Book picks similar to
The Forbidden Man by Elle Wright


romance
contemporary
like-kiera-from-thoughtless
needy-heroine

My Big, Huge Mistake


M.E. Clayton - 2019
    Growing up, he had been her best friend, and the man she secretly was hoping to spend the rest of her life with. So, the night they finally get their groove on-with the help of copious amounts of alcohol-she should be ecstatic. Thrilled, even. Well, she was. At least she was until that little plus sign appeared on that notoriously life-changing stick. Callum Rosewood had it all planned out. Graduate high school, go to college, get into law school, get hired on at one of the best law firms in the state, establish himself as a cutthroat attorney, make Chloe dump whatever shmuck she's dating, marry her, have three kids, and live happily every after. It was the perfect plan. Then one night, while drunk off their asses, they do the deed. But instead of reciting love sonnets, Chloe avoids him for weeks. That is, until she can't avoid him any longer. Now, while Chloe is trying to come to grips with the reality that she's pregnant by her best friend...well, ex-best friend now, Callum's pissed off that Chloe failed to mention she was NOT on birth control. He thinks she trapped him on purpose, making her reevaluate everything she ever felt about him. Word to the wise, my friends, if you're going to have a drunken one-night stand, don't have it with your best friend.

The Ground Rules


Roya Carmen - 2015
    Don’t sleep around.2. Don’t kiss and tell.3. Be nice.4. Don’t text or call.5. Don’t fall in love.The rules are simple...until they aren't.I have everything I ever thought I could want: a nice home, a job I love, two beautiful girls, and my husband, Gabe - my high school sweetheart who still rocks my world. If you ask anyone to describe me they would say, "Oh, Mirella? She's such a nice girl." And I was...until a mysterious, peculiar man and his beautiful wife enter our lives. Weston and Bridget Hanson are no ordinary couple—they’re stunning, enigmatic, and sexy as hell. During the course of one unexpected evening, my ordinary world is turned upside down. How could it not be when Weston and Bridget propose the unthinkable? And when the unthinkable is so very tempting, giving in becomes inevitable. It sounds so logical and simple. Just five rules and we can all have what we desire. But the heart doesn't follow rules, and now passion, jealousy, and confusion threaten to tear everything apart.Two beautiful couples. Five simple rules. One hot mess.

Once Tempted


Laura Moore - 2013
    And now that the family business has expanded to include a popular resort, he’s working harder than ever. Silver Creek is his legacy and his life, which is fine for the ruggedly sexy ladies’ man and committed bachelor. Love and trust don’t come easily for Ward since he lost his heart to a gold digger—until he meets a shy, unpretentious beauty whose sweet grace is about to turn his jaded heart into a hungry one.   Tess Casari has found sanctuary at Silver Creek, working as an assistant to Ward’s mother, Adele. Grateful for her busy new life running the ranch’s spa and resort, Tess can escape the heartbreak, humiliation, and secret shame of her failed marriage. The last thing she needs is temptation—especially from a man who reminds her so much of the husband who shattered her faith in love. But passion and destiny are about to change the rules for two people who have stopped believing in the healing power of love.Praise for Once Tempted  “[Laura] Moore’s first in her new Silver Creek series is packed with plenty of great, realistic dialogue and features two main characters whose actions and choices are easy to sympathize with. The glimpses of the hero’s two siblings will leave readers eager for their stories.”—RT Book Reviews  “When I read [Moore’s] books, I'm transported to the peaceful countryside with ranch homes and barns dotting the landscape. Once Tempted has all that and more.”—USA Today  “Ward is the perfect cowboy hero for a twenty-first century romance.”—Heroes and Heartbreakers   “Moore is a fantastic storyteller ensnaring your interest from the first page.”—Fresh Fiction   “Once Tempted is a sexy new read by author Laura Moore that not only gives us a tantalizing tale of undeniable love but also is a great start to a new series that's sure to speak to contemporary romance lovers everywhere.”—The Romance Reviews

Digging In


Loretta Nyhan - 2018
    Since his death, she’s been sleepwalking through life, barely holding on for the sake of her teenage son. Her house is a wreck, the grass is overrun with weeds, and she’s at risk of losing her job. As Paige stares at her neglected lawn, she knows she’s hit rock bottom. So she does something entirely unexpected: she begins to dig.As the hole gets bigger, Paige decides to turn her entire yard into a vegetable garden. The neighbors in her tidy gated community are more than a little alarmed. Paige knows nothing about gardening, and she’s boldly flouting neighborhood-association bylaws. But with the help of new friends, a charming local cop, and the transformative power of the soil, Paige starts to see potential in the chaos of her life. Something big is beginning to take root—both in her garden and in herself.

Wife 22


Melanie Gideon - 2008
    . . and finding herself again . . . in the middle of her life.Maybe it was those extra five pounds I’d gained. Maybe it was because I was about to turn the same age my mother was when I lost her. Maybe it was because after almost twenty years of marriage my husband and I seemed to be running out of things to say to each other.   But when the anonymous online study called “Marriage in the 21st Century” showed up in my inbox, I had no idea how profoundly it would change my life. It wasn’t long before I was assigned both a pseudonym (Wife 22) and a caseworker (Researcher 101).   And, just like that, I found myself answering questions.   7. Sometimes I tell him he’s snoring when he’s not snoring so he’ll sleep in the guest room and I can have the bed all to myself. 61. Chet Baker on the tape player. He was cutting peppers for the salad. I looked at those hands and thought, I am going to have this man’s children. 67. To not want what you don’t have. What you can’t have. What you shouldn’t have. 32. That if we weren’t careful, it was possible to forget one another.   Before the study, my life was an endless blur of school lunches and doctor’s appointments, family dinners, budgets, and trying to discern the fastest-moving line at the grocery store. I was Alice Buckle: spouse of William and mother to Zoe and Peter, drama teacher and Facebook chatter, downloader of memories and Googler of solutions.   But these days, I’m also Wife 22. And somehow, my anonymous correspondence with Researcher 101 has taken an unexpectedly personal turn. Soon, I’ll have to make a decision—one that will affect my family, my marriage, my whole life. But at the moment, I’m too busy answering questions.   As it turns out, confession can be a very powerful aphrodisiac.

The Guest Cottage


Nancy Thayer - 2015
    She knows her role in life: supportive wife of a successful architect and calm, capable mother of two. But on a warm summer night, as the house grows quiet around her and her children fall asleep, she wonders what’s missing from her life. When her husband echoes that lonely question, announcing that he’s leaving her for another woman, Sophie realizes she has no idea what’s next. Impulsively renting a guest cottage on Nantucket from her friend Susie Swenson, Sophie rounds up her kids, Jonah and Lacey, and leaves Boston for a quiet family vacation, minus one.Also minus one is Trevor Black, a software entrepreneur who has recently lost his wife. Trevor is the last person to imagine himself, age thirty and on his own, raising a little boy like Leo—smart and sweet, but grappling constantly with his mother’s death, growing more and more closed off. Hoping a quiet summer on the Nantucket coast will help him reconnect with Leo, Trevor rents a guest house on the beautiful island from his friend Ivan Swenson.Best-laid plans run awry when Sophie and Trevor realize they’ve mistakenly rented the same house. Still, determined to make this a summer their kids will always remember, the two agree to share the Swensons’ Nantucket house. But as the summer unfolds and the families grow close, Sophie and Trevor must ask themselves if the guest cottage is all they want to share.Inspiring and true to life, The Guest Cottage is Nancy Thayer at her finest, inscribing in graceful, knowing prose matters of the heart and the meaning of family.

Last One Home


Debbie Macomber - 2015
    After high school, Cassie ran away from home to marry the wrong man, throwing away a college scholarship and breaking her parents’ hearts. To make matters worse, Cassie had always been their father’s favorite—a sentiment that weighed heavily on her sisters and made Cassie’s actions even harder to bear. Now thirty-one, Cassie is back in Washington, living in Seattle with her daughter and hoping to leave her past behind. After ending a difficult marriage, Cassie is back on her own two feet, the pieces of her life slowly but surely coming together. Despite the strides Cassie’s made, she hasn’t been able to make peace with her sisters. Karen, the oldest, is a busy wife and mother, balancing her career with raising her two children. And Nichole, the youngest, is a stay-at-home mom whose husband indulges her every whim. Then one day, Cassie receives a letter from Karen, offering what Cassie thinks may be a chance to reconcile. And as Cassie opens herself up to new possibilities—making amends with her sisters, finding love once more—she realizes the power of compassion, and the promise of a fresh start.

Wild Raspberries


Connie Chappell - 2015
    She simply wants to fulfill her promise to Jack to visit their cabin in the West Virginia mountains, where their long love affair was safely hidden. Instead, her emotionally reminiscent trip becomes crowded with the two Sebring women, a grief counselor, and the massive role Callie assumes. She must speak for Jack in order to protect his four-year old grandson Chad from his stubbornly manipulative and blame-passing grandmother and his recently widowed and power-usurping mother. Callie understands both women grieve the loss of Chad’s father. He died when a raging storm split the tree that crushed him. Grief isn’t the only common thread running between the four women. One by one, their secrets are revealed on the West Virginia mountaintop.

Who Do You Love


Jennifer Weiner - 2015
    Born with a congenital heart defect, Rachel is a veteran of hospitals, and she's intrigued by the boy who shows up all alone with a broken arm. He tells her his name. She tells him a story. After Andy's taken back to the emergency room and Rachel's sent back to her bed, they think they'll never see each other again.Rachel, the beloved, popular, and protected daughter of two doting parents, grows up wanting for nothing in a fancy Florida suburb. Andy grows up poor in Philadelphia with a single mom and a rare talent that will let him become one of the best runners of his generation.Over the course of three decades, through high school and college, marriages and divorces, from the pinnacles of victory and the heartbreak of defeat, Andy and Rachel will find each other again and again, until they are finally given a chance to decide whether love can surmount difference and distance and if they've been running toward each other all along.With honesty, wit, and clear-eyed observations about men and women, love and fate, and the truth about happy endings, Jennifer Weiner delivers two of her most memorable characters, and a love story you'll never forget.

The Lilac Bouquet


Carolyn Brown - 2017
    After three generations of Massey women with children out of wedlock, she wants the whole town of Hickory, Texas, to witness the legitimacy of her union with Logan Grady. But dream weddings aren’t cheap. So she accepts a highly lucrative stint as a home health assistant to retired realtor, and town recluse, Seth Thomas—a decision her great-grandmother Tandy is dead-set against.Seth isn’t happy about it, either. The eighty-two-year-old doesn’t want a “babysitter”—much less a Massey—something he makes clear when Emmy arrives at his house, an empty mansion built for the woman who broke his heart. But as Emmy stays and the two eventually open up to each other, she learns the reason behind a feud between Seth, Tandy, and Logan’s grandfather Jesse Grady that goes back six decades. She also uncovers a secret that forever changes how she sees her past and her future…

Escaping Heartbreak


Regina Bartley - 2014
    Since she was fifteen she has taken care of everyone but herself, including her older brother Dane. She has been lying to herself to keep from feeling the pain of her parent’s death. Now she is twenty and she’s ready to start a life of her own. Moving into her parent’s lake house would be the perfect escape. Wouldn’t it? That’s what she thought. Only, it led her right into the emotional place she’s been hiding from all this time. All of those years of running from her feelings, she now has to face them. It’s too much. She can’t deal with it alone. Someone has to help. She’ll do anything to escape the heartbreak, but you can only run so far. Travis can’t believe his eyes; his half-opened, blood shot eyes. Sawyer Evans was in the flesh and standing over him. He hadn’t seen this girl since he was ten years old. Travis only saw the Evan’s during the summer when they moved into the lake house. He and Dane were best friends. When Dane invited him and the old gang to a welcome back party at the Lake House, he couldn’t wait to go. It turns out getting wasted was only half the fun. Seeing Sawyer was the other half. She was the sexiest girl he’d ever seen and he was going to make sure that she knew it. Only she shot him down time and time again. He’s determined to break down those walls and get inside her head, but he’ll have to be sober to do it, and no matter how hard he tries, she’ll always run. He can’t keep chasing her. He has to figure out a way to make her stay. It’s time to stop running, stop hiding, and start learning where the true escape lies. Everyone will face heartbreak, but not everyone will find love. Stand Alone Novel for ages 18+ due to graphic language, and sexual content.

The Secrets of Married Women


Carol Mason - 2007
    Frustrated, she seeks comfort in her friends: fierce Leigh, with her high-powered career and doting family, and sweet, uncomplicated Wendy, who has a rock-solid marriage any woman would envy.Leigh and Wendy’s lives seem perfect. But beneath the surface are secrets that could tear their friendship apart.Leigh has grown tired of her stay-at-home husband and is looking for excitement—outside of the marriage bed. And after seventeen years of marriage, Wendy can’t shake the sense that there is something missing in her life.As Jill is drawn deeper into her friends’ relationships, she is confronted by a temptation of her own: an intriguing stranger whose good looks and charm spark an instant connection.Full of the realities of modern-day marriage, The Secrets of Married Women asks the question: how well can we ever know our husbands, our friends, or even ourselves? Revised edition: This edition of Secrets Of Married Women includes editorial revisions.

Forgiven


Rebecca Brooke - 2013
    Knowing he can never forgive himself for the events that led to his departure, Caleb chooses to live a quiet life—concentrating on school, sports, and shots. But when he is paired with Angie for a history project he realizes that no matter how much you try to hide from your past, one way or another it will find you.Angelina Powers knows what she wants from life. Growing up with only an alcoholic father for company, Angie learned early on in life that you can only count on yourself. But that doesn’t stop her wishing for her white knight. She’s confident, happy and focused…until she meets Caleb. So how will she feel when her potential white knight turns out to be more of a black shadow?

Best Man


Katy Evans - 2019
    When the wedding of your dreams is just around the corner, everything needs to go as planned. Only problem is, the groom didn’t get the memo.Aaron forgot the rings, and Lia is determined to make the long drive home to get them in time for their “I do’s.”But there’s a catch. There always is with Aaron, isn’t there?Aaron is too hungover to come, and sends a replacement.The best man.Miles Foster. The cocky, arrogant, sexy best man…and the last person Lia wants to be trapped in a car with for hours.But Aaron insists, and Lia wonders if there’s another reason Aaron wants Miles tagging along—aside from sticking her with a hot, surly babysitter.Yet how bad can it be? It’ll be over before she knows it, and she’ll never see him again. Just like in college.But when secrets are revealed, and Lia’s whole world is turned upside down, she realizes she’s been living a lie—and so has her groom.Miles is supposed to be the best man at her wedding.But what if he is simply the best man she has ever known? The best man for her?

The Precious One


Marisa de los Santos - 2015
    In all that time, Taisy’s family has seen Wilson, Caroline, and their daughter Willow only once. Why then, is Wilson calling Taisy now, inviting her for an extended visit, encouraging her to meet her pretty sister — a teenager who views her with jealousy, mistrust, and grudging admiration? Why, now, does Wilson want Taisy to help him write his memoir?Told in alternating voices — Taisy’s strong, unsparing observations and Willow’s naive, heartbreakingly earnest yearnings — The Precious One is an unforgettable novel of family secrets, lost love, and dangerous obsession, a captivating tale with the deep characterization, piercing emotional resonance, and heartfelt insight that are the hallmarks of Marisa de los Santos’s beloved works.