03/08/2023

Hey Ryders! Happy Wednesday! PS: I’ve decided to call all my followers “Ryders” because why not?

It’s been a stressful week. Still. Again. Some more. Uuuuuugh. But I’m not giving up, dammit, so let’s get into it!

This week’s updates include a free spicy book just for you, a hot gay romance novel book sale, and a fun new section that I think you’ll at least find amusing, so be sure to read all the way to the end! And please don’t hesitate to leave a comment letting me know if you have any questions, suggestions, or just wanna talk about my cat-children. They love you already, I promise!

Why is Mr. Copernicus Wearing the Cone of Shame!?

So last week has been more stressful than I could have anticipated. It started off with a power outage that lasted about 2 days. In literally freezing weather. It was GREAT.

Mr. Copernicus is 19 years old. For those of you without cast, that’s pretty old. He’s basically in his 90s in human years. So I was worried it might be too cold for him.

I waited a couple hours and when the power didn’t come back, I packed him up and took him to a friend’s place….Whose power went out about 3 hours after we arrived.

Luckily it came back on the next morning, so we were all safe and warm. But when we got home, Copernicus was a little lethargic. I noticed a mark on him and we took him to the emergency vet.

Long story short, they had to drain an abscess and now he has to wear the cone so he doesn’t lick it too much. We also have to give him medicine, which he HATES. He’s my little baby boy who I’ve had for the past 18 years and so I worry about him pretty much constantly. We’ve got a follow up visit on Friday, so fingers crossed that he gets a clean bill of health!

Dark, Kinky, & Taboo Gay Romance

Ryders, check this out~! This month’s sale is 100% my jam, and if you’re reading this then there’s a good chance that it’s yours too. Seriously, my ‘to be read’ list is growing faster than I can read. Especially when I’m also trying to write books of my own! But there are at least like 10 books on this list that I’m adding to my TBR anyway LOL. Most of them are available on Kindle Unlimited, so check them out. I’d love to hear what you think!

Dark, Kinky, & Taboo Gay Romance

Click here to read A Hellhound Called Derek by Michelle Frost

I realized pretty immediately after last week’s blog post that I messed up the URL to the book! So if you were hoping to read A Hellhound Called Derek last week but couldn’t find the URL, here it is – for real this time! And in case you missed it, here’s the synopsis:

Touch his mate and you’ll wish for the fires of hell.

Alpha of the Hellhound enforcers, Derek doesn’t think he has time for a mate until the Paranormal Council of the city gives him one.

Hollis is smart, funny, vulnerable…human, and his police commissioner uncle has designs to use Hollis’s new mating for his own ends.

He’ll learn quickly not to mess with a hellhound’s mate.

A Hellhound Called Derek is the first in this fast-paced novella series where the paranormals are all deliciously protective of their humans…no matter what type of trouble they get into.

Click here to read A Hellhound Called Derek by Michelle Frost!

Fuck Amazon! Here’s your copy of Discovery

Discovery (Inheritance Book 1) by Ryder O. Cox & esotericPride

Fam, I’m just so fucking done. I’ve gone back and forth with Amazon for weeks now on this and I just don’t want to fight anymore. If Amazon wants to be homophobic and not allow my book on their site, then fine. I’ll just give it to my loyal followers for free. Click Here to download it through Book Funnel!

For those of you that are new, my last blog update was all about how I had planned to auto-release Discovery on March 1. I had everything uploaded and approved, but then I realized that I hadn’t added ‘gay’ to the title or subtitle. When I edited the book to add the word gay, Amazon suddenly decided that my book ‘violated their guidelines’ with no further explanation.

I emailed back and forth, getting the same copy/pasted ‘we reserve the right to determine what does and does not meet our guidelines’ line every time, so fuck it! Here’s the link with the description, trope, warnings, etc where you can just download it for free. Click Here to get the book! – https://dl.bookfunnel.com/x8qtukeiqu

How Can You Support Indie Authors?

Like I mentioned last week, I added an entirely new page to my site with plenty of ways you can support me and other independent authors like myself without having to spend a dime. The graphic above shows the basics, but this page has a more in-depth description of how to do each one and why each one helps – https://ryderocox.com/best-free-ways-to-support-indie-authors/

Inside Ryder’s Mind

No questions this week, so we’re gonna do something different. I’m super ADHD, and one of the ways I cope is having conversations with that part of my brain as if it’s a separate entity. When I don’t have any questions, I’ll just be dropping my ADHD thoughts here. I hope you find them fun and amusing!

If you want to send me a question to answer, feel free to hit reply to this email, or if you want to send an anonymous question, you can use my NGL link – https://ngl.link/authorryderocox

Now for the ADHD thought of the week… +

Me: Ok. We’re on a schedule today. No getting distracted.
ADHD: Ok, but we should really pluck our eyebrows.
Me: Yeah, ok. That’s a quick task-
ADHD: For like an hour.
Me: What? No!
ADHD: And do our makeup for another couple hours.

More coming soon!

That’s it for this week, but I’m still working on those ideas for how to make these newsletters more fun and engaging with things like giveaways and more ways to get involved in my life and my journey as an author. I’d like to grow my list to around 2 times what it is now before we do any of that, but if you’ve got something you’d like to see me do here, even share something you’ve made with everyone, let me know by replying to this email and I’ll do my best to make it happen!

Latest Books

Practice Makes Perfect

Get it now FREE on Bookfunnel!

Sparks fly when best friends Mateo and Morgan decide to work together to get good at dating. They’re two good-looking college guys, they just need a little practice.

Too bad they have no one to practice with but each other.

Hey, at least Morgan looks cute in a skirt, right?

Getting dumped sucks, and nobody knows the truth of that statement more than Mateo and Morgan. They’ve been best friends for a couple years, but neither of them can keep a girlfriend for more than a couple months! Mateo hasn’t even kissed a girl, let alone get past first base with one. So of course he turns to his bestie, Morgan, for help. And, after all, practice makes perfect, right..?

Killer Love

Harris McGuire and Dalton Gardener are both assassins utilized by the mafia. Dalton is one of the highest professionals on the totem pole, known for his precision and planning, who works for the top crime family in the area. Harris, on the other hand, is a brutal yet efficient freelancer who various mafia outfits have been known to contract. The two assassins’ paths cross on occasion and they enjoy a friendly rivalry, with Dalton teasing Harris for not ‘settling down’ to work with a single mafia family and Harris thinking that Dalton is the more stuck up and limited of the two due to the mafia’s rules which he must follow to a T.
But one day, unbeknownst to each other, they both receive peculiar assignments – to kill the other assassin. Dalton’s comes from his mafia boss, whereas Harris’ is from a strange anonymous (but wealthy) client. The two men chase each other around the city attempting to complete their jobs, each using his own skill set to the best of his ability.
But when Harris corners Dalton in his home, it’s not fighting that he has on his mind…

Tainted Belief

Bad: An asexual Catholic priest falls for the choir director at his church.
Worse: That choir director just happens to be an incubus in disguise.
For as long as he’s been an adult, Father Nikolas has been a priest. He went from high school to seminary school and then found a flock to lead in a small suburb of London. He’s never needed or wanted anything else, really. But when he finds his eyes lingering on the choir director long after everyone else has left, Niko begins to question everything.
Leviathan was cast out from Heaven and he chose to become an incubus, pursuing the pleasures of mankind instead of their torment. He sees Father Nikolas as just another meal, someone to play with, seduce, nourish himself with, and leave. But all that changes when he finds himself growing feelings for the priest.
Representation: trans main character (FtM), asexual main character, male homosexual main characters, POC main character

Discovery (Inheritance Part 1) – A Dark Gay MM Romance Novella, is now Free~!