Spellbinding: Tales from the Magic University

Magic University

by Cecilia Tan

The short stories in this anthology all take place in the erotic romance world of Veritas, the secret magical college inside Harvard that is home to Cecilia Tan's Magic University series.

Cecilia Tan and a merry crew of ten writers explore the intriguing secondary characters, unanswered mysteries, and background stories of Veritas. Some stories introduce new characters, but most satisfy every reader's craving for more of Kyle, Frost, Alex, Master Brandish, Dean Bell, and the rest of the cast. Most of the stories are male/male, with a smattering of gender-bending, het, and even one lesbian tale set at Collegium Sophia (the secret magic school at Smith College, of course!). Tan herself wrote four of the fifteen enchanting tales in the book.

In the tradition of fan fiction, some of the stories have pairings that are unseen in the original books, like Dean Bell and Timothy Frost, or Kyle and Alex. Others explore canonical couples who just don't get much screen time in the book series. One of Tan's stories reveals how Frost and Michael Candlin started dating and what their first sex was like. Learn more of the conflict between Master Brandish and Dean Bell.

Any fan of Magic University will find these stories revealing and erotic!

Genres: Fantasy, Erotica, Short Stories, Queer, Fiction, Anthologies, M M Romance

218 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 2011

About the author

Susie Bright says, "Cecilia Tan is simply one of the most important writers, editors, and innovators in contemporary American erotic literature." Since the publication of Telepaths Don't Need Safewords in 1992, she has been on the cutting edge of the erotic form, often combining elements of fantasy and science fiction in her work. She is also founder and editor of Circlet Press.

RT Book Reviews awarded her Career Achievement in Erotic Romance in 2015 and her novel Slow Surrender (Hachette/Forever, 2013) won the RT Reviewers Choice Award and the Maggie Award for Excellence from GRW in 2013. She has been publishing Daron's Guitar Chronicles as a web serial since 2009 and her Secrets of a Rock Star series (Taking the Lead, Wild Licks, Hard Rhythm) is published by Hachette/Forever. In 2018 Tor Books will launch her urban fantasy/paranormal series, The Vanished Chronicles. In her other life, Cecilia is also the editor of the Baseball Research Journal and publications director for SABR, the Society for American Baseball Research.

Reviews

[Anica · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stars

Always hard to rate an anthology, since some stories were really good and some not so much. There weren't any really bad though, and I read through the whole thing without a problem.

This was a collection of stores, some from the author herself, and others from other authors in her universe. I appreciate the author opening up her world like that and even publishing the fan fiction - I don't get why some authors are so against it. While I haven't written any myself, I would take it as a high form of flattery if someone liked my universe so much they wanted to create stories within it.

If you're reading the whole series, I would read this as well, or at least the ones from the author at the very least. It gives some more background info and you get to be in a couple other people's head too, which is good.

Overall it was enjoyable, just didn't get into it as much as the other books. (This took me a week to read, compared to two days for The Incubus and the Angel.)

It's also divided into sections, so stories that take place after each book, so you won't get spoiled for events that happen in the other ones. However, I would probably still read it after the third book if you want a truly spoiler free experience, as there were occasional comments or mentions of characters earlier than they are important (if that makes sense).

[Kim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not a bad collection of stories, overall. Some didn't feel like situations/actions that Tan's characters would have gone through/done, but it was still cool to put them through different scenarios.

[E.]

There was only one lesbian story, so that's the only one I read thoroughly. But I liked that one and the others seemed well written enough. (I got this with a host of other books from StoryBundle, if you're wondering why I was looking for a lesbian pairing in a series that seems to focus more on gay and het relationships.)

[Nathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Finally got a Alex/Kyle pairing, and it’s both hot as hell and sweet enough to keep me up at night thinking about it.

Frost’s story about meeting Callendra for the first time hit home how much he’s the child of her heart. The last paragraph almost made me cry on the bus.

[Sara]

Kindle edition.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

Variable but overall fairly good. Includes some additional stories by Tan and also some fan fic stories by others.