave them once they realized there was "better" our there, not thinking about the fact that they've both been pining for the other for centuries.

Their story did throw in a sexual assault scene, unfortunately. It's thankfully not between the two of them. All their scenes were consensual. Instead, a side character started stripping Roi to have sex with him despite Roi's repeated protests. It's another one of those things I could have done without.

There were also 3 other stories in series, 1 in the first book and 2 in the second. The first was another supernatural story, although the supernatural elements were only hinted at in the beginning. The main character, Takara, was just fired again and his neighbor, Katabami, was hoping he'd finally let him take care of him. But Takara was determined to get a job and an old acquaintance had an opening to interview for. But nobody was quite who they seem in this story. This was an interesting one, but definitely a twisted romance once the reveal of what was going on came.

The next story featured side characters from the main story. It was a short story about the couple sorting out an issue with their relationship after having just gotten back together by communicating (it took a little bit of time to get to the communication). It was pretty sweet.

The last story was my least favorite and also felt out of place as the only contemporary story in a book of supernatural stories. It opened with a nephew and uncle having sex on page one of the story and things didn't get better. Additional revelations that the uncle had been the primary caretaker of the kid since he had been an infant because the parents kept leaving him with the uncle to go on extended vacations, that the nephew was still a kid, that the nephew didn't eat so that he'd stay skinny like he thought the uncle would like, and that the nephew didn't want to grow up because he though the uncle only liked young boys just made everything unpleasant. I was very happy it was a one-shot and the book went right back to Roi and Xiu after this.

Overall, it was an enjoyable series (except for the incest story, Someday's Dream, which I would just skip). It's certainly not for everyone, but if fantasy BL that gets a bit dark without going grimdark is your thing, this might be one to check out.

Evvie was in the process of leaving her husband, as in had the bag packed and was about to drive away, when she got the call that he had been in an accident and died in the hospital. Since she hadn't told anyone she was leaving him, this put Evvie in a weird position as everyone around her mourned the man who treated her terribly.

Dean was a major-league pitcher who now had the yips and was struggling with what to do now. He decided to take his childhood friend, Andy (who was also Evvie's best friend), up on an offer to stay for a few months and rented out the apartment in Evvie's house at Andy's suggestion.

This was a fun read, despite dealing with a main character coming to terms with the fact that she was in an emotionally abusive relationship, which was impressive. I really liked watching Evvie figure out how to navigate relationships with other people after the emotional damage caused by her husband. Evvie started the book fairly isolated with only Andy as a friend. I liked their friendship and how it was tested over the course of the book, but I was also happy to see Evvie become friends with Andy's girlfriend, Monica. There was not a lot of Monica, but she was lovely whenever she showed up. Evvie also learned how to establish boundaries with people who cause her pain for her own mental health. Evvie's journey to healing was my favorite part of the book by far.

Of course, there was also Dean and Evvie's relationship. The two of them were rather sweet. I liked how, while they could help one another, neither of them were the cure for the other's problems.

The book was just nice. When there were problems, people would talk it out (even if it sometimes took a little bit of time to get them back in a room together). And I loved how the story also focused on Evvie healing, even if the path wasn't always the straight line she'd like it to be.

The book jumped between the past and present. The past focused on when Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein. The present had Ron Lord, a sexbot salesman who believed sexbots were the answer to many of humanity's problems; Ry Shelley, a transgender non-binary doctor; Dr. Victor Stein, a professor who was an expert on AI and was Ry's lover; and several other characters.

I liked the past parts of the books featuring Mary Shelley. The book began with in the past, so things started off well. Then it switched to present day and was just a complete change from what the book started as and had liked that I had a hard time connecting to it. I was always relieved whenever it switched back to the past because I enjoyed those sections more.

Then there was the treatment of Ry Shelley. They were constantly misgendered, deadnamed, and had everyone obsessed with their genitals throughout the book. There were so many personal questions about Ry's body. Their lover, Victor Stein, was one of the people doing these things. I didn't understand what Ry saw in Victor.

I picked this up because I knew there was a trans lead, but if I had known how much transphobia was constantly directed at said lead, I would have given it a pass. It was relentless. That was also part of the reason why I enjoyed the past sections more. Mary Shelley's sections are the only reason it's getting 2 stars. Otherwise, it'd be 1 star.