Archives de catégorie : Contemporary Romance

HOW TO FAKE A LOVE STORY d’Aashna Avachat

She wants to break his heart. He wants her to fall in love. A messy revenge romcom for fans of Lynn Painter and Sandhya Menon.

HOW TO FAKE A LOVE STORY
by Aashna Avachat
Penguin Workshop, January 2027
(via KT Literary)

Photo Credit: Emily Zeng

Now that Lakshmi has returned to her hometown for her senior year of high school, she’s determined to “live a little”—as her new friend Emily would say. That means searching for love, chasing an adrenaline rush, and of course, studiously ignoring her former best friend and crush, Adil.

But after Adil carelessly meddles in Em’s relationship, her heartbreak leaves the girls wanting to give him a taste of his own medicine. What if Lakshmi broke his heart? She has her own reasons for wanting to get revenge, after all.

Meanwhile, Adil isn’t sure why Lakshmi left without so much as a goodbye. He’s been doing his usual thing. But when his romantic expertise is called into question, his friends issue him a challenge: to prove himself, Adil will have to get a girl of their choosing to fall in love with him. And they know one who never would—Lakshmi.

Adil needs to win Lakshmi over and Lakshmi needs to break his heart. They might know how to fake a love story, but as ulterior motives give way to genuine feelings, will they be able to build a real one?

Aashna Avachat is the author of Love Craves Cardamom (Penguin Random House/Joy Revolution, Spring 2025) and the editor of the anthology Study Break (Feiwel & Friends/Macmillan, 2023). She is a graduate of Harvard Law and lives in Chicago.

Aashna Avachat is a writer, reader, and lawyer from California. She studied English and Philosophy at the University of California, Berkeley and law at Harvard Law School. She is also the author of Love Craves Cardamom (Penguin Random House/Joy Revolution, Spring 2025) and Mischief Girls (Delacorte, September 2026). When she’s not working, she’s probably reading on a sunny patch of grass, going on long walks to grocery stores, or being cozy with one of her many foster cats. Visit her online at aashnaavachat.com.

MATCHA & MATCHES de Cara Tanamachi

Love & Gelato meets the cozy café romance trend in this irresistible opposites-attract summer fling story set on an idyllic trip to Japan.

MATCHA & MATCHES
by Cara Tanamachi
Avon A/HarperCollins, April 2027

THE VACATION FLING COLLIDES WITH THE CAFÉ CRUSH: Matcha & Matches serves up a new swoony, contemporary romance where a girl unexpectedly find love—and herself—in charming café aboard, proving that sometimes the best romance comes with splash of matcha foam.

TIKTOK-FRIENDLY TROPES: Combining forced proximity and rivals, MATCHA & MATCHES might hook BookTokers with the tropes they crave, but they’ll stay for Rina and Takashi’s unmistakable chemistry.

LAYERS BENEATH THE ROMANCE: The novel gains extra emotional heft by diving headfirst into Rina’s complex family dynamic: growing up with divorced parents, trying to bond with a father who’s lives an ocean away, and navigating cultural gaps she’s only just beginning to understand.

MORE TO COME: Readers won’t have long to wait for a new Brewed with Love book—next stop is Mexico! Horchata & Hearts is planned for Summer 2027.

Cara Tanamachi is the USA Today bestselling author of The Takeover, and the Diverse Writers and Readers International romance book literary award winner, The Second You’re Single. She also writes under the name Cara Lockwood, authoring 40 books, including I Do (But I Don’t), which became an original Lifetime Movie. She wrote the novelization of The Dater’s Handbook, a Hallmark movie starring Meghan Markle.

TOMMY FROM THE MOON de Daisy Garrison

A romantic coming-of-age novel set during a Broadway production of Romeo and Juliet, about an unknown actress whose co-star is her longtime celebrity crush.

TOMMY FROM THE MOON
by Daisy Garrison
Flatiron, December 2026
(via Sterling Lord Literistic)

Grace Franklin was never supposed to be Juliet. When she shows up to audition for the new Broadway production of Romeo and Juliet, she’s just there as a dancer. But the director, fed up with the big-name actresses auditioning, calls Grace in for a cold read, and changes her life. Then, she meets her Romeo: Miles Drake, cultural icon and the star of Grace’s childhood dreams.

As Grace and Miles are swept up in the thrilling whirlwind of rehearsals, their onstage chemistry is electric, and their immediate friendship evolves into something deeper. But Miles’ fame weighs on him in ways Grace can’t understand. And Grace is keeping a secret from him, too, about her connection to his first big break. As opening night draws closer, it becomes increasingly difficult to separate acting from reality, and Grace and Miles begin to spin out of control. Everyone knows how Romeo and Juliet ends, except Romeo and Juliet. Will Grace and Miles be able to write their own ending, or are they destined to be star-crossed, too?

Utterly immersive, brimming with joy, wit, and heart, Tommy from the Moon is an ode to being young in New York City, the camaraderie of backstage life, and two characters on the brink of adulthood in a tale as old as time, and fresh as first love.

Daisy Garrison graduated from Northwestern University and lives in Brooklyn with her friends. This is her first novel.

LOVE WALKED IN de Sarah Chamberlain

A sunshiny American bookstore whisperer clashes with the grumpy British owner of the shop she’s trying to save in this winning opposites-attract romance for book lovers.

LOVE WALKED IN
by Sarah Chamberlain
St. Martin’s Press, September 2025
(via Kaplan/DeFiore Rights)

He has a struggling bookshop. She has a knack for bringing bookstores back to life. As soon as she walks into his store, all bets are off…

Mari Cole’s whole life is her dream job: rescuing and revitalizing indie bookstores. Friendship? Love? No thanks. After a hard childhood, she doesn’t want to get too close to anyone. Besides, books have never let Mari down the way people have. Then she gets the offer of a lifetime: rescuing Ross & Co. Once the most prestigious independent booksellers in London, the store is a shadow of its former self and needs an expert outsider to turn things around. But the offer turns out to be a double-edged sword: Leo Ross, the store’s new owner, is as cold and hostile as the British winter.

For as long as he can remember, Leo Ross has known his future is becoming the next generation to run Ross and Co. He’s sacrificed almost everything he cares about, but the bookshop is still failing on his watch, and now there’s an obnoxiously cheerful American woman convinced that she’s going to magically make everything better. Leo’s life is difficult and messy enough as it is, and he doesn’t want her help.

When Mari and Leo are forced to work closely together to bring the store back to life, Leo’s icy surface thaws to reveal the passionate man underneath. As winter gives way to the possibility of new beginnings, Mari begins to see that true love could be even better in real life than in the pages of a book. Can they put their pasts aside and learn to let love in?

« A comfort read for lovers of books, Richard Curtis movies, and romance with a touch of enemies-to-lovers. » ―Kirkus

« The grumpy/sunshine trope animates this charming rom-com… Readers will fall in love with Mari and Leo as Chamberlain skillfully reveals their hidden depths and believable vulnerabilities. The result is a multilayered love story that hits all the right notes. » ―Publishers Weekly

Sarah Chamberlain is a writer, editor, and cookbook translator whose articles have appeared in VICE, The Guardian, Food52, and McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. When she’s not writing witty, sexy contemporary romance, she enjoys making dinner for her friends and family, watching Cary Grant movies, and setting records as an amateur competitive powerlifter. Originally from Northern California, she lives in London.

THIS IS WHY WE DON’T DATE SERIAL KILLERS de L.M. Gilmore

Fans of Brynne Weaver and Navessa Allen will delight in this killer dark romcom by upcoming author L.M. Gilmore. When your soulmate’s a serial killer, true love gives ‘touch her and die’ a whole new meaning—but all the red flags in the world won’t stop Roxie from being with the man of her dreams until death (or murder) may they part.

THIS IS WHY WE DON’T DATE SERIAL KILLERS
by L.M. Gilmore
Sourcebooks, January 2027

After narrowly escaping death at the hands of a serial killer, Roxie wants one thing and one thing only: her rescuer’s phone number. Too bad he disappears into the night, determined to return to his solitary life of hunting down the men who give serial killing a bad name.

The last thing Maximilian Ruscombe wants is to be saddled with an unhinged stalker who’s determined to make him out to be some kind of hero. But when Roxie puts herself in the direct path of another serial killer in order to draw him out, he has no choice but to kidnap her and take her in hand.

Only instead of showing fear at her captivity, Roxie kind of likes it. In fact, she’s never had a hotter experience in her life. She’ll stop at nothing to enjoy it again and again…even if it means convincing Max to let her be used as bait to draw out one of the worst criminals Sin City has ever seen.

As the pair of them join forces to catch a killer before time runs out, Max and Roxie discover that dating in the modern world comes with its challenges—especially when one of them is a sociopath and the other just wants her Happily Ever After.

L.M Gilmore is the open pen name of Lucy Gilmore, celebrated novelist in a wide range of genres, including literary fiction, contemporary romance, and cozy mystery. She began her reading (and writing) career as an English literature major and ended as a book lover without all those pesky academic papers attached. She lives in Spokane, WA with her family.