Category Archives: Romance

Under the Neon Lights by Arriel Vinson

Sixteen-year-old Jaelyn Coleman lives for Saturdays at WestSide Roll, the iconic neighborhood roller rink. On these magical nights, Jae can lose herself in the music of DJ Sunny, the smell of nachos from the concession, and the crowd of some of her favorite people—old heads, dance crews, and other regulars like herself. Here, Jae and other Black teens can fully be themselves. One Saturday, as Jae skates away her worries, she crashes into the cutest boy she’s ever seen. Trey’s dimples, rich brown skin, and warm smile make it impossible for her to be mad at him… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Parental abandonment & divorce
  • Miscarriage motioned (off-page)
  • Police brutality mentioned
  • Gentrification discussed

In It to Win It by Sharon C. Cooper

Spoiled, fickle, and flighty are only a few adjectives that have been used to describe Morgan Redford. She’s never had to worry about money, but she’s determined to build a career on her own and do something meaningful with her life—by helping children who are aging out of the foster care system. She has her eyes on a property that a family friend is selling, which is perfect for these young adults to live in, but her competition is someone she never expected. When Los Angeles real estate developer Drake Faulkner learns that his eccentric mentor is selling… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Unplanned pregnancy (protagonist)
  • Death of a mother & father recounted

Business Not As Usual by Sharon C. Cooper

This is the mantra that will get Dreamy Daniels through each day until she makes it big. So what if she lives in a seedy part of Los Angeles in a house that’s one earthquake away from crumbling, or works an unfulfilling secretarial job while struggling to finish her bachelor’s degree? All Dreamy needs to do is win the lottery, which she’s been entering in as a weekly tradition with her grandfather. When she catches the attention of her boss’s potential investor, Dreamy has to remind herself to focus on her career goals so she can be her own boss. Who cares if he has the… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Depression

Love Letters for Other People by Shaylin Gandhi

When mathematician Aubrey MacLean’s career implodes, she has no choice but to return to her rural Indiana hometown, at least temporarily. But small towns have long memories, and so does she, especially when it comes to Nick Thacker, the boy who broke her heart. Nick’s life is routine: long shifts at the steel mill, plus a side business writing love letters for other people. It’s enough to numb his regrets—until his first love returns, stirring up a past he thought he’d buried. Aubrey is focused on rebuilding her career, until she falls for a new man whose love letters feel… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Child neglet
  • Parental infidelity
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a parent
  • Financial difficulties & food insecurity

When We Had Forever by Shaylin Gandhi

Six months after her husband died in a car crash, Mina Drake is still mired in a haze of grief. Reminders of her years with Michael are everywhere, but beneath her heartache lies an even more painful emotion. It’s a guilty suspicion she can hardly admit to anyone, even herself—that her marriage was over long before Michael’s accident. They were good together once, she’s sure of it, sharing a connection so deep that Mina can’t understand how it unraveled. That is, until a chance discovery in her husband’s office—and the reappearance of Michael’s estranged… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Alcoholism recovery
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a husband in a car accident recounted

The Extra by Megan Walker and Janci Patterson

Gabby Mays wishes she had her future figured out, like her gorgeous roommate Anna-Marie, who has just landed a role on the hit soap opera Passion Medical. Gabby would give anything to find a career she’s half as passionate about as Anna-Marie is about acting—and a love life that isn’t comprised of nights with a party-sized bag of Doritos and her Netflix account. When Gabby becomes a recurring extra on Passion Medical, she finds a job she’s surprisingly great at. Even better, her old crush and ex-boss—the sexy, sweet Will Bowen—is writing the scripts, allowing Gabby lots… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Cheating
  • Substance addiction
  • Bullying

Hollow Heathens: Book of Blackwell by Nicole Fiorina

Once upon a time, there lived a girl named Fallon who was taken far away from home shortly after she was born. A home that held more than strange traditions and bizarre superstitions. Twenty-four years later, she returned to Weeping Hollow, a town she’d only heard about in stories during restless nights under a marble moon, in the middle of the night to take care of her last living relative. They called the nosy mortician a freakshow–a ghastly thing. They said I couldn’t go near her. Still, there was this aching pull to Fallon Grimaldi that I couldn’t escape. A nostalgic pull as… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Self-harm
  • Animal death (sacrificial)

At Summer’s End by Courtney Ellis

When an ambitious female artist accepts an unexpected commission at a powerful earl’s country estate in 1920s England, she finds his war-torn family crumbling under the weight of long-kept secrets. From debut author Courtney Ellis comes a captivating novel about finding the courage to heal after the ravages of war. Alberta Preston accepts the commission of a lifetime when she receives an invitation from the Earl of Wakeford to spend a summer painting at His Lordship’s country home, Castle Braemore. Bertie imagines her residence at the prodigious estate will.. Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Period-typical misogyny & homophobia
  • Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) & trauma
  • Attempted suicide

Love Stories by Elizabeth Eulberg

Teffy, Tay, Taylor, and TS have been best friends since middle school. As they enter their high school freshmen era, relationships bring on the drama. Teffy is crushing on the boy next door who belongs to someone else. Tay finds herself down bad for a tortured poet. Things get treacherous as an older boy starts flirting with Taylor. And TS is definitely focused only on soccer and doesn’t fancy her new teammate, a cute London girl . . . right? Suddenly, it feels like everything has changed. Pulled in different directions between navigating high school and new relationships, will their friendship be long lived or is it so long, Taylors?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Alcohol consumption mentioned (secondary character)

Cruel Summer by Elizabeth Eulberg

Four girls, all named Taylor, make for one unforgettable friendship! International bestseller Elizabeth Eulberg follows four stories of first love, friendship, and heartbreak. Don’t miss the sister novel, Jen Calonita’s The Taylors! The sequel to LOVE STORIES (The Taylors Version #1) follows the Taylors through four very different love stories over the course of a turbulent summer.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Classism
  • Intimate partner violence (protagonist’s ex-partner pushes her against a well & puts a hand over her mouth to silence her until its broken up by an adult, on-page)