Book picks similar to
All the Pretty Lies by Melissa Toppen
romance
high-school
contemporary
young-adult
The Boy Next Door
Jennifer Sucevic - 2021
I’ve spent more years than I care to admit crushing hard on Colton Montgomery. The blond, blue-eyed hottie leaves a trail of broken hearts in his wake wherever he goes. Mine being one of them. Just when I’d decided to cut my losses and move on, he appeared out of nowhere and swept me off my feet. It had all seemed like a fairytale until he dumped me.Through text message, no less.Ouch.Eighteen months and one study abroad program later, I’ve returned to Wesley University to finish out my senior year.And Colton?He’s nothing more than a regrettable mistake I’d prefer to forget. Or so I tell myself. It only takes one run-in to realize that my feelings for him aren’t as dead and buried as I’d thought. Nope, they’re still there, simmering dangerously beneath the surface.He wants a second chance to make things right.That’s not going to happen.But Colton has other ideas.And part of me is afraid that if he actually puts his mind to it, he’ll end up changing mine.
Rebel Heart
L.K. Farlow - 2018
When AJ Adams is coerced into tutoring Brock Larson, she can’t help but wonder what she’s done to deserve such an epic punishment. He’s the very definition of an All-American good boy—and a total kiss ass. He’s the perfect son, the perfect student, and according to rumor, by far the best golfer the university has ever seen. Puh-lease. If he’s so perfect, why does he need tutoring? With his British Literature grade circling the drain, Brock knows he needs help. But when he meets his tutor, he can’t believe his friggin’ luck. Abby Jane no longer resembles the childhood best friend he used to play hide and seek with. No, she’s all attitude and pink hair and tattoos. Oh, and she hates him, so that’s a plus. Brock and AJ couldn’t clash more and antagonizing one another is just too easy. But, as they spend more time together, the lines begin to blur, leading them to realize they have more in common than what meets the eye. Hate. Lust. Love. They all look the same when you’re in denial, and everyone knows you can’t control your rebel heart.
Chasing Spring
R.S. Grey - 2016
I didn't belong in the small town, but my dad wouldn't listen. He dragged me back home in his beat-up truck and dropped a bomb along the way: Chase Matthews was moving in with us. He was the golden boy of my high school, my former best friend, and the last person I wanted sleeping across the hall. His presence was too great a reminder of the ghosts I was trying to forget.I didn't ask for a hero. I don't want to be saved.To me, Lilah Calloway meant late nights sneakin'; out, moonlit hair, and sparklers in July. She was my best friend until the day she left and I'd assumed Blackwater had seen the last of her. Then, like a tempest, she rolled back into town for the final half of senior year. The chopped hair and dark devil-may-care attitude warned most people away, but I knew if I fought hard enough, I could find the lost girl.I didn't want to be her hero. Some girls don't need to be saved.
Suddenly Forbidden
Ella Fields - 2018
We were never meant to let go, but it happened anyway. Too bad I didn’t know someone was waiting to take my place, or I would've held on a lot tighter. Two years later, we were exactly where we'd always planned to be. I'd kept my promise. He'd forgotten all about his. Not only had he moved on, but the person he'd moved on with was my best friend, leaving me to begin college with a broken heart. I guess this is the part where I’m supposed to tell you some other guy stepped in, repaired my shattered pieces, and made me smile again. This isn't that kind of story. My heart might have been broken, but it refused to fall out of love. WARNING: this book contains cheating.Each book in the Gray Springs world can be read as a standalone.
Left Behind
Vi Keeland - 2014
Sure, we were just kids, but I was old enough to know my life would never be the same. She was my best friend. My destiny. My fate. I wasn’t wrong…I just didn’t know how twisted fate could be.Nikki FallonAfter the death of my mother, moving from my dark and dreary trailer park to sunny California, I was focused on one thing – finding a sister I’d only just learned existed. Falling in love with him wasn’t part of the plan. But he filled a void I never knew was possible to fill. He had to be my fate. My destiny. Until the day I finally found out who my sister was…and how twisted fate could be.
Shameless King
Maya Hughes - 2018
Voted Biggest Flirt. Highest goal scorer in Kings of Rittenhouse Prep history. Everyone’s impressed, well except one person…After a blow out in high school, Makenna Halstead and I were happy to never have to cross paths again. Except life has a way of knocking you straight in the teeth with a puck when you least expect it. She hasn’t just returned to my life, she crashed into it like a wrecking ball...into my college kingdom, into my class, and smack dab into the seat next to mine. My new lab partner to be exact. For years we hated each other... I may be King on the ice, but she is the Ice Queen. She has no problem calling me out, doesn’t back down, and her piercing blue eyes have me picturing more than than just my arms wrapped around her. Now we’re stuck with each other and there’s no getting around that fact that we have to work together. My hockey career hangs in the balance. Problem? Oh, yeah.I can’t deny it. I want her. More than I ever thought I could want a woman. I’ve got one semester–only four months–to convince her everything she thought about me was wrong. Will my queen let me prove to her I’m the King she can’t live without? Only one way to find out...
The Trouble With Bullies
Ruby Vincent - 2019
they hate when you stand up to them.
I used to be on top. I used to rule the school. Then one cruel act knocked me off my pedestal and Christian was more than happy to ride me down.Christian Moreau: resident bad boy, former best friend, now my tormentor. Nobody dared to stand up to him until one girl, a bottle of vodka, and a shove changed everything.Yeah, that girl was me.If only I had known what that shove would set off.A war with the Queen Bee of Meadow Creek. Long-hidden dark secrets revealed. And Christian Moreau moving in down the hall.Christian lures me into his game, but he's not the only bully that came to play.Can I handle the price of playing when winning may grant me his heart... but losing could cost me my life?
The Trouble With Bullies is a high school bully romance. This book features language and sexual scenes. If you're cool with that, dive in!
Addictive
Lola Finn - 2020
Gorgeous. Frustrating. Sculpted perfection.Years ago, he claimed me as his best friend and then left, never to be heard from again—or so I thought until he showed up last year.We both spent the summer working at his father's luxury resort. Except he pretended not to know me, ignored me, managed to not even look at me for twelve weeks.Now we're both back again for another season, and a lot has changed since last year.He isn't just my secret obsession anymore. He isn't just my boss for the entire summer.Knox Cabot is about to become my stepbrother.And given the scorching stares, forbidden touches, and downright dirty things he says, Knox plans to claim me again...only in a hotter, sinful, and much more scandalous way.Welcome to Haven Cove. Elite, sexy, scandalous—and that's just the guests and staff. At one of the world's most exclusive resorts, someone's always doing something they shouldn't. Or, more likely...someone.Don't forget the sunscreen. It's amping up to be one long, hot summer.
Each book in the Haven Cove series is a complete standalone with no cliffhangers, no cheating, and a guaranteed HEA.
All the Little Lights
Jamie McGuire - 2018
Both Elliott and Catherine feel like outcasts, yet they find an easy friendship with each other. But when Catherine needs him most, Elliott is forced to leave town.Elliott finally returns, but he and Catherine are now different people. He’s a star high school athlete, and she spends all her free time working at her mother’s mysterious bed-and-breakfast. Catherine hasn’t forgiven Elliott for abandoning her, but he’s determined to win back her friendship…and her heart.Just when Catherine is ready to fully trust Elliott, he becomes the prime suspect in a local tragedy. Despite the town’s growing suspicions, Catherine clings to her love for Elliott. But a devastating secret that Catherine has buried could destroy whatever chance of happiness they have left.
Be the Girl
K.A. Tucker - 2019
New postal code, new last name, new rules. But she doesn’t mind, because it means she can leave her painful regrets behind. In the bustling town of Eastmonte, she can become someone else. Someone better.With the Hartford family living next door, it seems she will succeed. Sure, Cassie Hartford may be the epitome of social awkwardness thanks to her autism, but she also offers an innocent and sincere friendship that Aria learns to appreciate. And Cassie’s older brother, Emmett—a popular Junior A hockey player with a bright future—well … Aria wishes that friendship could lead to something more. If he didn’t already have a girlfriend, maybe it would.But Aria soon finds herself in a dicey moral predicament that could derail her attempt at a fresh start. It is her loyalty to Cassie and her growing crush on Emmett that leads her to make a risky move, one that earns her a vindictive enemy who is determined to splinter her happy new world.
Blitzed
Lauren Landish - 2016
I brought her back to meet you.”
I’m normally not into jocks, but when Troy Wood asks me out, I feel like I’m the Chosen One. After all, he’s hot as hell and Silver Lake’s best athlete, practically the King of Campus. God’s gift to women—that’s what they call him, but I’ll make a gentleman out of him. Everything is perfect, and he already practically has his ticket to the Big Leagues. There’s just one little problem . . . I’m hiding a secret that could destroy him and his future. I can’t tell him . . .
I can’t tell him that I’m pregnant with his baby.
**Blitzed is a full-length romance with an HEA, no cheating, and no cliffhanger!
About Tomorrow
Abbi Glines - 2020
I take one very long and deep breath hoping to calm the immediate butterflies that take flight in my stomach and hope to slow down the racing of my heart. The voice was slightly deeper but the timbre was one that was achingly familiar.My actions did little to help, but then who was I kidding? A deep breath wasn't going to fix the effect he had on me and my body's inevitable reaction. Even the memories that would forever haunt me couldn't keep my emotions from triggering at the nearness of him once again.I used to pray that I'd find the strength to move on from him, from the pain that the end carried, from the emptiness in my chest, but ultimately move on from—the loss of Creed Sullivan and the death of his sister, Cora.The Sullivans had been the best part of my summers in New England.Deep down, I knew my ache for all that I had lost was the reason I returned...But I hadn't expected to see him again—especially not like this.
Spinning Out
Lexi Ryan - 2016
I had it all, and I threw it away with a semester of drugs, alcohol, and pissing off anyone who tried to stop me. Now I’m suspended from the team, on house arrest, and forced to spend a semester at home to get my shit together. The cherry on my fuckup sundae? Sleeping in the room next to mine is my best friend’s girl, Mia Mendez—the only woman I’ve ever loved and a reminder of everything I regret.I’m not sure if having Mia so close will be heaven or hell. She’s off-limits—and not just because she’s working for my dad. Her heart belongs to someone else. But since the accident that killed her brother and changed everything, she walks around like a zombie, shutting out her friends and ignoring her dreams. We’re both broken, numb, and stuck in limbo.Until I break my own rules and touch her. Until she saves me from my nightmares by climbing into my bed. Until the only thing I want more than having Mia for myself is to protect her from the truth. I can’t rewrite the past, but I refuse to leave her heart in the hands of fate. For this girl, I’d climb into the sky and rearrange the stars.SPINNING OUT is a sexy, emotional novel of 100,000 words. It is first in the Blackhawk Boys, a series of standalone novels.
Pretty When She Cries
A. Zavarelli - 2020
Ours was baptized in fire.I was the new girl trying to find her place.Landon was the brooding neighbor I tutored over the summer.I didn’t know he was a legend at Black Mountain Academy.I didn’t know they worshipped him like a religion.But I fell for him before I knew those things.To me, he was just the tortured soul who drew me in like a magnet.And then he did something so unspeakable, so unforgivable, it shattered me.I ran away then because I was weak, but I’ve shed my tears.He stole my heart and my dignity, and I’m here to take it back.The only problem is… he’s not giving it up without a fight.
One & Only
Viv Daniels - 2013
Tess McMann lives her life according to the secrets she's sworn to keep: the father who won't acknowledge her, the sister who doesn't know she exists, and the mother who's content playing mistress to a prominent businessman. When she meets the distractingly cute Dylan Kingsley at a prestigious summer program and falls in love, Tess allows herself to imagine a life beyond these secrets. But when summer ends, so does their relationship -- Dylan heads off to Canton College while Tess enrolls at the state university. One love they can't ignore... Two years later, a scholarship brings Tess to Canton and back into Dylan's life. Their attraction is as strong as ever, but Dylan has a girlfriend…who also happens to be Tess's legitimate half-sister. Tess refuses to follow in her mother's footsteps, which leaves her only one choice: break the rules she’s always followed, or allow Dylan to slip away for a second time. ...And only one chance to get things right.