Book picks similar to
The Contract by Zeenat Mahal
romance
contemporary
novella
indian
Only You
Denise Grover Swank - 2016
. .Romance isn't an option for Holly Greenwood. With her wedding planner career on the line she needs to stay focused, and that means pleasing her demanding boss, not getting distracted by her mind-alteringly hot neighbor . . . Ex-Marine Kevin Vandemeer craves normalcy. Instead, he has a broken-down old house in need of a match and some gasoline, a meddling family, and the uncanny ability to attract the world's craziest women. At least that last one he can fix: he and his buddies have made a pact to swear off women, and this includes his sweetly sexy new neighbor. After one hot night that looks a whole lot like a disaster in the light of day, Kevin and Holly are about to learn that true love doesn't play by the rules . . .
Marriage Vacation
Pauline Turner Brooks - 2018
Knowing the book will cause a sensation, they decide they must publish it. Now you can read what the hype is about.To find herself…she might lose everything.By all appearances, Kate Carmichael had the perfect life: two adorable daughters, a pre-war town house on the Upper East Side, and a husband who ran one of the most successful publishing companies in New York. But when Kate attends the wedding of two of her oldest friends and reconnects with successful classmates from graduate school, she suddenly sees her life in a different light: the career she didn’t pursue, the dreams she’s locked away, the empty veneer of her privilege.When the wedding weekend ends, instead of heading home to her husband and family, Kate gets on a plane and flies halfway around the world. She claims it’s just going to be for a week—two max—so she can clear her head, make headway with her writing, and shake free of the feeling that time is passing her by.But just like Kate’s life, the adventure doesn’t go quite as planned. When it’s time to return, she finds herself trapped between wanting to be a good mother and partner and needing to find herself again.This provocative and gripping novel asks: is a wife and mother allowed to have a midlife crisis? And, if she does, can she ever be forgiven? Marriage Vacation is for anyone who has ever fantasized about what it would be like to run away from it all.
The Fastest Way to Fall
Denise Williams - 2021
Plans change and it’s unclear if love, career, or both will meet them at the finish line. Britta Colby works for a lifestyle website, and when tasked to write about her experience with a hot new body-positive fitness app that includes personal coaching, she knows it’s a major opportunity to prove she should write for the site full-time. As CEO of the FitMe app, Wes Lawson finally has the financial security he grew up without, but despite his success, his floundering love life and complicated family situation leaves him feeling isolated and unfulfilled. He decides to get back to what he loves—coaching. Britta’s his first new client and they click immediately.As weeks pass, she’s surprised at how much she enjoys experimenting with her exercise routine. He’s surprised at how much he looks forward to talking to her every day. They convince themselves their attraction is harmless, but when they start working out in person, Wes and Britta find it increasingly challenging to deny their chemistry and maintain a professional distance.Wes isn’t supposed to be training clients, much less meeting with them, and Britta’s credibility will be sunk if the lifestyle site finds out she’s practically dating the fitness coach she’s reviewing. Walking away from each other is the smartest thing to do, but running side by side feels like the start of something big.
Legally Blonde
Amanda Brown - 2001
President of Delta Gamma sorority, she's aced her major--sociopolitical jewellery design--and is on the verge of becoming Mrs. Warner Huntington III. Too bad Warner, bound for Stanford Law, dumps her with the explanation he needs a more "serious" woman at his side. Faced with this unexpected reversal of fortune, Woods doesn't get depressed, she gets busy.Thanks to a creative application video and a demand for "diversity" at Stanford Law, Elle gets admitted. Soon she's packing her convertible--as well as her pet Chihuahua "Underdog"--and heading north, determined to win back her man. Smart, fast, and funny,
Legally Blonde
proves how much fun blondes really can have!
Chasing Red
Isabelle Ronin - 2017
Until a chance encounter with a siren in a red dress changes everything. Until he meets the woman he dubs Red.Veronica Strafford's past makes it hard for her to trust anyone. Now, kicked out of her apartment, she reluctantly accepts Caleb's offer for a place to stay.Caleb feels intensely drawn to Veronica. And, for the first time in his life, he really wants something—someone. Too bad Veronica's heart might just be the one thing Caleb can't win.
You've Reached Sam
Dustin Thao - 2021
But then Sam dies. And everything changes.Heartbroken, Julie skips his funeral, throws out his things, and tries everything to forget him and the tragic way he died. But a message Sam left behind in her yearbook forces back memories. Desperate to hear his voice one more time, Julie calls Sam’s cellphone just to listen to his voicemail.And Sam picks up the phone.In a miraculous turn of events, Julie’s been given a second chance at goodbye. The connection is temporary. But hearing Sam’s voice makes her fall for him all over again, and with each call it becomes harder to let him go. However, keeping her otherworldly calls with Sam a secret isn’t easy, especially when Julie witnesses the suffering Sam’s family is going through. Unable to stand by the sidelines and watch their shared loved ones in pain, Julie is torn between spilling the truth about her calls with Sam and risking their connection and losing him forever.
My Lucky #13
Piper Rayne - 2021
I prefer to call it hard work, at least I did until my game went to complete crap. I haven’t scored in eight games and my team owner is talking about trading me. I’ve never believed in superstitions. Never needed one. I suppose I was “lucky” in that way. But now the best way to refer to me is desperate. I’d wear the same socks for an entire year just to be the high-scoring center I used to be. Imagine my surprise when after spending New Year’s Eve with a woman, I score a hat trick in the next game—that’s three goals in one game for you non-hockey lovers. Now, I have to track her down and bribe her to do it again before every game. Get your mind out of the gutter, I’m not talking about it.I find her and when I get to know her better, I end up spending more time thinking about her than my game, but she’s made it clear she wants no part of me. She’s going to learn that I didn’t become a professional hockey player without having to fight for what I want.
The No-Show
Beth O'LearyBeth O'Leary
Miranda is a tree surgeon used to being treated as just one of the guys on the job. Jane is a soft-spoken volunteer for the local charity shop with zero sense of self-worth.These three women are strangers who have only one thing in common: They've all been stood up on the same day, the very worst day to be stood up--Valentine's Day. And, unbeknownst to them, they've all been stood up by the same man.Once they've each forgiven him for standing them up, they let him back into their lives and are in serious danger of falling in love with a man who seems to have not just one or two but three women on the go....Is there more to him than meets the eye? And will they each untangle the truth before they all get their hearts broken?
Naughty Little Secret
Shayla Black - 2006
After divorcing her never-home husband, Lauren Southall plucked up her courage, dusted off her power suits, and returned to corporate life. Two years later, there's just one six-foot three, testosterone-packed problem: her ex-husband's good friend and her current boss, Noah Reeves. Lauren aches for him. No other man will do. But she cant possibly measure up to the silicone-packed professional cheerleaders he dates. So she hides her desire behind a professional persona and fantasizes. For ten years, Noah Reeves has waited to make Lauren his. Once her divorce was final, he tracked down and hired the brilliant, dedicated woman. But when he's with her, it isn't spreadsheets and profit margins on his brain. Problem is, she's never seen him as anything but her ex-husbands pal. Now that she's finally a free woman and with him 40+ hours a week, well... he'd love to persuade her to throw in her nights and weekends. Noah decides to romance her by day. By night, he becomes a mysterious stranger devoted only to her pleasureand discovers shes hiding a naughty little secret of her own. Warning, this title contains the following: explicit sex, graphic language
The Wandering Falcon
Jamil Ahmad - 2011
It is a formidable world and the people who live there are constantly subjected to extremes—both of geography and of culture.The Wandering Falcon begins with a young couple, refugees from their tribe, who have traveled to the middle of nowhere to escape the cruel punishments meted upon those who transgress the boundaries of marriage and family. Their son, Tor Baz, descended from both chiefs and outlaws, becomes “The Wandering Falcon,” a character who travels throughout the tribes, over the mountains and the plains, in the towns and tents that comprise the homes of the tribal people. The media today speak about this unimaginably remote region, a geopolitical hotbed of conspiracies, drone attacks, and conflict—now, told in the rich, dramatic tones of a master storyteller, this stunning, honor-bound culture is revealed from the inside.Jamil Ahmad has written an unforgettable portrait of a world of custom and compassion, of love and cruelty, of hardship and survival, a place fragile, unknown, and unforgiving.
Privacy Code
Jordan Burke - 2014
No one has secrets like Watts.Catherine Kolb has found the perfect diversion from her life of nearly complete seclusion: a virtually anonymous correspondence with a man she knows only as “Watts.”Intelligent, mysterious, and with an insatiable appetite for sex, he begins to draw Catherine out of her closely guarded world, tempting her with his words—some dirty, some simply enticing…“You should indulge your curiosities, especially the forbidden ones.”Watts insists on privacy. He has no choice. In the wrong hands, his secrets could get people killed. Including Catherine.Common sense says they should never meet, but curiosity and lust prove stronger than reason and caution. A planned one-time encounter sets into motion a series of events that bring Catherine and Watts to the edge of ecstasy and the brink of peril.Two very private people. One risky night. A shot at love and redemption.Due to mature themes, this book is recommended for readers 18+.
Kamila Knows Best
Farah Heron - 2022
She lives a life of comfort, filled with her elaborate Bollywood movie parties, a dog with more Instagram followers than most reality stars, a job she loves, and an endless array of friends who clearly need her help finding love. In fact, Kamila is so busy with her friends’ love lives, she’s hardly given any thought to her own . . .Fortunately, Kamila has Rohan Nasser. A longtime friend of the family, he’s hugely successful, with the deliciously lean, firm body of a rock climber. Only lately, Kamila’s “harmless flirting” with Rohan is making her insides do a little bhangra dance.But between planning the local shelter’s puppy prom, throwing a huge work event, and proving to everyone that she’s got it all figured out, Kamila isn’t letting herself get distracted—until her secret nemesis returns to town with an eye for Rohan. Suddenly, it seems like the more Kamila tries to plan, the more things are starting to unravel—and her perfectly ordered life is about to be turned upside down.
The Restaurant
Pamela M. Kelley - 2020
Journal bestselling author of Nantucket Neighbors and Nantucket White Christmas. Three sisters. An inherited Nantucket restaurant. One year before they can sell.Mandy, Emma and Jill are as close as three sisters who live hundreds of miles apart can be. They grew up together on Nantucket, but Mandy is the only one that stayed.Jill lives a glamorous life in Manhattan as a co-owner of a successful executive search firm. Never married, she is in her mid-thirties and lives in a stunning, corner condo with breathtaking views of the city and Hudson river. Everyone thinks there's something going on with her partner, Nick, because as a workaholic, she spends more time with him than anyone else. But there's never been anything but friendship between them and Nick loves being a bachelor in NYC.Emma lives in Arizona and is an elementary school teacher and aspiring photographer. She met her college professor husband, Peter, in grad school and they've been married for over fifteen years. In recent years, she's noticed that Peter has grown distant. But when he shares a surprising secret, she doesn't see it coming and her world is turned upside down.Mandy followed her high school boyfriend, Cory to Boston College, and after graduation, they married and Cory joined a successful hedge fund in Boston, while Mandy stayed home and had two children, Blake and Brooke. They moved home to Nantucket when Cory opened a competing hedge fund. Now that the children are older, Mandy is eager to do more than coordinate local charity events. But Cory doesn't want her to work. He thinks it doesn't reflect well on him and appearances are everything to Cory. Though when Mandy finds a second cell phone in his gym bag, she begins to question what is really going on.When their beloved grandmother, Ethel Ferguson passes peacefully in her sleep a week before her ninety-ninth birthday, she leaves them quite a surprise. In addition to her Nantucket home, they learn that she was the silent owner of Mimi's Place, one of Nantucket's most popular year-round restaurants. There is of course, a catch--she left the restaurant equally to Mandy, Emma, and Jill--and also to Paul, the restaurant chef for the past fifteen years. And before they can sell, all three girls must work at the restaurant for one year--or their shares of the restaurant will go to Paul.The same Paul that broke one of their hearts many years ago.
Seduction & Temptation
Jessica Sorensen - 2014
It’s something that’s always bothered her, but even more so after her mother dies. Lola thinks there’s more to her mother’s death than what she’s been told; that one of her father’s many enemies might have had something to do with it. And when a secret is revealed about her mother, Lola decides it’s time to leave the dangerous life she’s grown up in and get some answers. But before Lola can get too far, she’s kidnapped by Frankie Catherlson, one of her father’s enemies, and given a choice—commit murder or let her father die. Worse, Layton Everett is the guy chosen to make sure she goes through with the hit. Lola has known Layton since they were kids, but their friendship was ruined when he went to work for Frankie without so much as an explanation. Lola thinks Layton is just keeping an eye on her to make sure she goes through with the murder, but when it all comes down to it, Layton just might be on her side.
The Wedding Tamasha
Sudha Nair - 2017
She doesn’t know how to tell her parents the truth about her marriage and return to India. But then her brother’s wedding leaves her no choice.Entrepreneur Chef Niraj (Niru) Karthik is in charge of catering for his best friend's wedding. He isn't looking forward to meeting his childhood crush—the one that got away—but he finds himself drawn to her again.Shweta has only thought of Niru as her older brother's best friend, but now she’s falling head over heels in love with him. As both try to come to terms with their true feelings, they realize that a lot more than friendship is at stake.And then, there’s Shweta’s family, mixed up in a dilemma: an overbearing father, an over-anxious mother, and three very disparate yet close siblings.Will Shweta get the love and acceptance she yearns for? Or will upholding the family honour be more important?