Tropes: second chance romance; high school sweethearts; small town; pro football; accidental pregnancy; soul mates; he falls first
I’ve recently fallen into the world of big “teddy bear” MMCs who fall hard for their FMCs. Tia Louise’s newest book, The Way We Score, is a lovely, engaging romance that reminds us that first loves are hard to get over. In this story, Olivia and Garrett, are high school sweethearts who lose each other to long distance in college. Years later, newly divorced Olivia returns home for her friend’s wedding, only to be met with Garret, her friend’s older brother and the one “who got away.” Attraction is re-kindled, and the two spend a passionate night on the night of the wedding. A couple of months later, Olivia, who has since left town out of a fear of her growing attraction to Garrett, realizes she is pregnant. She also misses the simplicity and ease of her hometown, so she returns to their small town to be near her mother. What she doesn’t expect is Garrett deciding he would end his football career so he can be close to her and the baby. Over time, they grow closer and realize they want to be together. When a couple of incidents threaten their happy lives, Olivia and Garrett work together to find solutions, landing squarely in their happy ending.
From the start, Tia Louise crafts Olivia and Garrett so that you cannot help but root for them as a couple. Garrett clearly adores Olivia, and Olivia has never moved past her feelings for Garrett, even though she works hard to ignore them. Their chemistry is off the charts. It is easy to love them throughout this story. In fact, there is no third-act break-up here; instead, they have to learn to navigate some challenges which Louise quickly resolves for her reader without much tension.
This new series from Tia Louise, The Bradford Boys, has become one of my favorites of hers. Louise writes them as realistic; they are characters you cannot help but swoon over. Adding to that realism is a small town filled with characters who add dimension to each of her stories in this series. One of my favorite parts is the Dare Dish challenges of the fictional Cooters & Scooters found in each of the series’ stories. It’s the moment when the characters come together with banter and sibling love. You cannot help but love the Bradford family and their community.
My only criticism relates to a slight plot point with Olivia’s husband. Creating that complication seemed unnecessary. It seemed tangential and out of focus. However, it’s a small moment in a larger enjoyable read.
If you’re looking for a story that grabs at your heart, steams up your glasses, and leaves you with all of the small town happily ever after feels, run and grab this book.
Tropes: second chance romance; single divorced dad; close proximity – neighbors; soulmates
Nora Everly has been a staple of the Smartypants Romance world. Her Oh Brother! Series is a favorite, as it’s easy to fall hard for the Monroe brothers. Everly continues this world in her newest story, Passing Notes, book 1 of the new Teachers’ Lounge series. In this book, Nick and Clara are high school sweethearts, split apart by some manipulations, only to be reunited years later. When Nick moves next door to Clara, their latent chemistry is ignited, and they must decide if they want more.
Clara is the sister of the FMCs in the Monroe brothers’ stories, and I love that Everly found a space for her to inhabit. I loved her edginess; she’s the grump of this story. It’s Nick’s almost golden retriever, pining characterization that humanizes her. My issue with Everly’s book, however, is her choice to delay a talk about the past. In my opinion, it was delayed too far into the story, and it felt manipulative to me. Instead, for me, there was a repetition of Nick and Clara’s struggles. As they grow close, one or both of them push the other way, which grows tiring after a while. They simply needed to talk, and Everly kept that from happening with too much delay.
Does Passing Notes have the charm of Smartypants Romance’s small-town world? Indeed. Am I looking forward to more stories in the Teachers’ Lounge series? For sure. Do I think Nora Everly could have taken Nick and Clara in a different direction, granting us more spice and more development of their relationship? Absolutely. She wrote a beautiful ending for this couple, and you’ll end the story with a swoony sigh. It’s the middle of the book that needs a bit more focus.
Tropes/Characteristics: soulmates; morally gray MMC; single mom; standalone in an interconnected series; found family
I didn’t realize how much I needed to read Kristen Ashley’s Rock Chick Rematch. If you’ve read her Rock Chicks series, Darius Tucker is the silent yet present, morally gray character who keeps on giving to the resolution of trepidatious situations. Yet, until now, his story along with his soulmate, Malia’s, has been unknown. Reading Rock Chick Rematch was like returning home after a long time away. Unlike many of my fellow Rock Chicks, I don’t do an annual re-read of Ashley’s stories. That’s simply because her book list is so prolific that I find myself working through it still after beginning to read her a year and a half ago. Even more, whether you are reading one of her novellas from 1001 Dark Nights/Blue Box Press or independently published full novels, Ashley treats her readers to a full meal of story. I can’t tell you the number of times I leave a novella wanting more. This isn’t the case with Rock Chick Rematch; instead, she gifts you a story between two long-suffering, but deeply-in-love characters who receive the happiest of endings. It has everything you love about the Rock Chicks and the Hot Bunch: an undying love, an MMC who protects beyond any measure of his own happiness, and a quirky, but independent FMC who keeps him and his “brothers” on their toes.
What did I love about Rock Chick Rematch?
Malia is fierce. Kristen Ashley knows that you can’t gain entry into the Rock Chick world unless you can go toe to toe with a possessive, alpha-male Hot Bunch guy. I love strong female characters, and Kristen Ashley’s portrait of Malia and the Rock Chicks is exactly that. While Malia doesn’t know herself when she’s young, she figures it out quickly, and she doesn’t suffer fools, namely Darius. In fact, my only disappointment was how quickly she forgives Darius for a secret, and I understand this is a novella so KA has only so much space to write this story. However, I felt Malia’s pain and hurt, and I wanted her to revel in it a bit more. Even more, I wanted it seen and acknowledged more by the participants in that secret. Kristen Ashley has written a saint in Malia.
I loved Darius’s journey. That we are gifted his story is a treasure. My favorite moments of Rock Chick Rematch are Malia’s realization that Darius has become the best of his father. I won’t divulge more details, but Darius’s swooniness comes through his need to protect and care for Malia and their son, Liam. A morally gray character is always one of my favorites, and Darius has taken a top 10 spot of morally gray romance heroes for me after this book.
The reunion with the Rock Chicks and Hot Bunch. This is the sweet cream of this story. If you’ve read this series from Kristen Ashley, you know that it never lets go. It sticks to your ribs forever. Being granted the opportunity to return to it, to recognize the parallels of other stories as Kristen Ashley divulges Malia and Darius’s story is the thing that will make bubbles in your soul. Everyone is here. Everyone. And there’s a nod to the future. For me, this is Kristen Ashley’s superpower: developing her universe and allowing us continued access to it even when a particular world seems closed. She knows her reader fans, and she gifts us stories such as Rock Chick Rematch constantly, earning our undying love.
Rock Chick Rematch is all caps DIVINE. I inhaled this story of lost love and love regained. I am so thankful to Kristen Ashley for writing this beautiful book about soulmates who needed to wait for their time. In the end, they find it and a wealth of happiness that will absolutely warm your soul.
Tropes: marriage of convenience; grump/sunshine; pro football MMC; soulmates
Ilsa Madden-Mills will always be a must-read author for this reader. Her stories hit you right in the heart and tend to last long past their reading. Her newest romance, My Darling Bride, is an engaging, yet uneven marriage of convenience romance. When her MMC, Graham, requires a bride to acquire an inheritance as help for his brother, he chooses Emmy, the woman who “borrowed” his Lamborghini, as her penance. There is actually more to it, but Graham, the ever-serious grump who is too focused on football, cannot admit his attraction and interest in her. Madden-Mills’s story is a journey of tears and smiles as Graham comes to recognize his need for Emmy.
There is much to love about My Darling Bride:
*Emmy and Graham’s chemistry is at the top of this list. It’s clear from their meet-cute in the hallway of a motel in Arizona. Their attraction to each other is undeniable, and Madden-Mills deftly builds on that attraction throughout their story, turning up the heat once they return to New York. It is everything you expect from one of her romances.
*Graham’s struggles with life change make for an emotional read. Through his character’s journey, Madden-Mills is able to highlight the inherent danger of football, notably CTE. She has written Graham to struggle with his identity and whether he can be more than football. It’s this struggle that infuses him with the “grump” trope so many of us love in romance; however, he is more cinnamon roll hero as he becomes Emmy’s protector, even when he can’t explain the “why” behind it. Even more, Graham’s family life is fraught, and Madden-Mills uses it as a contrast to Emmy’s loving family, one she created.
*I connected the most with Emmy. She’s the woman who has taken care of everyone around her. Through her journey, Madden-Mills interrogates the trauma of DV in one’s past. There is nothing overt about it in the story, so I don’t think Madden-Mills’s book requires a content warning, but it’s good to acknowledge. With Emmy, we receive the warmth of the story. She loves and is loved, but she sacrifices her comfort for the lives of those she loves. This reality allows Graham to swoop in and care for her. It’s here where Madden-Mills builds the emotion of her story. When Graham cares, it gives Emmy (and the reader) hope for their future. However, Madden-Mills doesn’t make it easy on her reader, and Graham’s subsequent disinterest in hiding his feelings breeds the angst of the romance.
I state all of this to show My Darling Bride‘s beauty, but I struggled with this story. There is something missing from this book: a disconnect at moments in the story. While I clearly understood Graham and Emmy’s relationship, Graham’s indecisiveness throughout much of the story undermines the development of feelings in their relationship. When they are first intimate, I was confused because it was difficult for me to accept they’d move so quickly given Graham’s insistence on space. I found this occurring at different moments through their journeys. And it made the believability of their coupleship difficult.
Ilsa Madden-Mills’s My Darling Bride is a beautiful story about recognizing what matters in life: love and family. But it doesn’t quite have the same magic as her former stories, and I wonder if Graham and Emmy just needed a bit more spark to pull this book together.
Lexi Blake has revealed the gorgeous cover for Live, Love, Spy!
Releasing: March 5, 2024
Cover Design: Frauke Spanuth
Life can often be awkward when you are a child genius. For Louisa Ward, that came in the form of meeting her one true love at age 12. TJ Taggart was perfect. But being a year younger and a full year ahead of him in school always made things weird. Working in the CIA has made her into a strong and capable woman. Until she sees TJ. Fifteen years later, she still gets butterflies every time she sees the gorgeous soldier, but she’s tired of waiting and ready to find love, even if it can’t be with him.
Not everyone knows what they want out of life when they are a teenager, but TJ Taggart could always see exactly where he wanted to go. But joining the Army would require a sacrifice. Since meeting Louisa, TJ knew his cousin’s brilliant, oddball friend was the woman he wanted to spend his life with. He couldn’t ask her to live that life with him. She was meant to change the world at some prestigious research job or maybe teach a new generation of geniuses like herself at an Ivy League school. There would be a chance to sweep her off her feet when his time in this dangerous life was done, and their happily ever after could begin.
On a top-secret mission, TJ’s unit is ambushed by an unknown adversary. No rescue is coming. As he waits to die, all he can think of is the time he wasted and how badly he wants to be with Lou. He’s more than a little surprised when his sweet, quiet girl shows up leading a CIA special ops squad to bust him out. Back in Dallas, it’s time to claim the woman of his dreams. He has a plan to win her over, until the adversary who almost killed him returns to finish the job.
New York Times bestselling author Lexi Blake lives in North Texas with her husband and three kids. Since starting her publishing journey in 2010, she’s sold over three million copies of her books. She began writing at a young age, concentrating on plays and journalism. It wasn’t until she started writing romance that she found success. She likes to find humor in the strangest places and believes in happy endings.
Jessica Peterson has revealed the gorgeous cover for I Wish I Knew Then!
Releasing: October 5, 2023
Cover Design: Najla Qamber, Qamber Designs
My grandmother has a saying: what’s done in the dark always comes to light, especially in small towns with big secrets. And I was hiding the biggest secret of them all.
Every summer I spent growing up at my grandparents’ coastal estate was the same. Same cousins. Same chaos. Same long golf cart rides along the beach.
But everything changed the summer I turned eighteen, when my grandparents’ new housekeeper moved in with her son, Riley. With his big personality and head-turning looks, he was the local heartthrob.
We fell in love instantly. Riley was my first everything. First love. First time.
And my first heartbreak when he dumped me at the end of the summer.
Ten years later, I’m back on the island for my best friend’s wedding as her maid of honor. Who’s the first person I literally stumble into?
Riley Dixon. Even worse? He’s the groom’s best man.
Being forced to spend an entire week together for wedding festivities quickly leads to more: hot hate sex, late nights of sneaking out, and unexpected revelations. The boy I knew a decade ago is gone, and the hate becomes…something else entirely. And I begin to wonder if Riley is hiding some secrets of his own.
I WISH I KNEW THEN is a small town, second chance romance set on the coast of North Carolina. It is a standalone novel coming October 5, 2023 to KindleUnlimited!
Jessica Peterson writes romance with heat, humor, and heart. Heroes with hot accents are her specialty. When she’s not writing, she can be found bellying up to a bar in the south’s best restaurants with her husband Ben, reading books with her adorable daughter Gracie, or snuggling up with her 70-pound lap dog, Martha.
A Carolina girl at heart, she fantasizes about splitting her time between Charleston and Asheville, but currently lives in Charlotte, NC.
But for me, there was only one man and he was destined to be both.
I used to believe in fairytales.
I thought my happy ending was inevitable.
Until I lost my father, my home, and the gorgeous golden boy I loved in the blink of an eye.
I rebuilt my life with one thing in mind – certainty.
I didn’t get my happy ending, but I spent my days making other people’s come true.
I wasn’t happy, but I was in control.
It was enough.
Until my first love crash lands back into my life and
I start questioning everything about my perfectly constructed life.
I realize that I may have moved on but my heart stood absolutely still.
And when he asks for a second chance, I throw caution to the wind and say yes.
Back in the grown up arms of the man he’s become, I rediscover a passion and pleasure I’d forgotten existed.
But our second chance is a double edged sword that forces us to face the minefield of our complicated past.
He starts asking questions
I’ve spent a lifetime trying to ignore.
In the battle between my future and my past, will love be enough to overcome the secrets that tore us apart the first time?
Grab Your Copy!
Meet Dylan Allen:
Before I was “Wall Street Journal and USA Today Bestselling Author, Dylan Allen”, I was a lawyer who was unhappy at work and a bookworm who wanted nothing more than to get lost in stories I loved. I’ve always written for myself as a creative outlet, but in the year leading up to my 40th birthday, I decided to do something that had always been on my bucket list…write a book.
I’m not an independently wealthy person and had no intention of leaving my career. I didn’t think it was even possible to make a living writing the stories that lived in my vast and dynamic imagination.
That book, now called Then Came You, was so warmly and broadly received that I decided to write another. And then another… And two years after I accidentally found this amazing career, I left my job and went all in on my dream.
It hasn’t been a smooth journey. It’s been full of volatile ups and downs. But, it’s been the most rewarding and exciting thing I’ve ever done.
My favorite part of this job is connecting with my readers. I’m so honored by the kind and interesting people who read my work and reach out to connect to me.
I write compelling, dramatic, emotional romances with exceptional, diverse characters you’ll root for and never forget.
I’m a self-proclaimed happily ever junkie, I loves creating stories where under dogs find a love worth fighting for. When I’m not writing or reading, eating, or cooking, I indulges my wanderlust by planning her next globe-trotting adventure.
I was born in Accra, Ghana, raised in Houston, Texas, and finds that home is where my heart is.
I’m a proud graduate of Tufts University, Howard University School of Law, and the London School of Economics. Nearly twenty years ago, I married the love of my very own book boyfriend and together we’re raising two wonderful sons who are the light of our lives.
I believe in the power of dreams and know that nothing is beyond our reach if we’re willing to work hard and step out of our comfort zone to grab it.
I hope you find hours of entertainment and joy in my books!
You know what I don’t have time for? The brooding, dark-eyed former love of my life showing up when my life is finally settling down.
I don’t have time for Hunter Buchanan and that intense look in his eyes. The way he loved me so perfectly all those years ago.
I’m the one who asked him to leave back then, my attempt at saving him from the chaos of my screwed up family.
I didn’t expect him back in Green Valley, looking better than before and with an empty ring finger. And I definitely didn’t expect him to still be in love with me.
I don’t have time for the things I feel around him, or how amazing it is when he touches me.
Most of all, for the broken heart I’ll have if I have to say goodbye again. I survived him leaving once before, but I don’t think I can do it again.
So there’s only one thing I can make time for… staying away from Hunter Buchanan.
‘Worth the Wait’ is a full-length contemporary romance, can be read as a standalone, and is book #4 in the Love At First Sight series, Green Valley World, Penny Reid Book Universe.
“I’m not your teacher,” I said. “Right now, I’m just the guy who’s supposed to make sure you don’t have to go back to fourth grade. And that means honesty from both of us. And trust.” I stood from the bench and held out my hand again. “You can trust me, Theo. But only make a deal with me right now if I can trust you the same way.”
It never occurred to me, as a teacher and then later as an administrator, to talk to kids like they didn’t have the same struggles as adults. They understood stress and fear and anxiety, albeit on a different scale, with different language behind it.
That scale changed as you grew up. Your responsibilities took on a different face, and you knew how to label those struggles. But to them—at their age—the responsibilities still felt like the whole world was pressing down on their shoulders. It didn’t help if the adults in their life pretended otherwise.
So I knew I’d won something big when Theo Rossman stuck his skinny arm out toward me.
He gave me a firm handshake, his cheeks turning pink when I returned it.
“You sound like Iris,” he said quietly.
My heart skipped unsteadily in my chest at his use of that name.
“Who’s Iris?” I asked calmly. So very, very calmly. I’d only met one person in Green Valley with that name. And as far as I knew, she’d never come back. Not that anyone had told me, at least.
“My sister. I live with her.” He tucked his hand back in his pocket, his face softening as he answered. His love for her, even if it wasn’t my Iris, was immediately clear.
Behind my ribs, I felt a hot squeeze of pressure while my mind absolutely fucking raced.
“I knew an Iris once.” I watched his face as I said it. “She’d probably be about thirty-two now.”
His eyes narrowed, mental calculations evident in his face. “I think that’s how old my sister is.”
My breathing was choppy, my lungs struggling to pull in enough oxygen. “The Iris I knew … her last name wasn’t Rossman.”
He kicked at a stick, so blissfully unaware that all my insides were jolting with unchecked pulses of electricity at the mere thought of it being her.
“Yeah, she’s my half-sister. She had a different dad, so she has a different last name.”
“What’s your sister’s last name?” I asked, fighting the urge to grab him by the shoulders and shake the truth from his mouth.
At the sound of a car, Theo’s attention was pulled to the parking lot. In an instant, he transformed. Wide smile and happy, bright eyes as he waved at the driver of a beat-up-looking SUV. “That’s her. Iris Black.”
I swiped a hand over my face and tried to check my breathing.
Check my pulse.
My ability to stay fucking conscious.
This was it. All the sleepless nights I’d wondered if I’d ever see her again. Wondered how I’d ever walked away from her, why I believed her when she said she didn’t have room for us in her life. If respecting her choice would damn me to a life that would always feel a little empty. Where every day held a slight edge of grief, something that might have worn down over the years but could still damage me if I caught it in the right way.
The last time I saw Iris Black, she wept as she told me to leave. That she couldn’t—wouldn’t—make room in her life for some great big destined romance. That she couldn’t—wouldn’t—believe that it was true.
The last time I saw her, I told her I’d love her for the rest of my life, whether she was in it or not. And I walked away all the same.
And there it was.
A gentle snap, a whisper-soft snick of something sliding back into place underneath my ribs. The shift of something that had been out of place since the last time I saw her. The realization came as quick as a thunderbolt and just as powerful. As I slowly turned toward the parking lot and she stepped out of the car, I knew this was the reason I’d come back to Green Valley.
It was her.
The one I’d loved since the moment I saw her.
Who I hadn’t seen in twelve years.
The one staring at me like she’d just seen a ghost.
About Karla Sorensen
Karla Sorensen has been an avid reader her entire life, preferring stories with a happily-ever-after over just about any other kind. And considering she has an entire line item in her budget for books, she realized it might just be cheaper to write her own stories. It doesn’t take much to keep her happy…a book, a really big glass of wine, and at least thirty minutes of complete silence every day. She still keeps her toes in the world of health care marketing, where she made her living pre-babies. Now she stays home, writing and mommy-ing full time (this translates to almost every day being a ‘pajama day’ at the Sorensen household…don’t judge). She lives in West Michigan with her husband, two exceptionally adorable sons and big, shaggy rescue dog.
Worth the Wait, an all-new second chance small town romance from Karla Sorensen, is LIVE in Kindle Unlimited!
You know what I don’t have time for? The brooding, dark-eyed former love of my life showing up when my life is finally settling down.
I don’t have time for Hunter Buchanan and that intense look in his eyes. The way he loved me so perfectly all those years ago.
I’m the one who asked him to leave back then, my attempt at saving him from the chaos of my screwed up family.
I didn’t expect him back in Green Valley, looking better than before and with an empty ring finger. And I definitely didn’t expect him to still be in love with me.
I don’t have time for the things I feel around him, or how amazing it is when he touches me.
Most of all, for the broken heart I’ll have if I have to say goodbye again. I survived him leaving once before, but I don’t think I can do it again.
So there’s only one thing I can make time for… staying away from Hunter Buchanan.
‘Worth the Wait’ is a full-length contemporary romance, can be read as a standalone, and is book #4 in the Love At First Sight series, Green Valley World, Penny Reid Book Universe.
Karla Sorensen has been an avid reader her entire life, preferring stories with a happily-ever-after over just about any other kind. And considering she has an entire line item in her budget for books, she realized it might just be cheaper to write her own stories. It doesn’t take much to keep her happy…a book, a really big glass of wine, and at least thirty minutes of complete silence every day. She still keeps her toes in the world of health care marketing, where she made her living pre-babies. Now she stays home, writing and mommy-ing full time (this translates to almost every day being a ‘pajama day’ at the Sorensen household…don’t judge). She lives in West Michigan with her husband, two exceptionally adorable sons and big, shaggy rescue dog.
Professor Romance 