Alison Tyler
As the magical date for the royal wedding bore down on me, I was in the mood to read stories about weddings. On Amazon, I had Alison Tyler’s anthology already on the pre-order list. Full disclosure; Ms. Tyler’s anthologies are frequently on my list. Each one gets better. This particular anthology is divine.
With this Ring, I Thee Bed is a collection of stories based on weddings. While this premise seems like it could be too limiting, especially to the sappy, romantic concepts of wedding, each story has been chosen because it has a particularly novel outlook on the wedding day. In this way, Ms. Tyler has excelled. None of the stories are the same or remotely boring. From going to the church to renewing the vows, these stories cover all aspects of weddings and they do so in saucy, interesting ways. Aptly named Wedding Crasher, this naughty story, by Rachel Kramer Bussel tells the story of the delight and surprise of a wedding guest who finds herself in the thrall of a pair of devious wedding crashers. The sheer numbers of ways to explore weddings in erotic ways is almost mind-numbing. And the anthology is packed with great stories.
Opening with a nervous bride who has cancelled the wedding, this collection doesn’t dodge the sometimes painful ways that weddings stretch our emotions. Making a commitment is not to be taken lightly. Anniversaries become tender milestones and even events where buried passions flare up again as in Seven Year Itch by Kristina Lloyd where the wife nearly gets run over by a bus in Paris. Sometimes marriages nearly break apart, to be mended again with renewing the vows. There are plenty of cheaters too. In Kate Pearce’s May the Best Man Win, the potential groom loses out to his own groomsmen. And in P.S. Haven’s A Vow for a Vow, a wife cheats with as many men as her husband cheated with women during their marriage. Her empowerment turns into a complex addiction and an important revelation about herself. Every one of these stories has a twist and even when you start the story and it seems to be predictable, don’t be surprised if the reason that it was included in the anthology is because at the end your jaw will drop.
With This Ring, I Thee Bed is not without heat. The cliché of blushing brides takes on a whole new meaning, and it’s not their cheeks that are blushing! It’s not always the bride or grooms who are in on the action but when they are, it’s not all vanilla wedding cake! Jax Baynard gives the marriage of convenience a facelift in I Married a Gigilo. His characters are so delightful and funny that I find myself wishing the story was longer.
Another quirky look at the wedding traditions is through Janine Ashbless’ Forsaking All Others which takes a tour through the bride and groom’s photo albums through the perspective of the bride.
“We have two albums full of photographs from our wedding. The first is face in cream satin printed with little gold ribbons and bells, and it lives in a tissue-lined box in the dining room cupboard with the good china, the set we use only on special occasions. All those photos are in colour. The second one stays in a locked briefcase under my side of the bed, and its cover is unmarked black leather. All the prints in that one are black-and-white.”
From the very first paragraph, Ashbless has you looking forward to seeing all the pictures.
Just when you think that the anthology can’t get any better, Ms. Tyler gifts the reader with her own story as well, Naked Nuptials. The bride and groom make their love nest in bare splendor. But as the wedding approaches, they find that putting clothes on might be more erotic than not.
Like rich slices of wedding cake, these stories are to be consumed, savored, and then reminisced over again. Even as I thumb through this book to write this overdue review, I find myself wishing that I had a peaceful moment to just relax in the sun and transport myself to these weddings – the perfect summer escape! Each of these stories are like bits of wedding cake in different flavors, some sweet and thick with buttercream frosting, others bittersweet like a tart lemon cake, and then some dense and heavy with chocolate. Consume them but don’t pass up this collection because you are put off by weddings.
