Archives de catégorie : Contemporary Romance

OKAY, CUPID de Mason Deaver

From the bestselling author of I Wish You All the Best, the story of a cupid who thinks they know everything about love… until they fall in love themselves.

OKAY, CUPID
by Mason Deaver
Scholastic, January 2024
(via Dystel, Goderich & Bourret)

As a cupid, Jude thinks they understand love a little bit more than the average human. It makes sense — Jude’s been studying love their whole teen life. And, yes, there have been some bumps in the road, and they’re currently on probation for doing something that they absolutely, definitely shouldn’t have done… but they’re ready to prove they can make matches without ever getting involved.

Only… Jude’s next assignment isn’t about setting up two adults. No, this time Jude has to go to high school, with kids their own age. And the assignment is a tough one: two best friends who are meant to be more than just best friends… but who aren’t currently speaking to each other after a huge falling out.

Jude thinks they’ve got this one all under control, and that they won’t get involved whatsoever.

Which proves that maybe Jude hasn’t learned the first lesson of humans and love … It’s complicated.

Mason Deaver is a bestselling and award-winning young-adult novelist. Their first book, I Wish You All the Best, was an instant bestseller, being nominated for the Goodreads Choice Award and winning Pink News’ Best Young Adult Book award, as well as being named one of Cosmopolitan’s 100 Best YA Books! Their second novel, The Ghosts We Keep earned a starred review from Booklist, as well as praise from Publisher’s Weekly. They are a contributor to several anthologies, as well as the author of the horror novella, Another Name For the Devil. They currently call San Francisco home, where they watch too many movies.

SHOWSTOPPER de Tom Ramsay

A joyful and hilarious queer YA romance set in the mad mad world of musical theatre.

SHOWSTOPPER
by Tom Ramsay
TBA
(via Randle Editorial & Literary Consultancy)

In the bright lights of the West End, a competition – and romance – is heating up to bring the drama, plot twists and exhilarating highs that only musical theatre can.

Gregarious giant Olly is back at the UK’s most prestigious competition for teen performers to prove he has what it takes to be a leading man after he was sabotaged last year; determined to stand out like his favourite Broadway diva Bernadette Peters.

Nervous novice Tarun would rather be anywhere other than centre stage. Nominated after stepping into his school show under much duress; he’s been blackmailed into attending by his Mum and mates and knows nothing about musicals. As far as he’s concerned, ‘Chicago’ is somewhere you get deep dish pizza, and ‘Hairspray’ is something you buy in Boots.

So when the two boys get paired to share a hotel room, Olly can’t comprehend sharing with someone who doesn’t live and breathe the magical world of musicals, whilst Tarun thinks Olly is “way too much” and cannot decipher a single one of his references. But as they get to talking, they discover they’ve more in common than the opening number might reveal. Amidst the drama of rehearsals, could two boys be falling in love?

The novel is filled to the brim with humour, drama and queer joy, and is a laugh-out-loud page-turner that will be appreciated and embraced both by musical theatre fans and by those who are more sceptical. The love of musicals is irresistibly infectious, as is the romance, and it is perfect for readers who loved Heartstopper, Gay Club, and those who are re-discovering Glee (as well as those who remember it the first time around!)

Tom Ramsay works for a West End Producer as Literary Manager and Dramaturg, looking after new work and writers of theatre for the company. This role has included working on an Olivier-nominated play and helping to translate a musical about the life of Marie Curie from Korean to English. In his own writing, he is passionate about telling queer stories with the hope and optimism that he longed to find on bookshelves growing up, with a touch of theatrical magic for good measure.

THE FORGOTTEN BOY de Laura Andersen

Full of mystery, romance, and grief, THE FORGOTTEN BOY is a gorgeously written novel that tells the story of three powerful women who experience love and loss in vastly different time periods.

THE FORGOTTEN BOY
by Laura Andersen
Open Road Media, April 2024
(via Context)

1460: Ismay Deacon, caught between sides in the War of the Roses, tries to hide away in her ancestral home, Havencross. But when word gets out that she has a child, Ismay has to make a terrible choice to protect her son. The Deacon family disappears, but there are rumors of a young ghost haunting the halls of Havencross.

1918: Diana Neville, an experienced war nurse, is hired by Havencross School for Boys to run the infirmary. But soon there is knocking on her door in the middle of the night and she hears footsteps in empty corridors. Plus, the youngest students are reporting a ghostly boy luring them from bed in the middle of the night, all while the Spanish Flu hits Havencross. In the midst of the pandemic, the youngest boy disappears, and Diana has to face her deepest fear by going into medieval tunnels after him.

2018: Juliet Stratford is hired to spend the winter at Havencross to clear it out before it comes a luxury hotel. Juliet, an historian, throws herself into the mysteries of Havencross. Especially: Who is the forgotten boy that has haunted Havencross for so long? And is it the same boy that Juliet has begun to see in the echoing, empty house?

Laura Andersen is the award-winning author of The Boleyn trilogy, The Tudor Legacy trilogy, and The Darkling Bride.

BETTER LEFT UNSENT de Lia Louis

So many ways to torpedo your career and your love life… So little time. A woman accidentally reveals all her secrets in this witty and charming novel from the author of Eight Perfect Hours.

BETTER LEFT UNSENT
by Lia Louis
Bonnier, January 2024
(via Mushens Entertainment)

Two years ago, thirty-year-old receptionist Millie Chandler had her heart spectacularly broken in public. Ever since, she has been a closed book, vowing to keep everything to herself – her feelings, her truths, even her dreams – in an effort to protect herself from getting hurt again.

But Millie does write emails – sarcastic replies to her rude boss, hard truths to her friends, and of course, that one-thousand-word love declaration to her ex who is now engaged to someone else. The emails live safely in her drafts, but after a server outage at work, Millie wakes up to discover that all her draft emails have been sent. Every. Single. One.

As every truth, lie, and secret she’s worked so hard to keep only to herself are catapulted out into the open, Millie must fix the chaos her words have caused, and face everything she’s ever swept under the carpet. With her signature « tender and heartwarming » (Anstey Harris, author of When I First Held You) prose, Lia Louis presents another unforgettable and moving novel that is perfect for fans of Rebecca Serle and Emily Henry.

Lia Louis lives in the United Kingdom with her partner and three young children. Before raising a family, she worked as a freelance copywriter and proofreader. She was the 2015 winner of Elle magazine’s annual writing competition and has been a contributor for Bloomsbury’s Writers and Artists blog for aspiring writers.

SOUNDS LIKE A PLAN de Dwayne Alexander Smith & Pamela Samuels Young

SOUNDS LIKE A PLAN, the long-awaited second book from Dwayne Alexander Smith, is a dual POV rom-com suspense.

SOUNDS LIKE A PLAN
by Dwayne Alexander Smith & Pamela Samuels Young
Atria, July 2024
(via The Friedrich Agency)

Jackson Jones and Mackenzie Cunningham are both private investigators operating out of Los Angeles. While Jackson specializes in high-end clientele whose swagger matches his own, Mackenzie is scrappy, defensive, and easily underestimated. Despite many years in the same industry, they first meet when they are both hired to find the same missing woman. Unaware that they’ve entered a competition, they keep bumping heads until it’s clear that something suspicious is afoot. Equally attracted to and frustrated by one another, they soon realize that the client who hired them might actually be setting them up! Just as they shift from rivals to partners, Jackson and Mackenzie find themselves fighting for their lives, a string of bodies piling up around them. With no one to trust but each other, they race to solve the case before they can be forced to pay the price for their involvement.

Dwayne Alexander Smith is the author of Forty Acres, which was previously in development as a Feature Film at Netflix, with Luke Cage’s Cheo Hodari Coker attached to write, and Jay-Z attached to produce. Dwayne is also under contract with Audible to write an eight-episode original radio play for Kevin Hart and Charlamagne Tha God’s imprint. When Dwayne received an NAACP Image Award in 2014 for his debut novel, he happened to meet a fellow author named Pamela Samuels Young, whose novel Anybody’s Daughter won an award that same year.

Pamela Samuels Young has been widely published in both commercial suspense and erotica, and many of her characters have legal backgrounds that mirror Pamela’s own. Netflix is also developing Pamela’s work, having optioned the first two books in her Vernette Henderson series, which follows a Black female attorney from Compton, working in a corporate firm. Felicia D. Henderson is attached as Executive Producer (Empire, Everybody Hates Chris, Sister Sister).