Her parents—an abusive, close-minded father and a detached alcoholic mother—raised Mara to be like all the other girls in Barnaby: God-fearing, churchgoing, and straight. Mara wants nothing to do with any of it. She feels most at home with her best friend and older brother, Iggy, but Iggy hasn’t been the same since their father beat him and put him in the hospital with a concussion.As Mara’s mother feeds her denial with bourbon and Iggy struggles with his own demons, Mara finds an escape with her classmate Xylia. A San Francisco transplant, Xylia is everything Mara dreams of being: free-spirited, open, wild. The closer Mara and Xylia become, the more Mara feels for her—even though their growing relationship is very much forbidden in Barnaby. Just as Mara begins to live a life she’s only imagined, the girls’ secret is threatened with exposure and Mara’s world is thrown into chaos.Mara knows she can't live without Xylia, but can she live with an entire town who believes she is an abomination worse than the gravest sin?

    Michelle is playful, determined and ambitious - Despite being the only child of a teenaged, alcoholic mother who sometimes lets her judgment of the men she allows in their home throw wrenches in her relationship with her daughter. Michelle knows what she has to do to leave the small, redneck surf town in Florida where she's lived her entire life to make it as a singer in Hollywood. Nothing - and nobody - will come between her and that goal. Alexis, who moves to Florida from New York City with her Jewish father, French Catholic mother and autistic younger brother, is wildly intelligent and becomes instantly enamored with the feisty Michelle after she accidentally wipes out in their driveway on her skateboard. Over the course of a year, the two girls become close, passionately involved best friends and, as high school starts, they begin to question whether their feelings toward one another are 'normal' and 'right', two things that Michelle desperately knows she needs to be in order to fit into their tiny, prying town. As high school progresses, rumors of their relationship surface among the other students. Michelle throws their friendship - and everything else - to the wayside, shattering Alexis's heart in the process and forcing Michelle to realize that no matter how much she tries to control her actions, she still can't control her feelings. Ten years after high school and Michelle is at the brink of stardom. Having just finished her first international tour, a guilty conscience forces the twenty-seven year old singer to return to Florida after her mother is involved in a bad car accident. Disillusioned with the direction of her career, she leaves her cautious, nit-picky agent and action movie star boyfriend - who is harboring a deep secret of his own that could ruin his image and career if it were to go public - to return home, tend to her mother and be back in Hollywood just in time to accompany Tyler to the premiere of his newest summer blockbuster. What on Earth could go wrong? What nobody, not even Michelle, counts on is crossing paths with Alexis Vlodosky again. Alexis is eager to move on after finishing her residency at the hospital as the harsh memories of high school have soured her taste of this small town. After one night, they quickly realize that the fire is still burning deep within each of them. Michelle has to make a decision, but when faced with scores of paparazzi, an alcoholic mother desperate to make amends before her own secret is revealed, run-ins with unsavory past acquaintances, gossipy nurses, a neurotic agent and a fake boyfriend that needs Michelle for his image just as much as she needs him for hers, who will run first?

    When it comes to boys--especially other people's boys:Don't touch.Don't smile. Don't charm.In the past, drawing attention to herself helped distract people from what really makes Kat different--having two gay parents. But it also cost her friendships. Kat can't afford to lose any more of those, especially not her cousin, Harper. They're spending one last summer together at the lake, where they run into an intriguing newcomer named Emmett Reese. After years of trying to prove she's just like everybody else, Kat has found someone who wants her because she's not. A boy who could be everything she wants too--if Harper hadn't liked him first. . .

    They say you can never go home again, but sometimes you have no choice. A phone call in the middle of the night and news of a death in the family has Abigail Henry catching the next flight out of Los Angeles and traveling back to the small hometown she hasn’t visited in a decade. Nearly everything and everyone looks untouched by time, but it's Abigail herself who has changed. A love story by genre, Bittersweet Homecoming grapples with the basic question: Can you really ever go home again? You might never be able to go home again, but it’s Charlotte, the beautiful bartender at the local pub, who can tempt Abigail into staying.

    Then, everything changes and Bianca finds herself being thrust into the role of Prince Charming whether she likes it or not.Despite her misgivings, she’s drawn to the strange Princess and her ways and before she knows where she is she’s forced to fight for her love - and her life.Other comments/reviews: “[...] the story just fascinated me from beginning to end. I loved the idea in general, the hole between worlds, the princess in distress the not-quite Prince Charming. It's witty and lovely and rather epic and all sorts of gripping. I loved the characterisation, I loved the relationship between Bianca and Alexandra, I loved 'the gang'...it was just an awesome read, tyvm!”“[...] This was absolutely adorable, it captured everything i love about ya fiction and had amazing characterizations throughout. Some of my favorite YA books are the fantasy/realism fusions and i really felt this GOT it. I also loved the f/f aspect because I find that queer YA books are generally ~dramatic hs plots instead of ever venturing into fantasy etc.”

    Only, she's not a teenager anymore. Ready to challenge herself artistically and earn the part she's always dreamed of, she's forced to face the realization that in order to win the roles afforded to edgier actresses, she might first have to audition by playing someone edgier in her day-to-day life.Pop star Lila Wilder built a multimedia empire by always having her finger on the pulse of what's hot. However, as she struggles to produce her next smash hit record, she's finding it hard to keep her name in the public eye, and a string of tumultuous relationships with Hollywood boy-toys no longer captivates anyone's attention.Both women tentatively agree to a headline-grabbing fauxmance, with two simple rules: Always stick to the script, and never forget that on the stage of public perception, nothing is real. Can two women find love in a world of carefully crafted illusions, or will a successful charade mean the potential for something more gets left on the cutting-room floor?

    Real estate guru Krista Wyler is soon at the mercy of the Arizona desert when she learns she has inherited her family's business, Wyler Ranch. Her aunt is dying and her uncle is no longer capable of making decisions. Krista reluctantly moves in, but her plan is to sell the ranch as soon as possible. Rae Jarrett, the strong, stubborn vet who has cared for the ranch as well as the horses, objects to her selling and offers her aid. Krista resists the help as well as her attraction to the mysterious vet, but decides instead to turn the ranch into a dude ranch. Soon city folk are knocking at the door ready to pay good money to get a chance to herd the Wyler cattle across Arizona. The plan seems full proof until Krista herself, along with Rae, has to set out on the trail with them. The journey leads to a life changing adventure neither woman could have foreseen and will never forget.

    She was all warmth and sparking light. When I was with her, my skin sighed that the center of the world was precisely here.Anna is afraid she must be unlovable—until she meets Flynn. Together, the girls swim, eat banana cake, laugh, and love. Some days Flynn is unreachable; other days she's at Anna's door—but when Anna discovers Flynn's secret, she wonders if she knows her at all. This beautifully crafted novel explores the tension between the tender moments that pull people together and the secrets that push them apart.

    Ayla Hammond has come home.After years as a lone wolf in a self-imposed exile she’s rejoining the pack and trying to mend fences with her parents.She’s convinced them to accept her girlfriend, but can a lone wolf change her ways?As if homecoming wasn’t hard enough, Ayla also can’t help getting involved in a missing person case.With pressure to solve the case mounting from the pack alphas, Ayla is starting to question where her loyalties lie – and if a return to the pack she left behind is really what she wants.

    But, all that changes when she befriends and becomes intrigued with Clara, her widowed neighbor and the village’s social outcast. When their friendship grows into the “unnatural”, Sam is forced to examine her upbringing and come to terms with who she really is.

    That is, until Emma Pearson, a new transfer from North Carolina, decides to enter the picture. Emma is quiet, moody, and beautiful: a dangerous combination that fascinates Charlotte beyond her comfort zone. Girls aren't supposed to like girls. At least, that's what Charlotte has been told her whole life. But when strange new feelings begin to emerge, Charlotte has to decide what she's willing to risk to discover love -- and ultimately, herself.

    Ray McKenna returns from the war in Iraq to find that she had attained unwanted celebrity status back home. As the only surviving American soldier of a well-publicized hostage crisis, she is the center of attention at a time when all she wants is solitude. Struggling to overcome the fear and anxiety that plague her, she relies on her psychiatric therapy dog Jagger to help her through the vicious symptoms of PTSD. Veterinarian Dr. Carly Warner hasn't yet figured out how to open her heart to the possibility of falling in love again after the death of her longtime partner. When Ray McKenna walks into the North Coast Veterinary Clinic with Jagger, she and Carly begin a friendship that takes them both by surprise. Brought together by their shared love of dogs, Ray and Carly discover that they are both capable of moving forward, if only they are brave enough to try

    Now, years later, Amy returns to Little Dip, the Garoul home valley to help her aunt finish a botanical project. Except Little Dip is no longer the happy place of Amy’s childhood memories. There’s something sinister in the woods. And why hasn’t Leone moved on? Why does she still dog Amy’s every move? As more and more of the Garoul family arrive for a special hunting weekend, parts of the puzzle come together and Amy’s fears escalate as she moves closer to the truth—and the secret that has eluded her since childhood.

    She’s working two menial jobs to make ends meet, barely a paycheck away from financial disaster, and women aren’t exactly lining up at her door. Enter soccer star Diego Torres, who’s keeping a big secret: he’s gay. His manager fears that if he’s found out, his endorsements and his chance to play for the national team will evaporate into the wind.Amy jumps at the chance to act as Diego’s fake fiancée, even though it means signing her life away in a non-disclosure agreement. On the surface, the job couldn’t be better: the money’s great; the living accommodations are luxurious, and she gets to watch her favorite soccer team from the players’ box at the stadium.But she soon realizes that this new life is even harder to navigate than her old one. Diego’s manager is as sleazy as they come, and this easy job soon turns complicated, possibly even dangerous. More important, all the lies Amy is forced to tell are starting to eat away at her soul, especially when she finds herself attracted to Casey Palmer, Diego’s pretty assistant.Will Amy watch from the sidelines, or will she find the courage to get back into the game?Length: 284 pages (approx. 64,000 words)Themes: blackmail · lesbian · soccer · sports

    Only a select few know her as a loyal, loving friend. To a fault, she is committed to her family, friends and her job.As a surgeon, Nora Whitmore is used to being in control. The hospital is her life. There is little else. Respected by her colleagues but ridiculed by the residents, Nora takes what she needs and keeps everyone else at arm’s length, creating unexpected enemies.Tragedy brings them together in a clash of personalities. As the chaos around them continues, they find the lines between them blurring. A friendship forms, understanding grows, and attraction soon follows. Together, they may conquer their own misgivings, but will the outside forces keep them apart?Themes: lesbian · medical · police