Samhain Publishing, $3.50, ISBN 978-1-60504-678-5
Contemporary Erotica, 2009

The heroine Bailey Harris is a baker, which I guess explains the title of this short story. Nothing too dirty at all about the title, oh no! This one claims to be a BDSM romance, so naturally we have our heroine exploring the world of BDSM for the first time in order to satisfy her emotional and physical needs, taught at the hands of Aidn Greer, supposedly the most popular Dom in the neighborhood. Naturally, they fall in love because she’s the best he’s ever had but oh, but he has issues. Not that it matters, because apparently being a submissive means that Bailey also is a doormat, allowing Aidn to treat her like dirt and then come running back happily when he beckons at her.

What I want to ask about Pink Buttercream Frosting is this: where is the BDSM? The sex scenes here are pretty… ordinary, for the want of a better word. Seriously, where is the big beautiful BDSM balloon?

If Lissa Matthews wants to sell her short story as a BDSM romance, maybe she should remember to include at least one BDSM sex scene. Otherwise, people may start to assume that she’s just cashing in on the BDSM bandwagon. At any rate, this is an utterly familiar by-the-numbers erotic short story that doesn’t offer anything interesting or fresh, and not only that, it also doesn’t have BDSM when it’s supposed to be a BDSM romance. I don’t know anything else to say here apart from a big “Huh?” to this short story.