Lyra Parish delivers a cozy holiday romance where a chance encounter with a sexy cinnamon-roll lumberjack leads to a fake relationship with very real consequences. 🎄 A ride into town, a stay at his cabin, and eventually his bed—all things impossible to refuse when you’re stranded in a small mountain town and the man offering help looks like he walked straight out of a flannel fantasy. After several flirty glances and heated mistletoe kisses, they establish rules: no strings attached, no falling in love. Agreeing to the impossible might be the biggest mistake yet.

🏔️ She came to this small town for one reason: proving a point to her father about her independence and capability. Instead, she’s got a fake boyfriend who’s far too easy to be around, a secret she needs to keep hidden from everyone back home, and feelings that are breaking every rule they agreed to. The fake relationship that was supposed to solve her problems is creating entirely new ones—the kind that involve genuine emotions and a future she hadn’t planned on wanting.

Why this charms: Parish crafts a holiday romance that balances small-town coziness with genuine stakes, giving readers a lumberjack hero who’s all heart and a heroine learning that proving yourself to others matters less than being honest with yourself. Perfect for fans of no-strings-attached agreements that never work out as planned and holiday settings where mistletoe isn’t just decoration.

Eve Silver launches a dark Victorian gothic series where a desperate woman takes a position no one else dares—working for a dangerously attractive doctor with a sinister reputation. 🏚️ Betrayed, penniless, and alone, Darcie Finch is forced to accept employment as assistant to the brooding Dr. Damien Cole at his eerie estate. Ignoring whispered warnings that he’s a man to fear, she discovers nothing is as it seems—least of all her handsome employer who inspires both terror and fierce attraction in equal measure.

⚰️ As Darcie struggles with her growing feelings for Damien, she must also confront the blood, the disappearances, and the murders plaguing London’s East End. With options dwindling and danger closing in, she faces an impossible question: Is the man she’s falling for innocent, or is he a remorseless killer prowling the fog-shrouded streets?

Why this haunts: Silver crafts atmospheric Victorian gothic romance with genuine mystery, giving readers a morally ambiguous hero and a heroine brave enough to seek truth even when it might destroy her. Perfect for fans of Simone St. James’s ghostly historical mysteries or readers who love Brontë-style brooding estates where romance and danger are inseparable.

Toni Anderson delivers high-stakes FBI romantic suspense where an armed standoff on a remote mountain forces a patient negotiator and a tactical team leader to work together—and fight their attraction. 🎯 FBI negotiator Charlotte Blood tries to halt a siege by unraveling the mystery of a young woman’s death, but her stubborn, sexy Hostage Rescue Team counterpart fights her every step. HRT leader Payne Novak doesn’t have time for detective work or negotiating with killers—his focus is ending the standoff as quickly and decisively as possible.

⏰ Forced into partnership, the battle-hardened operative and the quietly determined negotiator discover unexpected common ground. As the clock ticks and buried lies surface, Charlotte learns some dangers can’t be talked away, and survival depends on trusting the man who challenged her from day one.

Why this thrills: Anderson balances tactical action with genuine romance, giving readers procedural authenticity and chemistry that builds under pressure. Perfect for fans of Julie James’s FBI series or readers who love forced-proximity romance where professional conflict becomes personal connection.

Julie Mulhern delivers witty cozy mystery where an upscale Kansas City socialite juggles murder investigations, disaster dates, and charity galas—all while trying to keep her daughter safe and Mother satisfied. 💐 With his dying breath, murdered teenager Bobby Lowell begs Ellison Russell to deliver a message: “Tell her I love her.” Unable to refuse, Ellison struggles to find the girl Bobby loved—except an epically bad blind date, a vindictive graffiti artist, and multiple emergency room visits keep interfering with her investigation.

🔪 Worse, a killer has Ellison in his sights, her newly rebellious daughter has gone missing, and there’s yet another body in her hostas. Mother won’t be pleased. Now Ellison must track down two runaway teenagers, keep her promise to a dying boy, and elude a murderer—all before her next charity committee meeting.

Why this delights: Mulhern crafts cozy mystery with sharp wit and genuine danger, balancing humor with heart as her society-page heroine proves capable of both perfect hosting and amateur sleuthing. Perfect for fans of Ellery Adams’s cozy mysteries or readers who love protagonists navigating murder investigations while maintaining social obligations.

Barbara Freethy delivers romantic suspense set in the high-stakes world of gaming, where an FBI agent hunting a kidnapped billionaire teams with a witness whose lies might be the only thing keeping them both alive. 🎮 FBI Agent Lucas Raines is desperate to find a kidnapped video game CEO after a horrific home invasion leaves two dead. Kat Parrish never expected that sneaking into a billionaire’s party would end with her hiding in a closet, clothes spattered with blood, ears ringing from gunshots—or that a ruthless FBI agent would start asking questions she can’t safely answer.

🎯 As Lucas and Kat dive into the gaming world’s dark underbelly, they discover nothing is what it seems—players keep changing, goal posts constantly move, and soon they can only trust each other. But should they?

Why this captivates: Freethy crafts fast-paced suspense with genuine chemistry, using the gaming industry backdrop for twists that keep readers guessing about who’s playing whom. Perfect for fans of Catherine Coulter’s FBI thrillers or readers who love romantic suspense where trust is the riskiest gamble.

Brynne Asher, author of romantic suspense that blends action with heart, delivers a high-stakes fake engagement romance where a wedding planner inherits a Miami estate and gets tangled up with drug cartels and a grumpy DEA agent. 💍 Meet Goldie Carter, romantic at heart and professional wedding planner, whose life takes a sharp left turn from “predictable” to “are you kidding me?” when she inherits The Pink—one of Miami’s most historic and grand estates. This should be the kind of fairy-tale moment that makes a girl’s heart sing, the kind of inheritance that changes everything for the better. Except fairy tales don’t usually come with surprise half-brothers, cartel connections, and enough danger to make even the most optimistic romantic reconsider her life choices.

🕵️ Enter Kingston Jennings, Special Agent for the DEA and quite possibly the crankiest, most infuriating man Goldie has ever met. He’s got the grumpy act down to a science—all sharp edges, suspicious glares, and a complete lack of patience for wedding planners who’ve accidentally become confidential informants. When money, greed, and dangerous cartels rear their ugly heads around Goldie’s inheritance, Kingston decides the best way to keep her safe and gather intelligence is to fake an engagement. Because nothing says “romantic comedy setup” quite like pretending to be in love with someone who looks at you like you’re a particularly annoying puzzle he’s forced to solve.

💎 What starts as a protection detail wrapped in a cover story quickly becomes something neither of them saw coming. Goldie’s belief in soul-wrenching, physically-painful-when-it’s-gone kind of love meets Kingston’s cynical, seen-too-much pragmatism, and somehow they find themselves genuinely falling for each other while navigating family betrayals, cartel threats, and the logistics of maintaining a fake relationship that’s starting to feel very real. The chemistry between the romantic optimist and the jaded federal agent creates the perfect tension—she’s still waiting for her prince charming, and he’s convinced fairy tales are surveillance operations waiting to go wrong.

🌴 Asher balances suspense and romance with expert pacing, moving seamlessly between dangerous cartel investigations and genuine emotional connection. The Miami setting adds glamour and danger in equal measure—The Pink estate becomes both a romantic dream and a target, while Goldie’s transformation from wedding planner to accidental player in a DEA operation feels organic rather than forced. For readers who enjoy Julie James’s FBI/US Attorney series or Lexi Blake’s romantic suspense with protective heroes and strong heroines who refuse to be sidelined, this delivers both the swoon and the danger.

Why this intrigues: Asher crafts a romantic suspense that doesn’t sacrifice character development for action scenes, giving readers a grumpy/sunshine romance with real stakes and a heroine whose optimism is her strength, not her weakness. Perfect for fans of fake engagement tropes with actual danger, protective heroes who fall hard, and stories where inheriting a historic estate turns out to be way more complicated than HGTV makes it look.

Moira Kane launches a new paranormal romance series with a grumpy/sunshine, fated mates romance where a divorced human secretary discovers her new boss is a wolf shifter with serious trust issues and a dangerous past. 🐺 Abby thought rock bottom was getting divorced and devastated, but apparently rock bottom has a basement—and that basement involves living out of her car while working for a tech genius who clearly hates humans and seems to communicate primarily through glares and growls. Taking a secretary job at Silver Bullet Security in Seattle was supposed to be a fresh start, a chance to rebuild after her marriage imploded. Instead, she’s landed in the middle of something she doesn’t understand: a world where shifters exist, where her grumpy boss isn’t just antisocial but literally wolfish, and where the word “mate” carries weight she never imagined.

⚡ Gage has spent five years pretending he’s fine after a covert mission went sideways and turned him into a literal lab rat in a secret shifter prison. He’s not fine. He runs Silver Bullet Security with his brother, keeps his walls firmly in place, and maintains exactly zero tolerance for complications—especially human secretaries stationed right outside his office door who smell impossibly right and trigger the one word he’s been dreading for years: mate. The timing couldn’t be worse. He’s got trust issues, trauma he hasn’t processed, and a past that’s about to come back with a vengeance. Adding a fated mate to that equation? That’s not romantic destiny—that’s a disaster waiting to happen.

🔥 Kane crafts a paranormal romance that balances fated mates intensity with genuine character development and real stakes. Abby isn’t magically okay with the shifter revelation or instantly ready to accept a mating bond with a man who bites—literally. Gage isn’t suddenly healed by love; his trauma is real, his fears are valid, and learning to trust after betrayal takes more than cosmic destiny. The romance builds through forced proximity (thank you, office setup), genuine connection beyond the mate bond, and the kind of slow-burn tension that comes from fighting attraction while knowing it’s inevitable.

🌙 When a ghost from Gage’s dark past resurfaces hunting for revenge, Abby becomes the perfect target—vulnerable, human, and connected to the man who escaped. Suddenly, this isn’t just about whether they can overcome their mutual damage to accept their bond; it’s about survival. The secret shifter war lurking in the background adds layers of danger and intrigue beyond the central romance, setting up a series with world-building potential. For readers who enjoy Patricia Briggs’s Mercy Thompson series with more explicit romance or Nalini Singh’s Psy-Changeling books with grumpier heroes, this delivers the paranormal elements with genuine emotional depth.

Why this captivates: Kane launches a series that takes fated mates seriously—destiny doesn’t fix trauma, and love requires work even when biology insists you’re meant to be together. Perfect for fans of grumpy heroes with dark pasts, sunshine heroines who refuse to be victims, and paranormal romance where the external danger is real enough to make you worry about the happily ever after.

Lily Graham, author of emotionally resonant WWII historical fiction, weaves a dual-timeline story about a Parisian restaurant owner accused of collaboration, a granddaughter seeking truth, and the fine line between survival and betrayal during the Nazi occupation. 🇫🇷 In 1944 Paris, while the city starves under Nazi occupation, one restaurant stays open—packed with German officers, filled with music and laughter, serving wholesome food while French citizens go to bed hungry. Marianne moves between tables with bright smiles and warm welcomes, serving the enemy with apparent enthusiasm. To her neighbors watching through dark windows, she’s a collaborator, a traitor profiting from France’s suffering. Then one night, the restaurant closes forever. By morning, “traitor” and “murderer” are scratched into the windows, and Marianne has vanished without a trace.

🔍 Decades later, Sabine stands under the faded green awning with a heavy brass key in hand, staring at the restaurant her grandmother Marianne left her—a grandmother she never met, a woman her family never spoke about except in whispered shame. Sabine has questions about her own identity, about where she comes from and why her family history feels like a carefully guarded secret. But she quickly discovers she’s not welcome in Paris; the locals remember Marianne’s “crimes,” and they’re not interested in redemption stories or revisionist history. The restaurant comes with a legacy of hate, and Sabine is ready to walk away from the whole mess.

🗝️ But then she finds a passport hidden in a water-stained wall cavity—with her grandmother’s photo but a completely different name. Suddenly, Marianne’s story doesn’t add up. If she was truly a Nazi collaborator, why would she need a false identity? What really happened the night she fled? And if the locals’ version of history is wrong, what was Marianne actually doing in that restaurant full of German officers? Graham alternates between Sabine’s present-day investigation and Marianne’s wartime experiences, slowly revealing a story far more complex than simple collaboration—one involving resistance, sacrifice, and impossible choices made in the name of survival.

⚜️ As Sabine digs deeper, she uncovers evidence that Marianne might have been working for the French Resistance, using her restaurant as cover for something far more dangerous than collaboration. The tragedy that haunts the restaurant—the reason locals still spit when they mention Marianne’s name—begins to take on new meaning when viewed through the lens of wartime resistance operations gone wrong. Graham explores the moral complexities of occupation: how survival sometimes looks like betrayal, how heroes are often mistaken for traitors, and how the truth can stay buried for generations when shame prevents anyone from asking the right questions.

What makes this resonate: Graham crafts a mystery that doubles as a meditation on judgment and legacy, asking whether we can ever truly understand the impossible choices people made during wartime. Perfect for fans of Kristin Hannah’s *The Nightingale* or Kate Quinn’s WWII heroines, readers who love dual-timeline historical fiction where uncovering the past changes the present, and anyone fascinated by the French Resistance and the gray areas of moral courage during occupation.

Mary Calmes, prolific author of M/M romance known for emotional depth and complex relationships, delivers a friends-to-lovers story about two men whose codependent friendship must evolve when danger from the past forces them to confront feelings they’ve been avoiding. 🏠 Paxton Walsh has built a comfortable life on the East Coast—stable, predictable, and crucially different from the tumultuous years he left behind on the West Coast. He credits himself for the change, but also his boss and best friend Colton Gates. Their relationship exists in that space most people don’t quite understand: too close to be just professional, too intimate to be casual friendship, yet somehow it works perfectly for them. They communicate with glances, finish each other’s thoughts, and maintain a connection that blurs every boundary except the one they’ve never quite crossed.

⚠️ When a threat from Pax’s past resurfaces, shattering the peace he’s worked so hard to build, Colton doesn’t hesitate—he immediately brings Pax into his home for protection. But living together, sharing space without the usual retreat to separate homes that gives them distance, forces both men to be honest about feelings they’ve been carefully not examining. The truth neither wants to admit: their relationship stopped being just friendship a long time ago, and the only people who don’t know it are them. Or maybe they do know, but acknowledging it means risking everything.

💔 Calmes explores the terrifying vulnerability of loving your best friend with raw honesty. Pax was hurt badly, body and soul, in ways that left scars visible and invisible. If he reaches for Colton and it doesn’t work, he doesn’t just lose a potential relationship—he loses the person who’s been his anchor, his safe place, the one constant in a life that’s had too much chaos. Colton faces the same impossible calculus: if he acts on his feelings and it fails, he loses Pax entirely—not just as a lover but as the best friend who knows him better than anyone. The “what-ifs” are paralyzing. What if the chemistry isn’t there? What if they try and fail? What if they destroy something precious while reaching for something more?

🌟 The forced proximity of Pax staying with Colton becomes a pressure cooker for emotions they’ve both been suppressing, while the external threat adds urgency—life is short, danger is real, and maybe waiting for the “perfect moment” means missing the only moment they’ll get. Calmes doesn’t rush the emotional journey; both men have to work through fear, process trauma, and decide whether potential happiness is worth the very real risk of devastating loss. For readers who appreciate Alexis Hall’s intimate character studies or Roan Parrish’s emotionally complex M/M romance, this delivers the slow-burn tension of friends who are already in love but terrified to admit it.

Why this moves: Calmes crafts a romance about choosing bravery when fear feels reasonable, about recognizing that the thing you’re most afraid of losing might be the thing you’re already holding. Perfect for fans of friends-to-lovers with genuine stakes, codependent relationships that need to evolve or break, and stories where the greatest danger isn’t the external threat but the risk of letting someone see your whole heart.

Award-winning journalist Claudia Rowe delivers an unflinching investigation into the American foster care system through the stories of six former foster youth, exposing the foster care-to-prison pipeline and the systemic failures that transform vulnerable children into incarcerated adults. By age sixteen, Maryanne had been arrested for murder. She’d cycled through foster and adoptive homes since age ten, had run away repeatedly, been trafficked and assaulted, and finally pulled the trigger on a man before fleeing. When police caught up with her, the courtroom drama that followed raised a question most people weren’t ready to hear: what if the real criminal wasn’t Maryanne, but Washington state’s foster care system itself?

The defense’s argument—that the state failed to protect a child it had legal custody of, that systematic neglect and institutional failures created the conditions for tragedy—didn’t convince the court. But it convinced Rowe, who spent years investigating how America’s foster care system routinely fails the children it’s supposed to protect. Through vivid, cinematic storytelling and exhaustive research, Rowe traces the paths of six former foster youth whose lives were irrevocably shaped by a system designed to save them but which too often destroys them instead. These aren’t abstract statistics about recidivism rates and system failures—these are real people whose childhoods were defined by instability, whose trauma was compounded by institutional neglect, and whose paths to prison were paved by a system that couldn’t or wouldn’t provide the most basic stability and care.

Rowe conducted extensive interviews with psychologists, child welfare advocates, judges, social workers, and most importantly, the former foster children themselves. What emerges is a heartbreaking portrait of how a broken system creates broken lives. Children bounced between homes without stability or attachment, teenagers aging out of the system without resources or support, young adults carrying trauma no one helped them process—and at every stage, the foster care-to-prison pipeline operating with devastating efficiency. The book explores how the same kids who needed protection from abuse often found themselves in placements that were just as damaging, how the system meant to nurture instead created conditions where trafficking, assault, and criminal activity became survival strategies.

What makes Rowe’s narrative nonfiction particularly powerful is her refusal to offer easy answers or simple villains. Social workers are overwhelmed, foster parents are undertrained, judges make decisions with incomplete information, and children fall through cracks that exist because the system is underfunded, understaffed, and fundamentally flawed. Yet the human cost is undeniable: kids who needed therapy got moved to new homes instead, teenagers who needed stability got “disrupted placements,” and young adults who needed guidance got criminal records. The foster care experience becomes not a safety net but a pipeline toward incarceration, poverty, and continued trauma.

Why this matters: Rowe delivers essential reading for anyone interested in child welfare, criminal justice reform, or understanding how systemic failures create intergenerational trauma. Perfect for readers of Matthew Desmond’s *Evicted* or Jennifer Eberhardt’s *Biased*, this combines investigative journalism with compelling human stories to demand urgent reform of a system that fails the most vulnerable children in America.