Over the Moon(cake) for You

By Isla Chiu

When my family finds out that a corporate chain bakery is going to open right next to our shop, we can't help freaking out. I try to stay positive and tell my family that there's no way a soulless corporate chain's mooncakes could compare to Grandma's. But even without competition, our little bakery is struggling to make ends meet.

When a gorgeous guy asks me out on a date, I think there might be some August Moon magic in the air.

Then I discover that he's the owner of the corporate chain bakery next door...

Get into the holiday spirit of August Moon with this sweet and steamy story that's full of instalove, alpha male goodness, and of course, mooncakes!

 

WORD COUNT: 9,500

• Language: English
• Publisher: Isla Chiu
• Release date: Sep 20, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201290801

Isla Chiu

When I manage to tear myself away from taking Buzzfeed quizzes and watching unhealthy amounts of TV, I write romance and smut. My works feature alpha males, sexy times, and/or my sarcastic sense of humor. I hail from Cleveland, aka the best freaking city in the world, and believe LeBron James is the perfect human being. Despite all of my efforts, I have never truly been able to quit caffeine. My problematic favorites include Taylor Swift and Gone with the Wind. I love to hate/hate to love k-dramas. If I say I’m on a diet, I’m just lying to you and myself. One of these days, I'm going to get hypertension from an excess of salt, both literal and figurative. If I'm awkward around you, I probably don't know what to say to you and/or I think you're hot. And despite what anyone says, Forrest Gump so deserved that Oscar over Pulp Fiction. 

Book preview

Our doom comes in the form of a corporate chain bakery

I JUMP WHEN NAINAI comes screaming into the bakery. "Aiyah, we’re doomed!" she shouts.

My oldest sister Blair rolls her eyes. Did gas prices go up again?

Nainai scowls. Why is gas so expensive? And why does that Elon man make his electric car so expensive? She shakes her head. But this is worse than high gas prices. Much worse.

What happened, Nainai? I ask.

I just found out Red Silk is going to open next door.

Shit, Blair says.

I feel the color draining from my face. No wonder Nainai came screaming into the bakery. Red Silk is a huge national Chinese bakery chain. When my sisters and I went to New York, we went to a Red Silk shop out of curiosity. We tried their egg custard tarts and almost spit out our food. The egg custard tarts tasted like artificially sweet sawdust, nothing like Nainai’s heavenly tarts. Nonetheless, Red Silk is a wildly popular chain, thanks to their low prices and ubiquitous advertising.

It’s going to be okay, I say with more optimism than I feel. Red Silk’s baked goods are garbage compared to yours, and our customers will see that.

Nainai pets my cheek. Sweet, naïve Layne. Americans don’t care about quality. They’ll just be blinded by Red Silk’s low prices. Then she murmurs, Maybe we should burn down the building next door.

Blair exclaims, We’re not going to burn down someone’s property!

Maybe we should burn down our bakery and collect the insurance money, Grandma says dreamily.

Nainai, you love this bakery, I say. You and Yeye have owned Peony Bakery for over 40 years. My grandparents came to America with nothing but dreams and 200 dollars. Despite the fact that most people in Middown, Ohio would ask, What the hell is lotus seed paste? they opened a Chinese bakery, and slowly, the people of Middown fell in love with their lotus seed buns, egg custard tarts, mooncakes, and other baked goods.

And you’re not going to prison for committing insurance fraud, Blair adds.

Who’s committing insurance fraud? Yeye walks into the bakery with an obliviously jovial smile on his face, carrying bags of flour. Behind him, my second oldest sister Sierra strolls in with some grocery bags.

Why are you smiling? Nainai asks, shooting daggers at Yeye. We’re doomed.

Sierra dumps the grocery bags on the floor, catching her breath. How can you, a 77-year-old man, carry those bags of flour like they’re nothing? And why do I, a young 24-year-old woman, struggle to carry a few grocery bags down a few blocks?

It’s because I eat a plate of plain tofu every day for breakfast, Yeye says.

Or it’s because you grew up working on a farm while my sisters and I had sedentary suburban childhoods, Blair says dryly.

Yeye shakes his head. It’s the tofu.

Nainai groans. "Aiyah, why are you talking about tofu when we’re doomed?"

Sierra asks, "Why