Book picks similar to
Summer Alone by Amy Sparling


young-adult
romance
contemporary
fiction

The Whole Thing Together


Ann Brashares - 2017
    Since they were children, they’ve shared almost everything—reading the same books, running down the same sandy footpaths to the beach, eating peaches from the same market, laughing around the same sun-soaked dining table. Even sleeping in the same bed, on the very same worn cotton sheets. But they’ve never met.Sasha’s dad was once married to Ray’s mom, and together they had three daughters: Emma, the perfectionist; Mattie, the beauty; and Quinn, the favorite. But the marriage crumbled and the bitterness lingered. Now there are two new families—and neither one will give up the beach house that holds the memories, happy and sad, of summers past.The choices we make come back to haunt us; the effect on our destinies ripples out of our control…or does it? This summer, the lives of Sasha, Ray, and their siblings intersect in ways none of them ever dreamed, in a novel about family relationships, keeping secrets, and most of all, love.

Only for Him


Cristin Harber - 2015
    He’s the stuff high school crushes are made of, Mister Popular, and captain of every team. She’s artsy, cute, and not in his league, though fully aware of Summerland’s "I Dream of Dating Grayson Ford" support group.I can’t say no. The girl’s had my heart since before I knew it went missing.He hides a life of hell. His father hates him, his mother’s gone. Emma is his only savior, yet she doesn’t know her power over him. She’s the only girl he wants, the only one he could ever tell—though he won’t.I’m stronger, bigger, more of a man than he’ll ever be, but because I ruined his life, I’ve taken his crap, his attacks, the vulgar nature of his existence.Until she discovers Gray’s embarrassment, his humiliation. Emma fights for him, for a chance. Theirs is a Cinderella story that she believes impossible. But as the layers peel back, it’s just a guy who needs a girl in order to keep breathing.My mind is already doodling Mrs. Grayson Ford in imaginary notebooks. He has no clue where my head is at… But, given that I didn’t see what just happened coming, maybe I have no clue where his head is at either.______* ONLY FOR HIM is the first book in the Only series, all of which will release in Spring 2015.

Just You


Rebecca Phillips - 2012
    When her first boyfriend cheats on her, Taylor can’t even pretend to act surprised. After all, her own father left her mother for another woman after fourteen years of marriage, so it was only a matter of time before it happened to her too.Betrayed one time too many, Taylor vows to give up boys for good. But when she meets sweet, gorgeous Michael Hurst at a party, her resolve to stay single begins to crack. Maybe, in spite of her past, she can trust him not to break her heart. Taylor and Michael begin an exciting-but-cautious romance, hitting several challenges along the way—parental disapproval, family secrets, and the most daunting obstacle of all, Elena Brewster, a calculating beauty who is determined to make Michael hers.Not just another teen romance, JUST YOU is about learning to embrace the risks involved in trusting someone with your heart.

Lost & Found


Nicole Williams - 2013
    And there’s Rowen Sterling.After numbing pain for the past five years with boys, alcohol, and all-around apathy, she finds herself on a Greyhound bus to nowhere Montana the summer after she graduates high school. Her mom agreed to front the bill to Rowen’s dream art school only if Rowen proves she can work hard and stay out of trouble at Willow Springs Ranch. Cooking breakfast at the crack of dawn for a couple dozen ranch hands and mucking out horse stalls are the last things in the world Rowen wants to spend her summer doing.Until Jesse Walker saunters into her life wearing a pair of painted-on jeans, a cowboy hat, and a grin that makes something in her chest she’d thought was frozen go boom-boom. Jesse’s like no one else, and certainly nothing like her. He’s the bright and shiny to her dark and jaded.Rowen knows there’s no happily-ever-after for the golden boy and the rebel girl—happily-right-now is a stretch—so she tries to forget and ignore the boy who makes her feel things she’s not sure she’s ready to feel. But the more she pushes him away, the closer he seems to get. The more she convinces herself she doesn’t care, the harder she falls.When her dark secrets refuse to stay locked behind the walls she’s kept up for years, Rowen realizes it’s not just everyone else she needs to be honest with. It’s herself.

April Showers


Karli Perrin - 2013
    When April enrolls at Manchester University, it feels like a whole new life. New city, new house, new friends...new crush. Isaac Sharpe is the hottest guy on campus - with an even hotter reputation. After a chance meeting, April quickly finds herself wrapped up in all that he is. But what if all that he is isn't what it seems?Caught up in a battle between what she wants and what she thinks she needs, April meets Lukas Roberts. Lukas is the security blanket that she craves so desperately and she finds solace in their friendship. But what happens when she finds more than she bargained for? April has always been a big believer of fate, but will she learn that she's in control of her own destiny before it's too late? Join April as she embarks on a life changing journey of love and loss, which will have you laughing and crying until the very end.

The Rock Star's Daughter


Caitlyn Duffy - 2011
    After all, he is the lead singer of a world-famous rock band, constantly on the cover of music magazines and giving interviews on MTV. He pays for Taylor to attend the Treadwell Academy, a prestigious boarding school in Massachusetts, and provides her mother with monthly checks to cover her basic needs, but has never made much of an effort to play an active part in Taylor’s life. Taylor's mom Dawn is the only family she has ever really known, and because of Dawn's hard-partying Hollywood lifestyle, studious Taylor is happiest on the other side of the country in Massachusetts with her nose buried in a book.When Taylor 's mom unexpectedly dies the summer before Taylor starts her junior year, she receives a crash course in fame. She has no choice but to join her father and his new family on their summer concert tour before she has even had a chance to mourn the loss of her mother. Life as the daughter of a rock star seems like it would be enviable, but Taylor can't figure her dad out. He seems like a supportive authority figure (even if he's kind of a fashion tragedy) , but she is collecting a growing pile of evidence that he's a liar and a cheat. Her stepmother, Jill, can’t seem to decide if she wants to treat Taylor like a girlfriend or a nuisance. Having had no time to grieve and say goodbye to her childhood before being thrust into the limelight, Taylor is suddenly finding herself in situations she could have never imagined before this summer.With no one else to turn to, Taylor falls head over heels in love with Jake, the teenage son of one of the band's touring groupies. Taylor has growing concerns about Jake's background and the suspicious relationship between his mom and her own father, but is desperate for something real in her life onto which she can build a future. When Jake offers Taylor an opportunity to join him on a whirlwind adventure and leave her problems with her father far behind, Taylor has to decide – should she carve out her own way in the world, or try to repair the relationship she has with her only living parent? Over the course of the summer with the band, Taylor learns the depths of her own strength, the difficulty of overcoming loss, and that the definition of family means much more than shared bloodlines.

Silence


Natasha Preston - 2012
    At the age of five, she stopped talking, and no one seems to know why. Refusing to communicate beyond a few physical actions, Oakley remains in her own little world. Bullied at school, she has just one friend, Cole Benson. Cole stands by her, refusing to believe that she is not perfect the way she is. Over the years, they have developed their own version of a normal friendship. However, will it still work as they start to grow even closer? When Oakley is forced to face someone from her past, can she hold her secret in any longer?

Unspeakable


Michelle K. Pickett - 2015
    No one will break me. I’m strong. Breathe. Just breathe.”On the outside, Willow appears to have it all. She’s beautiful, smart, from an influential family, and she dates the most popular guy in school—Jaden. But she would walk away from it all in a second. Willow is tormented by lies and suffocating guilt, not the hearts and flowers people believe her life is full of. She carries a dark secret. Plagued by nightmares and pain, the secret dominates her life. If she hadn’t walked away. If she had just…but she didn’t. And now she has to live with her choice. But when someone uncovers her family’s past, they use it against her, crushing her spirit little by little. She tells herself she just has to make it to graduation. Then she can leave Middleton, and her secret, far behind.When Brody transfers to Cassidy High, he turns Willow’s life upside down. He shows her what it feels like to live again, really live. And suddenly, she isn’t satisfied with just surviving until graduation. She wants a normal life—with Brody—and he wants her. But the closer they become, the more it threatens to unravel the secret she’s worked so hard to hide.Willow finds true love with Brody. Will she let his love save her, or walk away from him to keep her secret safe?

Thin White Line


J.A. Templeton - 2013
    Within months, she goes from private school and posh beachside living to public school and a sub-par apartment in rainy Washington. On her first day at her new school, Kenzie is reunited with her cousin Brooke, a rebellious senior who sings in a popular rock band with two of the sexiest men Kenzie has ever met. Kenzie is soon swept into a world of partying, concerts and tattooed bad boy rockers. Just when she starts to feel like she finally belongs, a single night and a fateful decision changes everything. *New Adult Romance--17+ due to adult situations.

If We Kiss


Rachel Vail - 2005
    I managed not to crash into him. I tried to look calm, cool, unperturbed. I told myself not to laugh, especially not a snorting kind of laugh. "Wha . . . what did . . ."And then he kissed me.Charlotte (Charlie to her friends) finds herself falling for a boy who is off-limits. Her best friend is in love with him, and her mother and his father are dating. Still, Charlie can't help but wonder, what would happen if we kiss?

Happenstance


Jamie McGuire - 2014
    Erin Easter, raised by a neglectful single mom, keeps to herself and admires Weston Gates from afar. The other Erins, Erin A. and Erin M. are the darlings of the community: daughters of the two wealthiest families in town, best friends, cheerleaders, and everything Erin Easter isn't--and they never let her forget it. Erin A. has even claimed Weston since the 8th grade.Weston is a well-liked star athlete, and the son of two prominent attorneys. He struggles daily with the pressures of living up to his family name and secretly empathizes with Erin Easter's feeling that she belongs somewhere else; in a different life. Not until he begins sneaking nights out with Erin does he gain the courage to buck expectations and acknowledge his feelings ... both for his future, and for her.But when a shocking tragedy rocks the tiny town, Erin's life is turned upside down in the best way possible. But when the truth is revealed and everything Erin thinks she wanted falls into her lap, life only becomes more complicated.

Throwaway


Heather Huffman - 2010
    But even if Jessie could walk away from Spence, there are darker forces of evil who won't let her go that easily. In this romantic suspense, author Heather Huffman delivers an adventure from the vibrant streets of St. Louis to the caves of the Ozarks as Jessie discovers whether she can love another, whether she can love herself, and whether any of it is enough.Throwaway is the first installment in the surprisingly warm and funny series The Throwaways, twelve novels that don’t shy away from the dark corners of this world but always shine the light of hope. At the core of the series is a group of strong but often unlikely heroes and heroines coming from all walks of life whose lives intertwine as they fight for justice, for love, and to leave their indelible mark on this world.Immerse yourself in a world of suspense, laughter, and love with The Throwaways.

The Party


Katie Ashley - 2013
    But after standing up as godfather for his great-nephew, Mason, that’s just what he gets at the Christening Party. Escaping the wrath of his father and sisters, he wants nothing more than to get to the company Christmas party. There he knows he can knock back a few stiff drinks and find some new no-strings-attached girl to take home for the night.The last thing Emma Harrison wants is to attend another party—least of all one at work. After throwing the annual life celebration (for the anniversary of her fiancée’s death) with close friends, she’s finally gotten the courage to take matters into her own hands and become a mother. Convincing her slightly inebriated best-friend, Connor, to be her sperm donor was a lot easier than she thought, and all that’s left now is to start the process. But at her best friend and work colleague, Casey’s, insistence, she decides to make an appearance at the company Christmas party for her new boss’s sake.Neither Aidan nor Emma could imagine what fate had in store for them at the party.

Forever Ours


Trisha Leigh - 2017
     
 After years of being tossed from one foster home to another, Claire arrives at the home of Jackie Knight and her son, tattooed guitarist Chris Knight. Chris becomes Claire’s first friend and first love. But Chris's dreams of musical stardom and Claire’s need for a stable home put their love at odds. Chris struggles with his plans for the future, entirely reluctant to leave Claire behind; until Claire does something that may break their love — and the only home she’s ever known — forever.

Operation Cinderella


Hope C. Tarr - 2012
    After he smears her article on his show, nearly costing Macie her job, she devises a plan to masquerade as a modern-day Cinderella and get her revenge on the infuriating Texan.All Ross wants is a woman with old-fashioned values to be his housekeeper and role model for his troubled teenage daughter. When the perfect woman shows up, Ross is relieved—until he finds himself drawn to his gorgeous, red-stiletto-wearing new employee. “Martha Jane” is opinionated and sexy, and Ross is intrigued…and more than a little turned on.Macie thought Operation Cinderella was foolproof, but Ross, with his rugged good looks and southern charm, proves to be as perfect behind-the-scenes as he does in public. But when she finally uncovers a secret that could destroy Ross's reputation, she faces losing her job or losing the fairy-tale ending she didn't even know she wanted.