Category Archives: Romance

I’ll Have What He’s Having by Adib Khorram

When it comes to love, Farzan Alavi is a disaster. After his most recent heartbreak, he’s drowning his sorrows at Kansas City’s newest wine bar. Only instead of being crowded between strangers, he’s escorted to a VIP table for one. There, the hot sommelier does more than treat him to the meal of his life. The way he flirts with Farzan ignites instant sparks. There’s just one problem: David Curtis thinks Farzan is Frank Allen, Kansas City’s most influential food critic. The truth only comes out after the two spend an unforgettably hot night together. Good news—both think the mix-up is… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Infidelity mentioned
  • Alcohol consumption

We Could Be So Good by Cat Sebastian

Nick Russo has worked his way from a rough Brooklyn neighbourhood to a reporting job at one of the city’s biggest newspapers. But the late 1950s are a hostile time for gay men, and Nick knows that he can’t let anyone into his life. He just never counted on meeting someone as impossible to say no to as Andy. Andy Fleming’s newspaper-tycoon father wants him to take over the family business. Andy, though, has no intention of running the paper. He’s barely able to run his life–he’s never paid a bill on time, routinely gets lost on the way to work, and would rather gouge out his own eyes than deal with office politics. Andy… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Period-typical homophobia & threats of outing
  • Infidelity recounted (protagonist’s ex-fiancée)
  • Parental divorce recounted
  • Physical sibling abuse recounted
  • Alcohol consumption & mentions of smoking and drug use
  • Death of a mother in a bombing recounted
  • Police violence & corruption
  • Blackmail
  • Bullying (recounted & off-page)

The Phoenix Keeper by S.A. MacLean

As head phoenix keeper at a world-renowned zoo for magical creatures, Aila’s childhood dream of conserving critically endangered firebirds seems closer than ever. There’s just one glaring caveat: her zoo’s breeding program hasn’t functioned for a decade. When a tragic phoenix heist sabotages the flagship initiative at a neighboring zoo, Aila must prove her derelict facilities are fit to take the reins. But saving an entire species from extinction requires more than stellar animal handling skills. Carnivorous water horses, tempestuous thunderhawks, mischievous dragons. Aila has no problem wrangling beasts. But muster… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Anxiety (protagonist)

A Dark and Drowning Tide by Allison Saft

Lorelei Kaskel, a folklorist with a quick temper and an even quicker wit, is on an expedition with six eccentric nobles in search of a fabled spring. The magical spring promises untold power, which the king wants to harness to secure his reign of the embattled country of Brunnestaad. Lorelei is determined to use this opportunity to prove herself and make her wildest, most impossible dream come to become a naturalist, able to travel freely to lands she’s only ever read about. The expedition gets off to a harrowing start when its leader—Lorelei’s beloved mentor—is murdered in her quarters aboard their ship. The suspects are her… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Antisemitism discussed
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Drugging
  • Blood, gore & injury depiction including dead body and emesis
  • Strangulation
  • Drowning
  • Fire

Lover Birds by Leanne Egan

When Isabel Williams moves to Liverpool, she criticises seemingly everything in Eloise Byrne’s life – her city, her accent, her trademark boldness – so if, when she catches Isabel staring, Eloise feels her pulse race, it must be because they hate each other. It surely couldn’t be for any other reason, could it? Eloise needs to get her ADHD under control in time for A-Levels, but when she meets Isabel, school becomes the least of her concerns. What begins as outright contempt turns into an oddly satisfactory rivalry, but for their rivalry to shift further into romance, their relationship must withstand Isabel’s classism, Eloise’s distrust, and whatever secrets their friends are hiding from them..

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Sexual harassment
  • Lesbophobia & slurs
  • Coming out themes
  • Alcohol consumption

You Should Be So Lucky by Cat Sebastian

The 1960 baseball season is shaping up to be the worst year of Eddie O’Leary’s life. He can’t manage to hit the ball, his new teammates hate him, he’s living out of a suitcase, and he’s homesick. When the team’s owner orders him to give a bunch of interviews to some snobby reporter, he’s ready to call it quits. He can barely manage to behave himself for the length of a game, let alone an entire season. But he’s already on thin ice, so he has no choice but to agree. Mark Bailey is not sports reporter. He writes for the arts page, and these days he’s barely even managing to… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Period-typical homophobia, racism & antisemitism including mentions of the gay protagonist being disowned and kicked out of home as a teenager
  • Infidelity mentioned (secondary characters)
  • Alcohol consumption & mentions of smoking, tobacco and drug use
  • Hospitalisation (secondary character)
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of an abusive parent with alcoholism in a drunk-driving accident recounted
  • Death of a partner from a heart attack discussed
  • Death of a grandparent from a heart attack recounted

Hers for the Weekend by Helena Greer

The relationship is a lie but the sparks are real in this laugh-out-loud, sparkling rom-com where a no-nonsense lawyer fakes a relationship with her barista to avoid going solo to her ex-girlfriend’s wedding.  No-nonsense lawyer Tara Sloane Chadwick is perfectly fine with going to her ex’s wedding—the break-up was congenial, and Tara is nothing if not well-mannered. But after one too many reminders of her dismal dating track, Tara panics when asked if she’ll need a plus-one and declares she’s bringing her new girlfriend. One Tara is seriously single. Thankfully, Holly… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Homophobia & lesbophobia
  • Alcohol consumption

Director’s Cut by Carlyn Greenwald

At twenty-nine, Valeria Sullivan is a celebrated, award-winning actress. But when her attempt to transition to directing is complicated by a bad interview on a late night show, Val decides she’s had enough of Hollywood. Intent on pursuing her other passion, she pours herself into a guest professorship at USC, hoping to transition to academia fulltime. Standing in her way is her co-professor, Maeve Arko, whose brilliance and beauty is matched only by her contempt for Val. As Val rises to the challenges that teaching throws at her, though, Maeve starts to soften, and soon sparks… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Homophobia & biphobia
  • Anxiety & panic attacks
  • Alcohol consumption

Not for the Faint of Heart by Lex Croucher

Mariel, a newly blooded and perpetually grumpy captain of the Merry Men, is desperate to live up to the legacy of her grandfather, the legendary Robin Hood. Clem, a too-perky backwoods healer known for her new-fangled cures, just wants to help people. .When Mariel’s ramshackle band of bandits kidnap Clem as retribution for her guardian helping the Sheriff of Nottingham, all seems to be going (sort of) to plan … until Jack Hartley, Mariel’s father and Commander of the Merry Men, is captured in a deadly ambush. Determined to prove herself, Mariel sets out to get him back – with her annoyingly cheerful… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Alcohol consumption (theme)
  • Emesis
  • Kidnapping

You Had Me at Happy Hour by Timothy Janovsky

O’ little town of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania—it may be charming, but Julien Boire can’t wait to get out of there. Soon he’ll be leaving to take an advanced wine course that will put him on track to become a master sommelier. Meantime, his OCD demands he keep clear of distractions, especially the hot new hire at his aunt and uncle’s restaurant, Martin’s Place. Which should be easy, because Greg Harlow is as ill-suited to Julien as a bold cabernet is to a delicate salmon entrée. As charismatic and confident as Julien is tightly wound, Greg is a TikTok mixologist who could… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Anxiety & Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
  • Alcohol consumption (theme)