Book picks similar to
Tree Change by Tea Cooper


hurting-heroine
ending-too-abrupt
beautiful-heroine
both-pov

Getting Wild


Sarah Barrie - 2013
    When Ella Jameson steps into a room, people scramble to attention. She’s ruthless, terrifying, and untouchable — and very, very successful as Editor-in-Chief of Australia’s top travel magazine.Then Ryan Edwards, adventure traveller, walks into her office with an unexpected job proposal, and Ella just knows he’s going to be trouble. As far as she’s concerned, the man’s a self-indulgent, kamikaze, adrenaline-junkie with an authority complex — and he’s also infuriatingly sexy! The idea of them working together is ludicrous, but the opportunity to co-host a new travel show is just too good to refuse.As she is swept from her world of inner-city glamour into a nightmare of camping, crocodiles, and outback adventures, Ella’s feelings for Ryan begin to heat up, and her walls start to come down. In the tropical beauty of Australia’s Top End, it’s not just the weather that’s going to sizzle...

Forgotten


Nicole Trope - 2017
    How on earth could this happen?All Malia needed was a single litre of milk and now she's surrounded by police and Zach has disappeared. Detective Ali Greenberg knows that this is not the best case for her, not with her history - but she of all people knows what Malia is going through and what is at stake.Edna is worried about the new residents at the boarding house. She knows Mary would turn in her grave if she knew the kinds of people her son was letting in.And then there is someone else. Someone whose heart is broken. Someone who feels she has been unfairly punished for her mistakes. Someone who wants what she can't have.What follows is a heart-stopping game of cat-and-mouse and a race against the clock. As the hours pass and the day heats up, all hope begins to fade.A gripping, haunting family drama shot through with emotion and suspense.

Sleepwalker


Karen Robards - 2011
    She’s a cop, after all. It’s just that finding out her boyfriend was cheating on her was enough drama for one night. Now she’s alone on New Year’s Eve, wearing flannel pajamas and wielding a Glock 22 as she zeroes in on the unmistakable source of the sound: Uncle Nicco’s private office.Jason Davis steals things for a living, so unexpected developments are a natural part of the job. Getting caught red-handed by a hot, pigtail-sporting police officer in what is supposed to be a gangster’s deserted house is just one more twist in the game. Kind of like finding incriminating photos in Nicco Marino’s safe, only to discover the cop—and the security cameras—have gotten a real good look at his face.Unfortunately for Mick, she also got a good look at the damned pictures. Her “uncle” might love her like family, but if he knows she’s seen evidence that implicates him in the murder of a city councilman, she doesn’t like her chances. Which is why she’s having a hard time reconciling her professional instincts with what she is rapidly concluding is an inescapable fact: She’s about to help a criminal get away with a suitcase full of stolen money. And she’s going with him.Mick and Jason’s race for their lives hurtles them through the dangerous Michigan wilderness on speedboat and snowmobile. As their adventure heats up and their enemies close in, Mick is torn between her duty to the force and the combustible passion engulfing her and her unlikely partner in crime. She’ll have to turn Jason in sooner or later…if they survive. But will they ever get a second chance at love?

The Claimant


Janette Turner Hospital - 2014
    The unadorned un-self-flattering gospel, the never-before-told story our intricately intertwined lives … Listen: I know things that no one else knows. Trust me.‘ Manhattan, 1996: the trial of the Vanderbilt claimant is finally coming to an end. The case - long, complex, riven with unknowns, attracting huge media and social interest - has been seeking to establish whether or not a certain man is the son of the fabulously wealthy and well-connected Vanderbilt family.The son went missing, presumed dead, while serving in the Vietnam war. There is huge fortune, prestige and status at stake. But is the man - a handsome cattle farmer from Queensland - really the Vanderbilt heir? And if so, why does he seem so reluctant to be found? From one of our foremost novelists, The Claimant is a compelling and ravishingly readable novel about the fluid, shifting and ultimately elusive nature of identity and the reasons why people seek to change their names, their identities or their personalities.

Almost Perfect


Dianne Blacklock - 2005
     In a beautiful house in an upscale Sydney suburb, Mac sees his picture-perfect marriage cracking under the strain of infertility. In another Sydney suburb, thirty-something Georgie, a bookstore owner, is trying to deal with a deadbeat roommate and no romantic prospects in sight. Then Liam walks into the bookstore and Georgie thinks she has found the perfect man-just as Mac and his wife reach the breaking point, putting Mac on a path that will have unforeseen consequences for them all.

Love and Relativity


Rachael Wade - 2012
    Stranded on Sanibel Island, Florida, she works at a nursing home by day and spends her nights dodging the island's infamous bad boy, Jackson Taylor, at her favorite karaoke bar. Trying to heal from the loss of her sister and a failed relationship she rerouted her life for, she's ready to graduate and finally leave Florida behind.When a run-in with Jackson and his rowdy crew goes sour at the bar one night, sparks fly and irreversible damage is done. It’s no secret that Jackson loves to get underneath her skin, but this time he's gone too far. Now all he wants is to earn her forgiveness before she's gone for good, but their ideas of closure—and the future—are enough to keep them worlds apart.This is a stand-alone title but coordinates with The Preservation Series:Preservation (Book One, Available Now)Reservation (Book Two, Coming March 6, 2013)Declaration (Book Three,TBA)

Kill Devil Hills


Sarah Darlington - 2014
    She’s eighteen.His life is exactly the way he’s always wanted it to be...stable.She’s quite possibly the very definition of unstable.Noah saved her.Georgina never wanted to be saved.Growing up, Noah Clark was passed from one relative to the next until he finally ended up living with his abusive, alcoholic uncle in Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina. Thanks in part to the unwavering love and support of his best friend, Ellie Turner, Noah survived those years, escaped his uncle, and grew into the man he is today. Now he runs his own business and lives a pretty normal, no-nonsense life—one where he maintains a high level of control. Georgina is Ellie’s younger sister. Four months ago, Noah saved Georgie’s life, but he thought that was where his involvement with his friend’s sister would end. Now Georgie has returned home from the recovery facility her parents sent her away to and Noah, still haunted by the night that connects them, can’t stop himself from continuously trying to protect this girl he barely knows. But is he willing to give up all of the control he’s worked so hard to build in his life and risk everything for her? Even more importantly, would she do the same for him?

Six Weeks


Jessica L. Degarmo - 2011
    Degarmo departs from the style of her very successful Romance novels - 'Hooking Up', 'The Storm Within', 'Decisions' and 'How To Meet A Guy In The Supermarket' - to examine every teenage girl's nightmare: that she is pregnant and not certain she's ready for a child.It is a life and death decision – not her life, but her decision - and despite the opinions of those around her, she is on her own.In a world of gray, one thing is black and white. Six weeks is her deadline to decide.Maybe you have been there, in which case you will understand.

More Than One Night


Sarah Mayberry - 2012
    A steamy night together. That's all Rhys Walker signs on for when Charlotte "Charlie" Long sashays across his path. Sure, maybe he catches a glimpse of forever in her eyes. But the brush-off note the gorgeous brunette leaves the next morning says it all, doesn't it? Time to move on.Rhys never expects that moving on actually means reconnecting with Charlie. Or that her big news changes everything. Becoming a father now, under these circumstances, never factored into his plans. Yet he's not as upset as he thought. Because now he has the opportunity to explore that glimpse of forever...and turn it into reality.

Shattered Rose


T.L. Gray - 2013
    GrayAvery Nichols knows how to wear the mask. Perfect student, perfect daughter and perfect friend. Nobody would ever guess that inside, Avery is a prisoner to her own self loathing. Then she meets him…and everything changes. Handsome, charming and self assured, Jake Matthew sweeps Avery off her feet in an effortless fashion. Avery knows that Jake is everything she needs and all she has ever wanted. She would destroy herself to be loved by him…until he walks away.Broken and lost, Avery meets Parker. His genuine, caring nature reaches past the mask and the shattered pieces her heart begin to slowly heal. But just when Avery starts to feel whole again, she realizes the impossible.Jake never really left.

Hold Your Fire


Chloe Wilson - 2021
    Prize-winning author Chloe Wilson’s stories will pin you to the page.‘Chilling, funny, and razor sharp – a writer in control every step of the way. How I relished this extraordinary and original collection.’ Sofie Laguna, Miles Franklin winner for The Eye of the SheepFirst published in Granta Magazine, the title story takes us into the cold war of a contemporary family: a missile-making mother doubts her husband’s guts and the steel of her son, until a playground incident escalates and brings them into the most surprising of alliances.Needle sharp, effortlessly surprising and beautifully controlled, every story is transfixing. A young couple move into a house in which there’s been a recent murder, and fall under the spell of their peculiar, commanding neighbours. Two sisters are determined to detoxify themselves into perfection. A diver pushes herself and those around her to higher and higher jumps. Interspersed with these transfixing tales are lightning strikes of flash fiction: we glimpse a leopard in the apartment next door; plants grown out of a strange and miraculous soil; the spirit of a girl who’s been thrown down a well. At each turn, Chloe Wilson offers a unique insight, a tear in the veil of our comfortable moral certainties. Hold Your Fire exposes the battles we wage beneath the surface.

Green Valentine


Lili Wilkinson - 2015
    She's Lobster Girl and he's Shopping Trolley Boy. Not an auspicious beginning. But it gets better. Then it gets worse. Much worse. Classic romantic comedy: girl-meets-boy, love blossoms, and is derailed. Incredibly engaging, upbeat, funny and smart. Astrid Katy Smythe is beautiful, smart and popular. She's a straight-A student and a committed environmental activist. She's basically perfect.Hiro is the opposite of perfect. He's slouchy, rude and resentful. Despite his brains, he doesn't see the point of school.But when Astrid meets Hiro at the shopping centre where he's wrangling shopping trolleys, he doesn't recognise her because she's in disguise - as a lobster. And she doesn't set him straight.Astrid wants to change the world, Hiro wants to survive it. But ultimately both believe that the world needs to be saved from itself. Can they find enough in common to right all the wrongs between them?A romantic comedy about life and love and trying to make the planet a better place, with a little heartbreak, and a whole lot of hilarity.

Nobody But Him


Victoria Purman - 2013
    Plans for an exciting life in a town that didn’t involve a main street with one pub or a particular boy named Ryan Blackburn.But after fifteen years and a lifetime later, Julia’s forced to put her career and big-city life on hold when she returns home to finalise her mother’s estate. Which is exactly where she runs smack-bang into the town’s hero, Ry. As in Ryan Blackburn.The sensible thing to do? Stay the hell away from him and head back to Melbourne as fast as her stilettos can carry her! But instead, Julia finds his offer of a helping hand and a hot body too delicious to refuse.Soon, Julia’s ignoring her better judgement and diving into an ‘I’ll think about it tomorrow’ fling with Ry. But what she doesn’t realise is that tomorrow has a way of sneaking up on you...and that saying goodbye to her home town — and to Ry — is so much harder the second time around.

Grease Monkey Jive


Ainslie Paton - 2012
    He’s precisely the type of man Alex’s mother warned her off – a player, like the father who abandoned her. Dan Maddox comes from a long line of men who were hiding under the hood of a beat up old car when the ‘successful relationship’ gene was given out, but he was first in the queue for an extra jolt of chick pulling power. The chicks in Dan’s life are universally gorgeous, random, disposable, and answer to the name Baby until one drunken night when he picks the wrong girl, hurts a good friend and realises that unless he does something to change, he’ll end up like his violent, unstable father. It’s Pimp My Ride meets Dancing With The Stars as Alex and Dan come together to compete in a ballroom dancing competition that changes the way they both feel about relationships and love.

College Girl


Sheila Grace - 2013
    He's the teacher. And their worlds are about to collide ...In her second term of college Alex Reed has one thing on her mind: passing Calculus. So when her professor introduces Ryan Matthews, the new TA, she writes him off in a second. Tall, hotter than hell—clearly a major ego case. Whatever. Guys like him don’t notice girls like her. Besides, she’s never even kissed a guy, so her sex-crazed roommate can have Mr. Hot.Ryan Bennett left the family business and his pill-popping ex-fiancée to do something for himself. Then, only months before finishing his doctorate under an assumed name, he walks into his advisor’s freshman Calculus class and sees her. Alex Reed. The last thing he needs. Young, inexperienced—and off limits. But when someone who shouldn't follows her across campus at night, he’s forced to do something about it.What happens next will change their lives forever.Reader discretion is advised. This book is NOT appropriate for readers under 18 or those who are easily offended. It contains numerous explicit sexual situations, strong profanity throughout, violence, underage drinking, and other themes not intended for sensitive readers.