Book picks similar to
Miserere by Caren J. Werlinger


lesbian
historical
giveaways
parallel-timelines

Paid in Full


Ann Roberts - 2006
    When her best friend, Bob, becomes the prime suspect, Ari's desire to prove his innocence puts her on a collision course with Detective Molly Nelson, the gorgeous homicide detective facing the enormous pressure of finding the power broker's killer - fast. When Bob disappears, Ari enters a world of betrayal and deception, causing her to question Bob's innocence. She realizes that she may need to admit that Molly's hunt for justice will lead to Ari's greatest secret. As both women hunt for Bob, they are drawn to each other - unable to control the desire that surfaces when they are together. While Ari desperately craves Molly's attention, her devotion to Bob may force her to choose between the debts of the past and the promise of a happy future - if she can stay alive that long.

Montauk


Nicola Harrison - 2019
    For three months, this humble fishing village will serve as the playground for New York City’s wealthy elite. Beatrice Bordeaux was looking forward to a summer of reigniting the passion between her and her husband, Harry. Instead, tasked with furthering his investment interest in Montauk as a resort destination, she learns she’ll be spending twelve weeks sequestered with the high society wives at The Montauk Manor—a two-hundred room seaside hotel—while Harry pursues other interests in the city. College educated, but raised a modest country girl in Pennsylvania, Bea has never felt fully comfortable among these privileged women, whose days are devoted not to their children but to leisure activities and charities that seemingly benefit no one but themselves. She longs to be a mother herself, as well as a loving wife, but after five years of marriage she remains childless while Harry is increasingly remote and distracted. Despite lavish parties at the Manor and the Yacht Club, Bea is lost and lonely and befriends the manor’s laundress whose work ethic and family life stir memories of who she once was. As she drifts further from the society women and their preoccupations and closer toward Montauk’s natural beauty and community spirit, Bea finds herself drawn to a man nothing like her husband –stoic, plain spoken and enigmatic. Inspiring a strength and courage she had almost forgotten, his presence forces her to face a haunting tragedy of her past and question her future. Desperate to embrace moments of happiness, no matter how fleeting, she soon discovers that such moments may be all she has, when fates conspire to tear her world apart…

Blue Ice Landing


K.A. Moll - 2019
    She has a comfortable home, good friends, and a loving family. She’s also a widow, carrying a burden of responsibility for her wife’s untimely death. She lost her footing that day, gave up her dream to be a doctor, and swore off relationships. Now, three years later, she’s ready to turn her life on end in an effort to regain what she lost. At 29, Coby O’Brien is a woman with secrets. She’s estranged from her family, a recovering alcoholic, and alone because she’s convinced that she’s unlovable. When she loses her job as a heavy equipment operator, she’ll accept one that’ll force her to step way outside her comfort zone into a life where nothing is, as it seems. Having caught next to no breaks in life, it may turn out to be her break of a lifetime. When Coy quits her job to accept a position in Antarctica, her path will cross with Coby’s. Their attraction to one another will be immediate, and despite their differences, it won’t be long before they fall in love. But for these two, with all their baggage, will love be enough?

In the Shadow of Lakecrest


Elizabeth Blackwell - 2017
    Kate Moore is looking for a way out of the poverty and violence of her childhood. When a chance encounter on a transatlantic ocean liner brings her face-to-face with the handsome heir to a Chicago fortune, she thinks she may have found her escape—as long as she can keep her past concealed.After exchanging wedding vows, Kate quickly discovers that something isn’t quite right with her husband—or her new family. As Mrs. Matthew Lemont, she must contend with her husband’s disturbing past, his domineering mother, and his overly close sister. Isolated at Lakecrest, the sprawling, secluded Lemont estate, she searches desperately for clues to Matthew’s terrors, which she suspects stem from the mysterious disappearance of his aunt years before. As Kate stumbles deeper into a maze of family secrets, she begins to question everyone’s sanity—especially her own. But just how far will she go to break free of this family’s twisted past?

When Angels Fall


Sherryl D. Hancock - 2017
    Now, every day she has to deal with the aftermath and the crippling PTSD that’s tearing her apart. Devin James is a wild child. Headstrong and beautiful, she’s a force to be reckoned with. She’s drawn to Skyler in a way she can’t explain and refuses to give up on her, no matter how much Skyler tries to push her away. Through all the love, loss, and heartache, she'll find that when angels fall, they sometimes need a little help to get back up.

Touching Divinity


Benjamin Medrano - 2019
    Callai is a mystery, and she holds many secrets, some of which involve Siane herself. Centuries ago the goddess of light was defeated by Callai and the other demon lords, who split the world between themselves to rule. Siane grew up in the Dominion of Shadow, and from an early age she dreamed of becoming Callai’s consort. Fortune favored her, and she managed to become one of the handful of students and potential suitors of the queen who resided in the Palace of Shadow. When she’d given the opportunity to impress Callai and have some time alone with her, Siane jumps at the opportunity. Little does she know that Callai has her own motives, and secrets which are entwined with Siane’s past as well. Note: This is a short story, not a full-length novel.

Actress


Anne Enright - 2020
    As her daughter Norah retraces her mother’s celebrated career and bohemian life, she delves into long-kept secrets, both her mother’s and her own.Katherine began her career on Ireland’s bus-and-truck circuit before making it to London’s West End, Broadway, and finally Hollywood. Every moment of her life is a star turn, with young Norah standing in the wings. But the mother-daughter romance cannot survive Katherine’s past or the world’s damage. With age, alcohol, and dimming stardom, her grip on reality grows fitful and, fueled by a proud and long-simmering rage, she commits a bizarre crime.Her mother’s protector, Norah understands the destructive love that binds an actress to her audience, but also the strength that an actress takes from her art. Once the victim of a haunting crime herself, Norah eventually becomes a writer, wife, and mother, finding her way to her own hard-won joy. Actress is a book about the freedom we find in our work and in the love we make and keep.

The Incarnations


Susan Barker - 2014
    I am your soulmate, your old friend, and I have come back to this city of sixteen million in search of you.So begins the first letter that falls into Wang’s lap as he flips down the visor in his taxi. The letters that follow are filled with the stories of Wang’s previous lives—from escaping a marriage to a spirit bride, to being a slave on the run from Genghis Khan, to living as a fisherman during the Opium Wars, and being a teenager on the Red Guard during the cultural revolution—bound to his mysterious “soulmate,” spanning one thousand years of betrayal and intrigue.As the letters continue to appear seemingly out of thin air, Wang becomes convinced that someone is watching him—someone who claims to have known him for over one thousand years. And with each letter, Wang feels the watcher growing closer and closer…Seamlessly weaving Chinese folklore, history, and literary classics, The Incarnations is a taut and gripping novel that sheds light on the cyclical nature of history as it hints that the past is never truly settled.

Pages for You


Sylvia Brownrigg - 2001
    The seventeen-year-old, new to everything around her—college, the East Coast, bodies of literature, and the sexual flurries of student life—is shocked by her desire to follow this wherever it will take her. When Flannery finds herself enrolled in a class with the remote, brilliant older woman, she is intimidated at first, but gradually becomes Anne Arden's student—Baudelaire, lipstick colors, or how to travel with a lover—Flannery proves an eager pupil, until one day learns more about Anne than she ever wanted to know.

Breathe In


Martha Sweeney - 2015
    No dating or going out on dates.2. Never let them know where I live. Lie if I must.3. Never pick up a guy in a particular social setting that I may frequently attend. Or, never sleep with a man whom I have the chance of running into on a regular basis.4. Never have a guy over to my apartment for any reason. My gay best friends are the only exceptions.5. Always end things before a guy starts to want more.6. Always use protection.7. Never sleep over at their place after sex. Once we’ve finished, or in most cases, they’ve finished, dress and leave.8. Always have more than one exit strategy.Orphaned at age sixteen, Emma, now twenty-four, has complete control of her life. She is a private, successful businesswoman who owns two companies and uses men for sex. When Emma’s sexual itch arises, and there are no possible male suitors to fill her need, she finds alternative means. Emma keeps most people at a distance, especially the men she has sex with, except her two best friends, Maggie and Jared. She adheres to her eight golden rules that keep her safe and in complete control — rules that she started after having sex with the first man. Rules that keep her guarded, safe and free — but then, along came Joe Covelli.

You Will Be Safe Here


Damian Barr - 2019
    I left this book bruised yet somehow better for it.” – Tayari Jones.“Brutal, haunting, redemptive and...beautiful.” – Jojo Moyes. This extraordinary debut set in South Africa reveals legacies of abuse and redemption exploring the extraordinary strength of the human spirit - from the Boer War in 1901 to brutal camps for teenage boys now. There is always darkness but there is always light in it if we just look.South Africa, 1901 - the height of the second Boer War. Sarah van der Watt and her six-year-old son Fred are forced from their home on Mulberry Farm by British troops. As the polite invaders welcome them to Bloemfontein Concentration Camp they promise Sarah and Fred that they will be safe there.2010. Sixteen-year-old Willem is an outsider. Hoping he will become the man she wants him to be, his Ma and her boyfriend send Willem away to the New Dawn Safari Training Camp where they are proud to 'make men out of boys'. They promise Willem he will be safe there.You Will Be Safe Here is a powerful and urgent novel of two connected South African stories with universal relevance. Inspired by real events, it uncovers a hidden colonial history, reveals a dark contemporary secret, and explores the legacy of violence and our drive to survive and to love. An Observer, Guardian, Financial Times, Irish Times, Irish Independent and Big Issue Pick of the Year

Once Upon a Twilight


Winter Pennington - 2012
    Though the two sisters have always been close, Millicent is often frustrated by her sister's inability to be what she perceives as mature and realistic. Too often, Malinda surrenders to her impulses, throwing herself thoughtlessly and headlong into flights of reckless fantasy.On the day before Malinda's wedding, Millicent finds herself dragged yet again on another of her sister's wild and imaginative quests. Convinced that she will beseech the Fey Ones to help her escape the dull world around her and her betrothed, Malinda persuades Millicent into riding out in the forest near their home. When things do not go as planned, Millicent realizes she's lost not only her sister in the deep heart of the forest, but her own way as well.Just when she thinks she can go on no longer, a strange woman from the forest offers Millicent shelter from the storm. As Millicent comes to better know the generous and beautiful stranger, she begins to wonder if perhaps her sister's far-fetched beliefs might have some merit to them after all, and that maybe, just maybe, fairytales and romance actually do exist beyond a page.

Rebeccah and the Highwayman


Barbara Davies - 2008
    Mistress Rebeccah Dutton never dreamed that several encounters with the notorious highwayman Blue-Eyed Nick on the deserted heaths around London would turn her respectable world upside down. When she discovers the highwayman is actually a woman named Kate, her curiosity about the dashing thief turns to fascination. Kate has to deal with a thieftaker snapping at her heels and secrets from her past before Rebeccah can become better acquainted with this intriguing highwaywoman. Will Kate avoid the shadow of Tyburn long enough for Rebeccah to explore this twist of fate?

Initiation by Desire


M.J. Williamz - 2012
    Tully Stephens wants only to survive her sophomore year. They soon realize how desperately they want each other, but that’s easier said than done.Tulley is a nineteen-year-old new initiate in the Gamma Alpha Epsilon sorority who has never loved a woman. Sue is the twenty-six-year-old resident adviser who jumps from bed to bed. Tulley is discovering her true self while Sue wants to discover more about the sexy young butch who’s invading her fantasies.A sorority house is never the ideal location for keeping a secret, especially when the secret is a blossoming affair. Can their love withstand the strain of the concealment? Will their time together always consist of stolen moments? Or will they complete their Initiation of Desire?

Daughter of Mystery


Heather Rose Jones - 2014
    The formidable Barbara, of unknown parentage and tied to the barony for secretive reasons, is a feared duelist, capable of defending her charges with efficient, deadly force.Equally perplexing is that while she is now a highly eligible heiress, Margerit did not also inherit the Saveze title, and the new baron eyes the fortunes he lost with open envy. Barbara, bitter that her servitude is to continue, may be the only force that stands between Margerit and the new Baron’s greed—and the ever deeper layers of intrigue that surround the ill-health of Alpennia’s prince and the divine power from rituals known only as The Mysteries of the Saints.At first Margerit protests the need for Barbara’s services, but soon she cannot imagine sending Barbara away—for reasons of state and reasons of the heart.Heather Rose Jone debuts with a sweeping story rich in intrigue and the clash of loyalties and love.