Book picks similar to
The Matchbreaker by Chris Manby


chick-lit
chicklit
fiction
chris-manby

Sundays at Tiffany's


James Patterson - 2008
    Her mother, the powerful head of a Broadway theater company, has no time for her. She does have one friend-a handsome, comforting, funny man named Michael-but only she can see him. Years later, Jane is in her thirties and just as alone as ever. Then she meets Michael again-as handsome, smart and perfect as she remembers him to be. But not even Michael knows the reason they've really been reunited.SUNDAYS AT TIFFANY'S is a love story with an irresistible twist, a novel about the child inside all of us-and the boundary-crossing power of love.

Everything Nice


Ellen Shanman - 2008
    Michaela “Mike” Edwards doesn’t do sugar and spice. But when mishandled office politics get her unexpectedly fired, the young advertising hotshot finds herself doing the unimaginable: moving back in with her widowed father, unraveling her complex feelings for an Aussie journalist named Gunther, and rethinking her entire life. She could never have guessed that fate would land her in a classroom teaching “life skills” to sixth-grade girls who desperately need her. But with a best friend rapidly becoming something more, and a family she’s just discovering, Mike is about to learn that going places in life doesn’t have to mean going it alone.

Fairytale of New York


Miranda Dickinson - 2009
    Once upon a time an English girl went to New York to live out her very own fairytale! Florist Rosie Duncan's life couldn't be better, she has a flourishing business on New York's Upper West Side and fantastic friends. Moving to Manhattan feels like the best decision she ever made. Even though at the time, it was her escape route from heartbreak ...For the past six years Rosie has kept her heart under lock and key, despite the protests of her closest friends - charming, commitment-phobic Ed, unlucky in love Marnie and the one-woman tornado that is Celia. Then a blossoming friendship with publishing hot-shot Nate begins to shake Rosie's resolve at the same time as her brother arrives in the Big Apple, hiding a secret. But a chance meeting brings Rosie face to face with her past, unravelling the mystery behind her arrival in New York. Rosie is forced to confront questions she has long been trying to ignore, including will she ever get her very own happy-ever-after? A sparkling, romantic comedy about an English girl who finds herself in the city where dreams can come true - or so she thinks!

My Best Friend's Girl


Dorothy Koomson - 2006
    From the moment they met in college, best friends Adele Brannon and Kamryn Matika thought nothing could come between them—until Adele did the unthinkable and slept with Kamryn’s fiancé, Nate. Now, after years of silence, the two women are reuniting, and Adele has a stunning request for her old friend: she wants Kamryn to adopt her five-year-old daughter, Tegan.Besides the difference in skin color—many will assume that headstrong, impulsive Kamryn is Tegan’s nanny—there’s the inconvenient truth that Kamryn is wholly unprepared to take care of anyone, especially someone who reminds her so much of Nate. With crises brewing at work and her love life in shambles, can Kamryn somehow become the mother a little girl needs her to be? In My Best Friend’s Girl, Dorothy Koomson takes us on a warm and wondrous journey through laughter and tears, forgiveness and hope—and the enduring love forged by the unlikeliest of families.

Fourplay


Jane Moore - 2001
    Suddenly she's single and back in the dating game with the added complication of children in tow. But Jo's no wallflower, and she soon finds herself with not one but four eligible bachelors vying for her time and affections. Add her two kids and her now booming interior design business to the mix, and she winds up with a nightmarish schedule but a dreamy love life.So who are the contestants? There's Sean, the sexy foreign affairs correspondent who sweeps Jo off her feet and proves to be masterful in bed; Martin, the music industry mogul who offers luxury, stability, and a glamorous lifestyle; and Conor, Jo's trusted confidant, who knows just what to say to make her smile (why hadn't she noticed his irresistible smile until now?). Then there's Jeff, her ex-husband: she wouldn't consider hooking up with him again, would she? It could happen--especially when Jeff's romance with the sweet young thing sours and he launches a full-scale campaign to win Jo back.Sophisticated, spirited, and as compulsive as a box of bonbons, Fourplay offers a new take on the single-girl life perfect for the thirty-something audience. Fourplay--what a position to be in...

Pear Shaped


Stella Newman - 2012
    She meets James Stephens: charismatic, elusive, and with a hosiery model ex who casts a long, thin shadow over their burgeoning relationship. He’s clever, funny and shares her greatest pleasure in life – to eat and drink slightly too much and then have a little lie down. Sophie’s instinct tells her James is too good to be true – and he is.An exploration of love, heartbreak, self-image, self-deception and lots of food. Pear-Shaped is in turns smart, laugh-out-loud funny and above all, recognizable to women everywhere.

Balancing in High Heels


Eileen Rendahl - 2005
     Alissa Lindley didn't mean to take it out on the fax machine. But when your not-yet-ex-husband knocks up his girlfriend and your divorce is going worse than the next World War -- well, something's got to give. Unfortunately, Alissa's employers at the L.A. Public Defender's office take a dim view of the destruction of office equipment. Funny how that anti-workplace violence policy used to seem like a good idea, before she got fired. And the networking thing just isn't happening at her Anger Management class. He was arrestingly handsome. San Jose is the place for a fresh start -- it's home, and family and friends are eagerly waiting to welcome her. But her first job as a lawyer there has Alissa walking a high wire of complicated emotions. Her client is from the Butterfly Brigade, a group of justice-seeking (and interestingly tattooed) ladies who right wrongs as they see fit even if that means bending the law. The arresting officer, Detective Rodriguez, is so hot he should be illegal. But can Alissa trust her instincts again when it comes to love? Or will one wrong step send her new life crashing down?

The Sun in Her Eyes


Paige Toon - 2015
    She doesn't remember the accident, but a stranger at the scene has been unable to forget. Now, almost thirty years later, she's trying to track Amber down. Amber, meanwhile, is married to Ned and living on the other side of the world in London. When her father has a stroke, she flies straight home to Australia to be with him. Away from her husband, Amber finds comfort in her oldest friends, but her feelings for Ethan, the gorgeous, green-eyed man she once fell for, have never been platonic.

Elegance


Kathleen Tessaro - 2003
    wants what Jackie O had ...Unhappy with her looks, her life, and her empty marriage, Louise Canova needs help -- and she finds it in a secondhand bookstore. A forty-year-old encyclopedia of style titled Elegance, this slim volume by formidable French fashion expert Madame Dariaux promises to transform even the plainest of women into creatures of poise and grace. It is a fairy godmother in print, an A-to-Z manual with essential advice that Louise vows to take to heart. But within its pages lie not only clues from her past, but also powerful lessons for the future. And as the old Louise gives way to the stunning new, she's about to find out that there's more to every life than what appears on the surface ... and that everything, even elegance, has its price.

Far From Over


Sheila O'Flanagan - 2000
    Gemma ended it and chose to be a single mother rather than continue the pretence that her marriage to work-obsessed David Hennessy was working. So why is she so upset when he marries bimbo Orla O'Neill? Is it that Orla's thin and gorgeous whilst Gemma at 35 feels more like 55? Or that David's starting a new life whilst she's facing middle age alone? For Orla being wife no. 2 isn't all she's imagined, always aware of how Gemma coped with a house, family and job while she can't even cook dinner without setting the kitchen alight. To David, who has loved them both, there isn't a problem. But the trouble's just begun...

Ink


Alice Broadway - 2017
    There are honorable marks that let people know you're trustworthy. And shameful tattoos that announce you as a traitor. After her father dies, Leora finds solace in the fact that his skin tells a wonderful story. That is, until she glimpses a mark on the back of his neck...the symbol of the worst crime a person can commit in Saintstone. Leora knows it has to be a mistake, but before she can do anything about it, the horrifying secret gets out, jeopardizing her father's legacy...and Leora's life.In her startlingly prescient debut, Alice Broadway shines a light on the dangerous lengths we go to make our world feel orderly--even when the truth refuses to stay within the lines. This rich, lyrical fantasy with echoes of Orwell is unlike anything you've ever read, a tale guaranteed to get under your skin...

The Modern Faerie Tales: Tithe; Valiant; Ironside


Holly Black - 2010
    Fierce and independent, she drifts from place to place with her mother’s rock band until an ominous attack forces Kaye back to her childhood home. There, amid the blue-collar New Jersey backdrop, Kaye finds herself an unwilling pawn in an ancient and violent power struggle between two rival faerie kingdoms—a struggle that could very well mean her death. In Valiant, the companion to Tithe, seventeen-year-old Valerie runs away to New York City, trying to escape a life that has utterly betrayed her. Sporting a new identity, she takes up with a gang of squatters who live in the city’s labyrinthine subway system. But there’s something eerily beguiling about Val’s new friends. When one talks Val into tracking down the lair of a mysterious creature, Val finds herself torn between her affection for an honorable monster and her fear of what her new friends are becoming. In Ironside, the sequel to Tithe, the time has come for Roiben’s coronation. Uneasy in the midst of the malevolent Unseelie Court, pixie Kaye is sure of only one thing—her love for Roiben. But when Kaye drunkenly declares herself to Roiben, he sends her on a seemingly impossible quest to find a faerie who can tell a lie. Unable to see Roiben until she has fulfilled his quest, Kaye finds herself in the center of the battle of wits and weapons being waged over his throne.This omnibus combines all three books into one.

The Little Dreams of Lara Cliffe: Quick Reads 2020


Milly Johnson - 2020
     It’s three weeks before her wedding to ’Steady Freddie’, one of the kindest men on the planet.  But something is worrying Lara. Her friends say it’s wedding jitters, but she isn’t so sure.  Fifteen years ago the love of her life, Danny Belfont, walked out on her three weeks before their wedding and she has never been able to fully get him out of her heart.   Then, on the overnight ferry, Lara finds out that Danny is playing in the onboard band and he spots her in the crowd. Will she meet him the next night to talk?   As the wonderful city of Amsterdam works its magic on Lara, she tries to sort out her thoughts.  And if fate has brought Lara and Danny back together … is it really for love or for something quite different?

Meet Me at Willow Hall


Carla Burgess - 2018
    That is, until the moment she squeezes into her bridesmaid dress and looks up to see the man who walked out of her life three months ago, Anthony Bascombe!Still just as gorgeous as she remembers, it’s clear Anthony’s been keeping a secret from her and Rachel’s determined to get to the bottom of it! The trouble is, the more time she spends around Anthony, the more she can’t help falling for him…But Anthony’s already disappeared before, can Rachel trust that this time he’s back for good?

The Twilight Saga: The Official Illustrated Guide


Stephenie Meyer - 2011
     This comprehensive handbook-essential for every Twilight Saga fan-is full-color throughout with nearly 100 gorgeous illustrations and photographs and with exclusive new material, character profiles, genealogical charts, maps, extensive cross-references, and much more.