Book picks similar to
Above The Surface by Serena Akeroyd
sports
contemporary-romance
virgin-heroine
not-safe
Rising
Jessica Ruben - 2018
Anonymity is key in my neighborhood—particularly as a lone female walking at night. All I want is to leave my crime-ridden shadow of a home in New York City. I’ve done everything I can to keep my head down and focus on my studies. College is my only goal; love has never been on the map… That is, until my sister brings me to an underground fight, where I meet a gorgeous and mysterious man: Vincent. He is the ghost in my shadows, showing up to feed me pieces of his upper-crust life, then evaporating into darkness until his next visit. I’m falling hard and fast. How can I trust him amidst the depth of his secrets? Vincent may be even more dangerous than the dark world I’m trying to escape.
The Cheat Sheet
Sarah AdamsSarah Adams - 2021
The first step is admitting, right? Except, I can never admit it to him because he clearly doesn’t see me that way, and the last thing I want is for things to get weird between us.Nothing but good old-fashioned, no-touching-the-sexiest-man-alive, platonic friendship for us! Everything is exactly how I like it! Yes. Good. (I’m not crying, I’m just peeling an onion.)Our friendship is going swimmingly until I accidentally spill my beans to a reporter over too much tequila, and now the world seems to think me and Nathan belong together. Oh, and did I mention we have to date publicly for three weeks until after the Super Bowl because we signed a contract with...oops, forgot I can’t tell anyone about that! Bottom line is, now my best friend is smudging all the lines and acting very un-platonic, and I’m just trying to keep my body from bursting into flames every time he touches me.How am I going to make it through three weeks of fake dating Nathan without anything changing between us? Especially when it almost-sort-a-kinda seems like he’s fighting for a completely different outcome?Send help.XO Bree
The New Girl: A Pacific High School Bully Romance (Pacific High Series Book 1)
Ashley Rose - 2020
My mom thinks sunshine, the beach and fresh air is just what I need. Which would be great if I didn’t also mean having to be The New Girl at Pacific High. Because apparently, that role comes with a target on my back. Hunter West is the king of the school, the popular, rich and spoiled bad boy who also happens to be drop dead gorgeous. They warned me about him and said that he won’t stop until he gets what he wants. And he wants me. But he’s the baddest of bad boys, and he seems dead set on becoming my worst nightmare. You see, he’s never had anyone say no before. Until he met me. But I don't like bullies. But he's not taking no for an answer. If he thinks he can change my mind, he’s got another thing coming. WARNING: The New Girl is the first book in the Pacific High Series. It is a young adult/new adult romance that at times deals with real-life gritty themes, sexual content and cursing. But if you want teen angst, heart pounding drama, and lust-filled romance, then this bad boy romance series will be right up your alley.
What You Deserve
Mary Martel - 2020
I thought wrong.Losing half of that whole left me feeling like I had nothing.It crippled me.Almost destroyed me.And left me with an aching heart, a slew of questions, and a need for revenge so strong I could almost taste it on my tongue.My name is Gem Stone. My twin’s name was Gin. We might have looked like the same person, but we were not. Divorce and a disgusting mother forced us apart at a young age, and a horrible family kept us that way.Still, we remained best friends—or so I thought.When you lose the other half to your whole, the other half of your soul, you lose everything.But I wasn’t ready to give up everything, even when I felt like I was dead inside.My twin kept a secret from me. One that changed everything and made me look at her in a whole different light.I ache for answers to my questions, and I find salvation where I shouldn’t. Mostly, I crave some type of vengeance. Something, anything, to make me feel better about what I’ve lost.What You Deserve is a 100,000+ word m/f/m contemporary book for readers 18 and up.
Master of Salt & Bones
Keri Lake - 2020
He'd ride up on his white steed and break the curse I've been fated to carry since the day I was born.Funny how things changed over time. How the fairy tale twisted into something far more crooked, darker than I ever imagined.In reality, my knight is scarred and broken, living alone in a castle of bones that overlooks the sea. He isn’t searching for me. He never was.Lucian Blackthorne is as cursed as I am, and equally shunned by the locals, the fishers of men, who believe him to be the devil in the flesh.Perhaps he is, with the way his amber eyes draw me in, ignite me like an infernal blaze. And the sins he whispers in my ear are as wickedly intoxicating as the man himself.Yet, his touch is heaven and his will is my weakness.He calls us forbidden, an unsalvageable tragedy, with no happy end. Maybe we are. But in this story, he’s the one who needs saving.
Until the Sun Burns Out
Amber Garza - 2016
He called me his summer girl, and said that was all I could ever be. But that didn’t stop me from wanting so much more.
Fables & Other Lies
Claire Contreras - 2020
Not until I met River Caliban himself, heir to a fortune of curses. My fated sworn enemy. I knew I should have stayed away from him. I should have run the other way when he called out my name, when he flashed that sinful smile of his, but instead, I walked toward him, leaving the light behind. Instead, I go against all reason, against all warning, and attended the gala of the year at his dark, allegedly haunted home at the top of the hill. The moment I step foot inside I know I’m in trouble, but there’s something about River that magnetizes me, reels me in, and when he asks for the impossible, I find it impossible to turn him away.
Aggro
Carrie Gray - 2020
Two boys.One tragedy.Grief bonds us.The mystery of this murder will break us.My best friend was brutally ripped from this world, but her brother and boyfriend are still here.One of them wants to use me.The other wants to forget me.Both of them make me feel alive.We’ll find Violet’s murderer, no matter the cost.Two boys.One tragedy.Grief bonds us.Love will tear us apart.**This is an emotional forbidden romance with dark themes that might be triggering for some readers.
Falcon
Michelle Heard - 2019
A life of luxury has left him with the notion that everything is attainable.Power. Wealth. Status.He’s a god and I a mere mortal.He’s Jupiter, and I am Mercury.There’s so much power in this man.He has the kind of influence most people can’t even begin to imagine.And me… I’m an eighteen-year-old girl who managed to make him lose control.I’m the girl who showed him there’s a kaleidoscope of colors outside the high walls of his black and white world.
Abducted
K.I. Lynn - 2020
His prison.The beast.A fate worse than death awaits me if I can’t get away, so when the opportunity of salvation presents itself I grab it, even if I’m unsure if I can trust the hand I’m holding.The only way out is through, exposing secrets and spilling blood.Things aren’t how they appear. Nobody is what they seem.Not even me.
Cry Baby
Ginger Scott - 2018
He doesn’t really have a choice, born into a gang that has a chokehold on every kid that roams its streets. He gave his life to them willingly, knowing if he did then one day this kingdom, led by boys drunk with power and ruled by fear, would all be his.He was loyal through it all. Loyal when prison took his dad away. Loyal when his face was touched by the cold metal of the rival gang’s gun. Loyal even though his mom begged him to run the moment she returned home from rehab.He thought about becoming someone else. It was hard not to crave the life of a regular 17-year-old. It’s the only reason he stayed in school—to pretend. But he always fell back in line.Loyal.Riley Rojas didn’t belong in Tristan’s real world. She should have only been part of the fantasy, one of the many faces he got to pretend with amidst rows of metal chairs and desks and whiteboards with assignments. But there she was, moving boxes from the back of an old pick-up into a house Tristan had shot up on a dare with his friends only a few months before.Tall enough to look him in the eyes and strong enough to fill his shadow, Riley took up space on his streets, her loud mouth fearless in the face of the gang leaders who terrified everyone else. She pushed Tristan around on the hard court, and she balled better than his friends—better than him sometimes. She challenged him. She needed him. He liked it. And when her pale blue eyes stared into his, he quit wanting to pretend.He couldn’t ask her to leave because she’d only dig her heels in deeper. He couldn’t ask because he didn’t want her to go. She was blurring his lines. She was testing his loyalty.He was falling in love.And it was going to tear him apart.
Two Truths and a Lie
Ashley Stoyanoff - 2015
I left everything behind—family, friends, school. It seemed like a good idea at the time. My only option, really, until I realized running from a police officer isn’t as easy as I thought it would be.It’s been exactly three-hundred and sixty-five days since I left home, but I’m finally ready to take the step I should have taken a year ago. I’m done hiding. I’m done running. I’m going to take my life back.It was supposed to be easy. A meeting with Jason Pierce, a private investigator, was set up for me. All I had to do was go to him, let him do his thing, and then I could go home, or so I thought.That is, until I met Jason and things got … complicated.
Avoiding Temptation
Rachel Van Dyken - 2019
Realized she was my best friend Finn's little sister second. And got a bloody nose third — compliments of Finn after he watched me nearly score with the new underclassman. After all I did have a reputation on campus, word on the street was that a girl could orgasm within one minute just watching me eat Lucky Charms. You can't make this stuff up — even though it was at least four minutes and included outside circumstances. Ahem, I digress. Point is, not only did I earn the attention of the worst sort of girl for me — my best friend's only sibling — but now she's out to seduce me. Me! One of the most famous Pleasure Ponies of them all! I can't shower — she follows me to the bathroom. Literally. I can't sleep — Lucky me, she lives in the same dorm. And I can't focus on anything except for her taunting eyes every single time something goes her way. I want her, but I don't want her to know I want her, and I definitely don't want to die before graduation, which is looking more and more likely considering we can't keep our hands off each other. Something's gotta give, and I have an inkling I should probably start writing my eulogy now because that something is probably going to be me.
Trouble in Hell
Alex Grayson - 2018
Welcome to Malus. Trouble and his brothers escaped from Malus, Texas as kids. In the dead of night, they left behind a hell so hideous, it made national news. Years later, they returned to make the place that was once their living nightmare, a safe place for those who have suffered just as they have. When Remi comes to town, heavily pregnant and in desperate need of help, as the town's only doctor, Trouble reluctantly offers his services. Little did he know the strong attraction he would feel for the woman. He fights it, tries to push it to the side, but it only grows stronger, nearly consuming him. Love is not something Trouble can afford to feel. Not when he still has vengeance in his blood and the need to punish those of his past. Not when he knows Remi would never be able to see past the merciless actions he must carry out. Remi has no time for love either, no matter how much her heart yearns for Trouble. Not when danger is knocking on her door, demanding something she'll never be able to give. Will the darkness in their pasts devour them, or will they find the beauty that's just out of reach? In a town like Malus, anything is possible.... DISCLAIMER: Intended for readers 18 years and older due to mature content, abusive situations, and harsh language. May contain triggers for some readers. Please read with caution.