Mick Mulligan has just arrived back at her childhood home after a five-year absence. She’s determined to help her mother, Leona, care for the house she grew up in and resolved to adjust to life back in Connecticut. After the childhood loss of her father, Mick proclaimed herself a “humbug.” Mick is happier in an operating room that gathering around a Christmas tree. Holidays conjure painful memories for the doctor. The problem is, Leona Mulligan thinks she’s Mrs. Claus. Ruby Pope has lived next door to Leona Mulligan for five years. Ruby’s become Leona’s family, and Leona has been dubbed “Grandma Lee,” by Ruby’s six-year-old son, Logan. Logan and Ruby are about to challenge everything Mick had convinced herself to be true.Loss has played a significant role in both Mick and Ruby’s lives. Both spend their days tending to sick people in the hospital; Mick as a vascular surgeon and Ruby as an ICU nurse. Neither could save the person they loved most. Mick has made it her mission to make a difference for families like hers. One day she might save the life of a little girl’s father at Christmas. Ruby has learned that life and death are inevitable parts of the other. She views life through Logan’s eyes with a sense of possibility and wonderment. Can Ruby and Logan help Mick rediscover the wonder of Christmas? What will Mick do when she’s forced to live in her mother’s version of the North Pole? Humbug’s Holiday Homecoming is a story about finding the strength to love despite the inevitability of loss. It’s a journey of discovery, of letting go, and of learning to hold on again. What could be more magical than falling in love? J.A. Armstrong is a pen-name for best-selling author Nancy Ann Healy. Nancy is best known for the Alex and Cassidy series of political thrillers that includes: Intersection, Betrayal, Commitment, Conspiracy, and Untold. She is also the author of the best-selling novels, Falling Through Shooting Stars and All the Way Home. As J.A. Armstrong, Nancy writes several popular series: Off Screen, By Design, Special Delivery, First Course, Open Tab (The Whiskey Springs Series), and the new Journey of Discovery Series of erotic lesbian romance.

    But I was a leader, a risk taker, a girl who knew what she wanted and I most certainly wanted Raina. Emily Gold, head chef for one of Chicago’s most acclaimed French restaurants, is about to have her life turned upside down. She’s been picked to compete on the hit reality TV show Hot Chef! Everything has been falling into place for Emily in regards to her career as a budding culinary mastermind. But when you dedicate as much of your life to your work as Emily has, some things are bound to slip away from you… like your love life. All of that is about to change for Emily, however, when she’s introduced to one of her fellow competitors. Raina appears to be introverted and sweet on the outside, but inside of her burns a flame of culinary talent that instantly draws Emily in. The two become fast friends and as the heat in the kitchen grows, so does the heat in their relationship. But reality TV is never drama free, as both Emily and Raina soon discover. Will the desire Emily feels for her beautiful competitor overcome her desire to win Hot Chef? Or will this behind the scenes romance come out of the oven undercooked? Emily is determined to have it all, a great career and a partner to share it with, but the realities of unscripted television might just be writing a different script for this driven young chef.

    Within twenty-four hours, the blood made international news. All over the world, blood appeared out of the ground, even through concrete, even in water. Then the earth started growing hair and bones.Lea wants to ignore the blood. She wants to spend time with her new girlfriend, Aracely, in public, if only Aracely wasn't so afraid of her father. Lea wants to be a regular teen again, but the blood has made her a prisoner in her own home. Fear for her social life turns into fear for her sanity, and Lea must save herself and Aracely whatever way she can.

    Now a successful real estate agent in New York City, she’s brought back on behalf of a client, begrudgingly accepting her return home in order to close the deal of a lifetime. Coming back opens doors she’s done her best to keep closed all these years, namely, how she felt about her childhood best friend, Sawyer Kent. Sawyer’s spent her whole life in Kingsford, working at her family’s antique store and trying to make everyone happy. Quinn’s return is unexpected, knocking her routine existence more than a little off balance. She’s still frustrated at how Quinn left things between them, and even if she has all kinds of unresolved feelings, she’s got bigger problems to worry about right now.

    But then she gets a wrong-number text message from a stranger named Eliza, asking her of all people for dating advice! Eliza is Denny’s total opposite: witty, outgoing—and straight. Despite their differences, the accidental text sparks an unlikely friendship. Soon, Eliza—self-proclaimed queen of disastrous first dates—would rather banter back and forth with Denny than to keep trying her luck at online dating. When they meet in person, there’s an instant connection. But what Eliza is feeling can’t be attraction, right? It doesn’t mean a thing that she’s starting to wish the guys she dates would be more like Denny. Or does it? Can the wrong number lead to the right woman after all? Wrong Number, Right Woman is a light-hearted, slow-burn lesbian romance that embraces likable characters without all the drama.Length: 116,000 wordsTropes & themes: slow-burn romance, low angst, relatable characters, butch/femme, age gap, “toaster oven” romance, craft romance, Portland romance, shy character

    But always being there for others can’t give Johanna everything she needs—it can’t give her Reeve Hartt.Reeve is fierce, beautiful, wounded, elusive; a flame that draws Johanna’s fluttering moth. Johanna is determined to get her, against all advice, and to help her, against all reason. But love isn’t always reasonable, right?In the precarious place where attraction and need collide, a teenager experiences the dark side of a first love, and struggles to find her way into a new light.

    She’ll make the trip, but she doesn’t have to like it, and she certainly doesn’t have to make nice with a stranger on a plane.Artist Lily Andersen is excited to finally meet her online crush, the only person in the world who truly gets her. She just needs to survive the eleven-hour flight from London to Japan with a testy seatmate who by turns annoys and fascinates her.Fate, upgrades, and a troupe of travelling clowns bring them together for a journey memorable for all the wrong reasons. Not only do they have nothing in common, they really can’t stand each other. But people are not always as they seem, and Celia and Lily are about to realise, there’s more than one path to love.Cover Artist: Tammy SeidickGenresContemporary / Romance

    All except for Luna, it seemed, who despite having mastered her craft, continued her fight in solitude.She was an enigma in their society—alone for far longer than any Guardian before her. Still, Luna remained hopeful that one day her soulmate would find her, and all the tender yearning would have been worth it.Then Gia stumbles into her life. Gia—who lives a Human life, in Human glamour, with a Human fiancé.Now Luna finds herself questioning everything that she—and the Guardians—have believed in for millennia.“Love isn’t always enough.” Luna had always understood the words, but she had never actually believed them.Genre: Fantasy, RomanceEditor: Ann RobertsCover Designer: Heather Honeywell

    Just when things are about to blow up, disaster strikes in the form of an avalanche, trapping the girls in an isolated region in the mountains.In order to survive, they must put aside their grudges and learn to work together to overcome the many obstacles nature has thrown at them.Can Jessica and Katelyn work through their differences and maybe, just maybe fall in love?Warning: This lesbian erotic romance story contains extreme graphic and sexual content, specifically lesbian sex and should not be read by those under the age of 18.50,000 word lesbian romance story.

    Everything Keile Griffen ever loved was taken away, including her family. Surviving a youth in Child Support Services has left her driven to succeed as an adult--and she has. A successful, sought after planning consultant, she maps out solutions for other people, but never for herself. When Hayden Davenport's partner walked out on her in the midst of planning their family, she decided to go it alone. It hasn't been easy, and she's not used to help. When her missing son is found by a stranger at the park, she's overwhelmingly grateful to the young woman. When her gratitude blossoms into something more, her first impulse is to protect her child--and her battered heart. All Keile knows is that fateful day in the park she fell for a pair of big, brown eyes. But if she wants a family she has to take a chance, a big one. She could win it all...or lose everything. Dillon Watson's tale of unexpected love unfolds in the beautiful southeast, and introduces an insightful new storyteller who explores the passionate commitment that leads to love and family.

    Jessica Badeaux, and their children are falling apart.In one life-changing moment precipitated by a spilled cup of coffee, the world Tully had so carefully constructed comes to an end. As Tully struggles to pick up the pieces, two women add to the complications—Dr. Kara Nicolas, the woman who stole her wife, and Libby Dexter, the young woman who moves in to assist Tully with the kids. Kara becomes her focus in the courtroom, and Libby offers more than a helping hand around the house.

    They are both successful doctors, but each longs to find that one person to share her life with. In a jaded world filled with cynicism, do dreams really still come true? Maybe all it takes is a wish upon a star...This short story is a mini-prequel to RJ Nolan's novel L.A. Metro.

    Online, she’s the great AlexTheDestroyer, leader of one of the biggest raiding guilds in Destruction of Elysium, a max level tank who kicks monster ass and she knows her way around every dungeon. In real life, she’s just Alex, a clumsy girl who’s hyper and too impulsive.Until she meets a healer who seems to be able to heal more than just her online character. Only, Alex can’t fall for her. The guild desperately needs a new healer, or they’ll lose their top rank.Can she risk the fate of the guild just to confess to the one girl who really seems to get her?Fleur is a girly-girl who loves flowers, dresses and being a healer in her favourite MMORPG.But in this online world, like in real life, she feels like she’s only playing a role, never truly herself.That is until she meets a tank who seems to match her play style perfectly. She’s curious but also a little wary.Can she really trust someone she met in a videogame?When Alex and Fleur meet offline at the yearly guild meeting, everything they ever knew starts to shift...

    Lana Novak hasn’t played violin in over twenty years, her musical life these days confined to being a devoted band mom to her clarinet whiz daughter Robin. She didn’t think she could get back into it after this long, but Melanie Feinberg, the outgoing, enthusiastic, and very cute butch orchestra director from Robin’s school, has other ideas.