My man was absolutely deranged in this book. Loved it <3

Favourite dark Beauty and the Beast retelling.This is how I imagine the miniature model under the dome inside the castle looks like!

Definitely a niche request haha. This might not exist but I recently watched To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar with Patrick Swayze and I love himmmmmm. He dresses as a drag queen in the flix and makes friends with an abused housewife. I am looking for a book with a straight or Bi man who dresses as a woman and falls in love with a woman. Have any of you come across anything like that? I thought that mistaken identity would be entertaining, and dealing with possible gender fluidity would be interesting. Would love any suggestions! Thank you!

I love a good romance series that follows a particular group and each book shows a different member falling in love. But one thing I realized is that the groups are always males, at least all the ones I come across. It’s never a girl group each finding their partners. Why do we think that is? We always get the guys all meeting up together and giving the next MMC advice. The girl night equivalent would be just as good. Does anyone else feel the same or am I just in the wrong book section?

I will admit that I enjoy sport romances so male teammates make sense. But there are women sports too! And if it’s not a sports team, it’s a family of brothers.

Edit: thank you for all of the recs! I will be checking them out. I wasn’t implying that no female group series exist, just that I found them to be mostly male groups. And i’m not mad about it! Just observed and was curious about others thoughts But I see you all are saying I need to put down the sports and pick up the historical fiction!

Also, just to clarify, the books I am referring to are still dual POV. FMC is a main character. there is just a new FMC each book and we meet all of the MMCs in book one. Think Off Campus series

There were a lot of great comments about how a new FMC coming into an established world (that the guys are a part of) is a great device to bring the reader into the book. Also knowing that a majority of the book audience is female causes influence. Thank you for all the comments and discussion!

I went into this book expecting good things after loving her {Bad Billionaire Bosses Series by Kyra Parsi} but was truly blown away by this gem! As someone recently bored with the tropes that used to excite me, this was a great find. A perfectly executed enemies to lovers, with a true reason for their animosity that I could get behind, true dislike of each other as the plot developed, and the kind of switch from enemies to lovers that has you kicking your feet! I think I smiled through the majority of this book, teared up several times, and even let out a “no fucking way” that scared my child trying to watch Ms. Rachel. (Please don’t repeat mommy’s language!) Amelia and Zackary were both so endearing and had character development that warmed my cynical heart. The side characters were compelling and added a lot to the story. Overall a wonderful little story that reminded my why I love reading so damn much.

Plot:
Our FMC and MMC meet when she is 17 and he is in his 20s (don’t worry there is zero interest on his end, she’s dorky with braces, and he’s laser-focused on his career). Things go so poorly she dedicates her life to revenge with the passion only a teenager can muster. They go their separate ways and our story gets going seven years later. What starts with a lot of assumptions about each other, which I thought would become tedious, turns into the groundwork for amazing tension and banter. I’m still not sure how she put so much story in 233 pages but it felt like a much longer book in the best way. So many books use sex to develop a relationship, but we really get to witness the foundation of love form between these two.

Tropes:
- enemies to lovers
- workplace romance
- open door explicit
- revenge
- forced proximity
- forbidden relationship

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5
🔥🔥🔥🔥/5

I read this 2-star review for {Naked In Death by JD Robb} and immediately went to download it on Libby (it’s fabulous by the way) 😂 I’d love to know if this has happened to anyone else and see the reviews that made you want to read a book!

Saw this book on my recommended books on Goodreads and I like the premise but I’m not sure what the age gap is and Im not a fan of huge age gaps unfortunately. I can’t find any information on the MMCs age anywhere so if anyone has an idea or any knowledge on it before I start reading ( or dnf) I’d love to know.

Like the title says, looking for a book where the MMC is in a position of power and is slightly morally grey. Open to dark romance and romantasy. Preferably a moderate to long read. Thanks for any recommendations! 🙏🏼

To the developers of romance.io - I am obsessed and use your site literally multiple times a day. However i do not understand why i can only “exclude” tags (cross them out) on the find books feature. I need to be able to exclude tags when I’m browsing my own TBR bookshelf!! Or even when I’m browsing a specific author’s bibliography.
If anyone has a workaround I’d love to hear it

(while we’re at it I’d also love a single POV tag but I digress)

Hello. I'm in a huge reading slump and was hoping you all could help out.

Every year, it seems like there are quite a few Halloween-flavored romance and erotica anthologies available, but if you get a free sample, the writing just isn't it. I know people feel self-conscious asking for "good writing," but that is what I'm doing.

If you've read Halloween-adjacent anthologies that just blew you away, please drop the name in comments! I only have two guidelines this time

- Nothing too dark in terms of relationship dynamics.
- If there are Poly/RH and LGBT stories that's fine, but I'd like at least a couple of monogamous M/F stories in the mix.

ETA: For me, strong writing means good prose, decent characterization, and spice that isn't too crude or unintentionally goofy.

If there's genuine spookiness, all the better! TIA.

The MMC is powerful, famous, or politically important, while the FMC is an ordinary woman. They hide their relationship because his team, family, or public image demands that he be seen with someone more suitable. The heartbreaking part is that he loves her privately, but the world doesn’t know she exists.

The fmc really tried her best to be understanding and patient.

Bonus part if there is a breakup scene between them.

CR only please.
1st person pov

looking for a werewolf book where fmc rejects her husband and leaves town because her daughter wants the new woman (an old flame)to be her mom,.years later fmc returns because her best friends son is sick, she bumps into the ex and her daughter and walks away from them. She bumps into a boy and his father who is her exs rival and ex flames ex husband. Fmc and rival later makes an agreement of pretending to be in a relationship.

During the book she is become (forsaken)rogue and becoming unfeeling

I saw a tiktok and decided to read it (mostly because I loved the cover tbh).

TLDR: 3.5/5 stars. Will read more from the author, have already downloaded another one. Nothing I disliked here made the book bad for me, and the parts I did enjoy were genuinely memorable

Seriously, basically all spoilers from here on

What I loved:

- CW: mental health. heavy, HEAVY discussion mental health issues, including suicide, grief, self harm and deep avoidance. The author is half Mexican I think? And being from Latin America myself, boy we love to dismiss mental health issues; very heavily especially in men. I really appreciate how it was written. So seriously consider skipping it if it's a sensitive topic. It had me balling. 10/10 on that, no complaints.

- it's well writen and engaging, the characters and friend group are funny and a good time all around. I usually cannot stand 20-something-years old cast, but this one did not bother me at all. (other than some university/relationship drama that was very true to the age group and by God I'm happy I'm not 20 anymore. Still fun to read) .

What I did not care for:

- Could have been 150 pages short, easily. I looove me a huge long book. Give me everything. But it became skippable in the middle.

- Surprisingly, the spice, and that's 100% subjective and a me problem. I'll read anything if you promise me explicit filthy spice. Anything. I read a veggie tales inspired book last week. I'll read ANYTHING. that being said, the sexual dynamic here gave me pause. I felt it went from zero to "oh, ok, they're doing that. Right". Kinda didn't feel like it fit their personality? Also, a lot of boobs boobing on his POV. Not unreasonably so, but the boobs did boob

That's it. The mental health aspect of the book really made it earn a lot of points for me with how it was written.

Thanks for reading my long ass essay!

(Image description: An illustrated vintage-style book cover with a warm yellow background and dark green text that reads "PLEASE DON'T GO" by E. Salvador (the midnight strike l series).
​Top half: A woman in a yellow bikini sits by a swimming pool while a shirtless man lies with his head resting in her lap.
​Bottom half: Three small square frames showing a profile portrait of the woman, a baseball, baseball bat and swim goggles, and a profile portrait of the man in a green shirt.)

Hi RomanceBooks - welcome to Salty Sunday!

What have you read this week that made your blood pressure boil? Annoying quirks of main characters? The utter frustration of a cliffhanger? What's got you feeling salty?

Feel free to share your rants and frustrations here. Please remember to abide by all sub rules. Cool-down periods will be enforced.

Announcements

Hey, RomanceBooks! Here are some announcements before we get to all the details of what you read:

• Our Autumn reading challenge is live now, running through December 20!
  

Now…

Tell us what you read this week!

Please say as much or little as you like, but here are some ideas of helpful things to mention:

• Pairing (for example, f/f, m/f, or mmf)
• Rating, and your scale (4 stars out of 5)
• Steam level
• Subgenre (fantasy, historical, contemporary, etc)
• Overview/tropes
• Content warnings, if any
• What did you like/dislike?

Was there a book you loved? Recommend it in the appropriate trope megathreads.

Did you find a Kindle Unlimited book you loved? Add it to the KU Spreadsheet where appropriate!

Still deciding about what book to read next? Check out the Recommendation Resource in our wiki, or our seasonal Reading Challenges!

I was given an ARC copy of {Between Heart And Stone by Rachel Lynn} about a week ago, and I just finished reading it yesterday. I devoured it in 3 days.

🩶Blurb:

Avery Eden came to Ireland for one reason: to remember how to write.

Burned out and adrift, she rents the centuries-old Kilmorran Castle on the windswept coast, hoping two quiet months away from home will help her find the words—and the woman—she’s lost. Instead, she finds creaking floorboards, doors that close on their own, and the striking portrait of a man who seems almost impossibly alive.

Royan Wolfe has spent two hundred years haunting the castle he once called home. Forgotten by the world, he exists in silence until the lonely stranger wandering his halls begins speaking to the empty rooms...and somehow hears him answer.

As Avery uncovers Wolfe’s journals and the life he left behind, an impossible connection begins to blur the line between memory and reality. But some distances cannot be crossed, and some love stories were never meant to last.

Set against the mist-shrouded cliffs of Ireland, Between Heart and Stone is an atmospheric romance about grief, hope, and the extraordinary people who change us—even when they cannot stay.

🩶Tropes: Paranormal Romance, Soulmates and Soul Bonds, Yearning, Found Family, Friends to Lovers, Forced Proximity

🩶This book will be released October 31, 2026, and will be available on KU as well I believe.

🩶My rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I stumbled upon Rachel Lynn by happy accident a few months ago when I decided to step out of my comforting zone and try to sign up for my very first ARC reads. I actually started with someone else entirely, but her ARC sign up for her book {A Study In Shadows by Rachel Lynn} popped up on my feeds and I signed up immediately. After A Study In Shadows, she announced a couple of new books, including Between Heart And Stone, and I immediately signed up for this one as well.

On to my review (or rather gush at this point):

I loved it. I will admit, I am not the best at reviews as I am 100% a mood reader with too many strong (usually super excited) opinions, but I genuinely loved this book (and A Study In Shadows Shadows as well but that’s not what this is about). The FMC hit a little close to home, so I felt connected with her a lot and it was easy to sort of self-insert into the story itself. The MMC is a huge golden retriever with an Irish accent, and the chemistry between these two was incredible. I will admit, it is a bit cheesy at times, but I love some cheesy moments in cozy romance books. However, that doesn’t mean it’s just a cutesy, happy-go-lucky Hallmark romance. I sobbed at some moments when I probably should have been cheering because I knew deep down, it was going to wreck me. And wreck me it did.

I will leave you with that because I don’t want to spoil it, but Rachel has definitely moved up my list of some of my favorite authors, and the fact that she’s an indie author basically doing it all herself is amazing. She actually has another book releasing soon that sounds like it will be the start of her first trilogy, and I am so excited for her. I am going to be reading some of her other books here soon, because some of them sound really fascinating, and I haven’t been disappointed yet!

Anyway, thanks for taking the time to read my first Reddit book rave. I’m going to go slink back into my lurking hole. I just genuinely liked this book, and this author, enough that I wanted to make more people aware of her and her work.

So someone posted a small blurb about this book and I just had to read it. A witch needs a familiar or she'll fail out of witch school, so she tries a forbidden spell and accidentally binds a cat shifter. With an idea like that I figured even if the book was terrible I'd enjoy it. It was not terrible.

The author was a little heavy handed with some of her hints but otherwise I loved it. The witch is from a high ranking family and her mom runs the school. Between that pressure and the death of her father she hasn't been able to summon a familiar, despite doing really well on all her knowledge tests. So her third year is ending with still no familiar when she finds an ancient spell book with forbidden magic and figures it's better to use forbidden magic than be kicked out and have no future.

The shifter is an enforcer, who kills witches who break the law. His father is also dead, killed by a witch when he was a child. Did I mention the witches and shifters are currently in a cold war? Yeah, this is an enemies to lovers book.

The witch doesn't immediately realize he's a shifter but when she does they realize they have to work together to get themselves out of the situation they find themselves in, with a bond that the shift finds uncomfortably similar to a mate bond. Add in the fact they are being played with by a goddess, who has her own agenda, and family secrets that will tear the family apart, not to mention turn the war from cold to hot, and this book was amazing.

Also, for those who want to know they play with a lot of kinks, including shadow tentacles, bondage, and chase just to name a few. I liked that they didn't fixate on anything, it made the scenes more about them and less about the kink.

My only real complaint is that now I have to wait for the sequel to find out what happens next. The mcs did receive their happy for now, but the world around them is in shambles. Does anyone know when to expect the sequel?

{A Game of Cat and Witch by Ruby Rune}