Contemporary Books

Jody Acosta’s life was turned upside down the day her father died in a work-related accident. Struggling with her grief, all she can do is immerse herself in her work at the local animal shelter and help her mother while they wait for the settlement from the wrongful death lawsuit.

Nicole Bergeron, the company's representative, is conducting an internal investigation into the accident. She understands the Acosta family’s grief, but that doesn’t mean the company her father built is automatically responsible for the tragedy.

Jody doesn’t know what makes her more furious, that the wealthy Bergeron family refuses to pay for what they did, or that she can’t ignore her knee-weakening attraction to Nicole. But she’ll need to push aside her anger to work with Nicole to find the truth, about the company, about her father, and about her own heart.

Life changes like the ocean tides, and Mikayla Pierce is discovering that the hard way. Recently divorced and learning more about her bisexuality, she struggles to find her way on her own. Living in a borrowed home in Oceana Mobile Home Park, Mikayla knows one thing for sure. She’s done trying to be the person other people think she should be.

Gem Helmstaad, the property manager of Oceana, has resigned herself to the life she’s lived since she was a kid, helping her dad take care of his business. She thought she’d broken free of her family obligations, but with her father’s poor health and her siblings having lives of their own, she’s back in Oceana and it’s up to her to keep the business going.

Falling in love is the last thing on either of their minds, but when Mikayla and Gem meet, sparks of possibility begin to shine, revealing a new path that just might lead them to a future neither expected.

Once the first female quarterback of her high school team, Sutton McCoy has since landed her dream job as the offensive coordinator for the new NFL team the Connecticut Cheetahs. When the team recruits established quarterback Grayson Moats to lead them, Sutton’s heart is crushed. Grayson isn’t the problem. Sutton’s fifteen-year crush on his wife, Parker O’Neal, is.

Parker is living a life full of regrets dating all the way back to high school when her parents made her end her relationship with Sutton because there were too many rumors about her, not all of them good. When Grayson accepts the new quarterback position with the Cheetahs, he consults Parker first, knowing the three of them have history. But it’s not like she can tell him the truth, that Sutton still occupies so much of Parker’s head and heart.

Interfering in the personal life of the star quarterback and convincing Parker to walk away from her family were never in Sutton’s game plan. But standing on the sidelines when a second chance at true love comes their way proves all but impossible.

Beth Richards is a thirty-two-year-old virgin married to the family farm that’s been in her family for generations. With her mother battling Alzheimer’s, Beth is struggling to keep the farm afloat and provide for her sister. So of course, she refuses to sell everything when a beautiful businesswoman from Dallas waltzes in expecting to be the answer to her prayers. How can Beth ever let go of her family legacy?

Evelyn Bremer is used to getting what she wants, and what she wants is to build a windmill farm on Beth’s land. As she spends a little time in the small town in West Texas, she wants Beth, too. But even her best efforts at wooing aren’t enough to convince Beth to take a chance on the attraction they can’t deny.

Beth and Evelyn seem destined to remain mortal enemies, as neither is willing to give up their dreams. But love has a way of bringing people together even when their hearts seem destined to float in opposite directions on the wind.

Bailey Kaczmarek has three loves: her dog, her construction company, and her very large family. After she finds out that her fiancée never stopped dating, she resolves to be content with what she has rather than search for happiness in a relationship. It’s not like she has much free time anyway.

Skye Kohl is a high-powered commercial real estate broker who spends most of her waking hours negotiating some of the largest leases in the nicest buildings in Chicago. She’s so focused on topping the list of the most influential brokers in the city that she ignores her love life.

Bailey’s and Skye’s professional and personal lives collide as they join forces on a construction project and deal with their meddling mothers, who think they’re perfect for one another. But the more they clash, the hotter their simmering attraction burns.

Bonnie James has built her life around her passions—cats, coffee, and community. She rejected her family’s narrow visions of success and instead chose the non-lucrative, fur-filled life of a cat café owner. So what if her decision means she works way too much to have time for true love? She has plenty of friends and cats to keep her company.

Wedding planner Taryn Ritter has a knack for making impossible dreams come true. She might not understand the appeal of getting married in a cat café, but if that’s what her clients want, then she’ll make it happen. She’s not about to let the reluctant café owner stand in her way, so she makes Bonnie an offer she can’t refuse—give her the venue for one day and she’ll find a way to get more cats adopted into happy homes.

When Bonnie and Taryn join forces to help a bunch of shelter cats find their forever homes, they just might discover forever for themselves as well.

Arlette Adair has always done what’s right. From the day she was born, she’s lived the life her parents forced upon her. Now, she’s stuck in a sparkless relationship and a job she never wanted. Her father's presidential campaign will forever root her in the world of politics that she’s trying to escape from.

Brooke Dawson has always made her own rules. She’s a struggling freelance artist by day and a catering bartender at night, but her heart is full…almost. When she picks up a bartending shift at a high society party, she hopes to bring home enough money to pay her rent. She never expects to run into Arlette Adair: her former best friend, the girl she spent all of college secretly crushing on, and the one who got away.

Now face-to-face with their unresolved past, Arlette and Brooke quickly fall back into their old ways while dancing around the biggest question: Why hadn’t they fallen in love all those years ago?

As the oldest daughter of a baroness with a quite superior attitude, Bronte de Lacey was brought up in privilege and expected to follow a traditional path. Make a good marriage and settle down to the business of making a family. But making a family isn’t what Bronte wants at all. Instead, she’s dedicated her life to saving animals as an animal rehabilitator. The Rosebrook village trust may give her the chance to finally live the life she wants and help others in the process.

Griffin Harris was brought up by her single mother in a poor housing estate. Finding out she is the sole heir of a large English estate catapults her from poverty to riches in one day. Her good-for-nothing father was never part of her life, so Griffin resents the money but uses it for her mother’s comfort while she travels the world, wandering, hoping to find her true place. When an old friend asks for a favor, she agrees to help restart a brewery in Rosebrook. It seems like a fine, and temporary, idea to Griffin.

When Bronte comes to the village, Griffin is drawn to her strength. Their connection creates a safe haven for the wanderer. But when Griffin discovers the truth about her father, all she wants to do is run.

When internet executive Crystal Tucker is given the opportunity to finally make it to the top in her company, she jumps at the chance. She just has to sell Pine Grove’s government on the future: Wi-Fi, high-speed internet, and streaming services. Should be easy, right? Apparently not. To succeed where others have failed, Crystal must blend into the community and understand why the small town is stuck in the past.

The internet café Cyber Shack has been in Janie Elliott’s family for decades. More than a place to access the web, it’s an integral part of Pine Grove culture. Meeting your neighbor for a coffee? Working from anywhere-but-at-home? Want in on the local gossip? Cyber Shack has it all, and almost everyone wants to keep it that way.

Crystal is sure Wi-Fi could really help the more marginalized residents, even if it means putting a small business out of business, but her instant attraction to Janie makes moving ahead with her plans complicated. As their spark combusts into an undeniable flame, Crystal has to come clean about why she’s really there, and what it might mean for Cyber Shack, for Pine Grove, and for her relationship with Janie.

Simone Lavoie would be the first to admit she’s running from her problems, literally. She’s convinced herself a new job as an intimacy coordinator in a new city will give her a fresh perspective. Instead, problems on set only add to her worries.

Evelyn Harper has spent her whole life thinking she knows exactly what she wants: to be an actress. But when the fame gets to be too much following her breakout role, she’s torn between the ideal and reality. Then Evelyn discovers that Simone suspects a friend of trading bit parts for sex, and she starts to second-guess her growing attraction.

As the integrity of the show comes crashing down, Evie must stand up for her conviction to go for what she really wants in life, while Simone struggles to let go of a hard held past and give love a chance. As their feelings grow, it becomes harder and harder to tell the difference between what’s real and what’s an act.

Cassidy Clarke wants to find herself. Tasked with scattering her friend Mason’s ashes, she heads to the campground where they met as kids. She expects the grief. She expects the guilt. She expects how absent she feels in her own life. What she doesn’t expect is the broken disrepair of the campground. Or the grouchily broody, yet intriguingly beautiful, cabin manager.

Francesca Sisto wants to lose herself. A deadly tragedy eight months ago has left her battered and guilt-ridden. The job at a rundown, very sparsely populated campground was supposed to keep her away from people. But when a very demanding and infuriatingly attractive guest keeps calling, she has no choice but to be a person and interact. 

They aren’t looking for love, they’re actively avoiding it. Nobody knows better than Cassidy and Frankie that life doesn’t always give you what you want. But sometimes, if you’re lucky, life gives you exactly what you need.

A hot summer fling or true love?

When budding geologist Jessica Sterling arrives to work on her thesis while camping in Washington’s Dry Falls State Park for the summer, she shatters park ranger Clare DeVere’s hope for an uneventful season. Neither can deny their unexpected attraction, but their secrets make romance impossible.

Clare’s best friend since college, Lyn, works as one of the park’s dispatchers, and her long-standing and unrequited crush on Clare grows increasingly obsessive as Clare draws closer to Jess.

While Clare contends with Lyn’s infatuation and unwanted advances from her womanizing boss, and Jess grapples with her unexpected feelings for a woman, their fiery fling challenges them to confront their pasts.

Dr. Lily Davenport is the poster child for burnout—physically and emotionally. All she wants is a few months of nondemanding work at a summer camp, of all places, so she can figure out what to do with the rest of her life. The last thing she expects is to run into a woman who awakens a passion she hadn’t even realized had died along with all those she’d failed to save.

Forest ranger Chase Fielder is not in the market for a relationship. Counting on people never leaving is for fools. A fling with Lily promises to be exactly what Chase is looking for—short-term, hot as a forest fire, and one Chase can extinguish whenever she wants. Now all she has to do is convince Lily they’re a perfect match.

After all, it’s only one summer.

When Nicole Steele left the small mountain town of Glenwood Springs, Colorado, she thought she’d never look back. Almost twenty years later, all she wants is to move home. She’s delighted to be hired to take photographs for Glenwood’s new tourism campaign. Instead of her usual week-long visit, she gets to spend the entire holiday season in town. But there’s a hitch: Quinn Zelinski.

Quinn’s working on the tourism project, too, and she and Nicole have a history: high school rivalry, teenage longing, and one memorable kiss. Then Nicole left for college, Quinn stayed, and except for a few fleeting glimpses, they haven’t seen or spoken to each other since.

Nicole and Quinn can’t avoid each other forever, and the magic of the Christmas season might rekindle the romance between them if they don’t let old hurts and rivalry ruin a picture-perfect reunion.

Drew Dawes’s life revolves around fantasy. She’s the geeky owner of a comic book store, cosplays at conventions, and loves her superheroes. Her life is a million miles away from the one her parents envisioned for her as a musical prodigy. They expected fame, fortune, and headlining the stages in Nashville. Drew never wanted the life they forced onto her as a child, and their deaths changed her world forever. Since then, the songs in Drew’s heart are silent.

Wren Banderas has her career planned out in minute detail. Becoming head chef at a very popular restaurant is just another step closer to her biggest dream: a restaurant bearing her own name. Her star is rising, yet self-doubt plagues her.

Drew and Wren couldn’t be more different, but each still carries wounds from the past. Falling in love was never part of the plan, but they just need each other to heal and make their dreams come true.

Mira Donahue’s bar, Mirage, is the hottest Christmas party venue in Boston, despite Mira’s secret: she hates Christmas. When self-described Queen of Carols Courtney Rivers books Mirage for her company’s holiday party, she clashes with Mira over the plans. Then a freak storm strands them in the bar, and more than miracles abound.

A Christmas Miracle was previously published in All I Want for Christmas: Romance Novellas (Bold Strokes Books, 2020).

Olivia Duran has made being a TV fangirl her life. Creating fan art sure beats her job as a parking lot attendant, and immersing herself in fictional worlds where girl gets girl helps her cope with her less-than-happy reality. If anyone deserves a little escapism, it’s Olivia.

Queer entertainment influencer Riley St. James has a huge following and an even bigger secret that could tank her career. Somewhere along the way her love for TV turned into a job that pays the bills. She’s never told anyone she sometimes has to fake it.

When Riley and Olivia attend QueerCon, Olivia gifts her favorite actress one of her drawings and goes from unknown to overnight sensation, while devoted fans flock to Riley, who only has eyes for Olivia. Navigating the world of long-distance dating, career crisis, and family obligations, Olivia and Riley begin to wonder: Can their real-life love ever be as perfect as those they see on-screen?

Siobhan Carney and Cassie Townsend are opposites. Siobhan’s struggling in her marriage but keeps things together for her two children. Cassie’s a charming investment banker and infamous flirt who just won’t commit.

When Siobhan arrives as a trainee at Cassie’s firm, desperate to shake up something in her life, she doesn’t expect their connection to change their lives forever. Siobhan and Cassie are instantly drawn to one another, but far too much stands in their way, including Siobhan’s children and Cassie’s fear of falling in love.

Try as they might, it’s impossible for them to keep away from each other. They relish the time they spend together and find they appreciate one another in ways they had never expected. This leads to a calculated proposal neither woman can resist, and their attraction grows deeper and more intense despite everything holding them back. But are they brave enough to give up everything they have ever known to be together?