Book picks similar to
Break Free by Amber Garza


new-adult
stand-alone
romance
standalone

From the Wreckage


Michele G. Miller - 2014
    When disaster strikes, their labels become irrelevant.“In a matter of minutes on a Friday night, I lost my school, my identity, the security of my first love, the personality of my sweet fearless brother, my best friend, my town, everything as I knew it. Everything changed.”"Minutes—that’s all it takes to change your entire life. How do you deal with that?”For high school senior Jules Blacklin surviving the storm is only the beginning. Faced with her life's new reality, she must find a way to rise from the wreckage and answer the question—how do you get back to normal when everything normal is gone?The From The Wreckage series is a Young Adult to New Adult series with one trilogy and multiple character spin-offs. Please see the reading order below:Jules and West's trilogy1. From the Wreckage2. Out of Ruins3. All that RemainsSpin-offs best read in order but CAN be read alone4. West: A male POV novel of From The Wreckage5. Into the Fire: Dani's story6. After the Fall: Austin's story7. Until We Crash: Jess and Carter's story

Gothikana


RuNyx - 2021
    An enigmatic man. An ancient castle. What could go wrong?An outcast her entire life, Corvina Clemm is left adrift after losing her mother. When she receives the admission letter from the mysterious University of Verenmore, she accepts it as a sign from the universe. The last thing she expects though is an olden, secluded castle on top of a mountain riddled with secrets, deceit, and death.An enigma his entire life, Vad Deverell likes being a closed book but knowing exactly everything that happens in the university. A part-time professor working on his thesis, Vad has been around long enough to know the dangers the castle possesses. And he knows the moment his paths cross with Corvina, she's dangerous to everything that he is.They shouldn't have caught each other's eye. They cannot be. But a chill-inducing century-old mystery forces them to collide. People have disappeared every five years for over a hundred years, and Corvina is getting clues to unraveling it all, and Vad needs to keep an eye on her.And so begins a tale of the mystique, the morbid, the macabre, and a deep love that blossoms in the unlikeliest of places.

The Devil You Know


Trish Doller - 2015
    Living in a tiny Florida town with her dad and four-year-old brother, Cadie spends most of her time working, going to school, and taking care of her family. So when she meets two handsome cousins at a campfire party, she finally has a chance for fun. They invite her and friend to join them on a road trip, and it's just the risk she's been craving-the opportunity to escape. But what starts out as a fun, sexy journey quickly becomes dangerous when she discovers that one of them is not at all who he claims to be. One of them has deadly intentions. A road trip fling turns terrifying in this contemporary story that will keep readers on the edge of their seats.

Brutally Beautiful


Christine Zolendz - 2013
    With blood still on her hands, Samantha Matthews is on the run, running from dark secrets and a man she prays to God will never find her. Running and hiding, just to stay alive. She had no choice but to run, to leave, to hide and forget about her life before. When Samantha believes she's gained enough distance from her past and her demons, she stops running, hoping to find her future in the heavily wooded area of the Adirondack Mountains, a place she never expected to encounter a man with secrets as dark and as sordid as hers. Kade Grayson is hiding, not from the demons after him, but from himself and from the entire outside world, wishing every day he could have just died. Arrogant and domineering, he’s tormented and terrorized by his past, seeing nothing good for his future. With the ghosts of his past still haunting him, he has exiled himself to a life of solitude, only living for his words and through his stories.Until her.An undeniable attraction, turns into hate and then ultimately obsession, an obsession that grows into a powerful story of love and redemption.Will the bond they have begun to build between them grow stronger than the tragedies that have scarred both of their lives? Or will they allow their demons to consume them?

Mountain Angel


Suzie O'Connell - 2012
    When a call from her stalker makes it clear he wasn’t deterred, Aelissm asks her overprotective uncle for advice. His decision to send Patrick O’Neil to keep her safe might become an even bigger problem. Pat is a haunted man with a kind smile and sad eyes. Aelissm knows he will leave, but there is something irresistible about him. He could be the best thing to ever happen to her… if she can convince him to stay.

On the Rocks


Sawyer Bennett - 2014
    Now he’s returned home to the sand and salty breeze of the North Carolina Outer Banks so he can open The Last Call, a beach bar nestled among the dunes of the Atlantic.Five years ago, Gabby Ward drunkenly threw herself at her best friend’s brother, only to have her young heart crushed. Hunter is back but Gabby is content to stay far away from him and his dangerously charming ways. Gabby’s well-schemed plans to ignore Hunter go up in flames when he presents her an offer she simply can’t refuse. Working together day in and day out proves problematic for two reasons—Gabby realizes her feelings for Hunter are still very much alive, while Hunter struggles to break through to Gabby’s cold heart. What starts out as a mutual business arrangement soon turns into a passion that neither can deny.But when the pro surfing tour comes knocking and Hunter has a chance to reclaim his former glory, hard choices lie ahead for both of them.Choices that could destroy what they have built or take them further than they could ever dare to hope in their second chance at romance.

Pretty Instinct


S.E. Hall - 2014
    Because you, you are everything.” There’s no easy road traveled to such an intense sentiment, one I never dreamt I’d feel… But I also never planned on Cannon Blackwell climbing aboard my tour bus.

The Unloved


Jennifer Snyder - 2012
    Julie Porter learned the hard way that trust is something which must be earned and not something to be given out lightly, those who say they love you are those who hold the power to hurt you most, and best friends can help you survive anything—until they move away.Nick Owen knows a thing or two about a hard life. At a young age Nick learned how to take a hit and to make lemonade out of the lemons life tossed his way. Returning home after nearly two years of being away, all Nick cares about now is protecting his mom from the abusive hands of his father and catching up with his best friend—the girl who lived across the street, the girl he can’t seem to stop thinking about.Finally reunited after two years apart, Nick and Julie are about to learn that age does nothing to protect you from life’s trials and tribulations, heartache and loss, but maybe together they’ll find a way to survive. (Mature Young Adult, contains violence, language, and sexual situations.)

Dangerous Lies


Becca Fitzpatrick - 2015
    Thunder Basin, Nebraska, is not her real home. This is not her real life.After witnessing a lethal crime, Stella Gordon is sent to the middle of nowhere for her own safety before she testifies against the man she saw kill her mother’s drug dealer.But Stella was about to start her senior year with the boyfriend she loves. How can she be pulled away from the only life she knows and expected to start a new one in Nebraska? Stella chafes at her protection and is rude to everyone she meets. She’s not planning on staying long, so why be friendly? Then she meets Chet Falconer and it becomes harder to keep her guard up, even as her guilt about having to lie to him grows.As Stella starts to feel safer, the real threat to her life increases—because her enemies are actually closer than she thinks…

A Life Less Broken


Margaret McHeyzer - 2014
    Broken and damaged, Allyn seeks help from someone that fate brought her.Dr. Dominic Shriver is a psychiatrist who’s drawn to difficult cases. He must push past his own personal battles to help Allyn fight her monsters and nightmares.Is Dr. Shriver the answer to her healing?Can Allyn overcome the broken?Contains distressing content. Only suitable for 18+. Standalone.

Lost In Italy


Stacey Joy Netzel - 2011
    Her itinerary did not include being stranded by her siblings, kidnapped by a sexy American movie star, dodging bullets, or fleeing criminals in a car chase around Lake Como.And that's just in the first three hours....often go awry.Trent Tomlin put his movie career on hold to investigate his brother's murder-ruled-suicide at his Italian villa. He's closing in on the suspects when an American tourist unwittingly films the murder of the retired cop helping him. The killers will stop at nothing to get the evidence-including holding Halli's family as collateral.Life's a little different unscripted. Thrust into the role of real-life hero, Trent finds himself falling for the Plain Jane whose beauty blossoms with every challenge they face. But how can he keep the evidence from falling into the wrong hands and get justice for his brother and friend without betraying Halli and her family?

In Harmony


Emma Scott - 2018
    The happy, driven girl is gone, and she is left wracked by post-traumatic stress her body remembers even if she does not. When her father suddenly uproots the family from their posh penthouse in New York City to the tiny town of Harmony, Indiana, Willow becomes more untethered and lost under the weight of her secret. On a whim, she auditions for a part in the community theater’s production of Hamlet and unexpectedly wins the role of Ophelia—the girl who is undone by madness, and her love of Hamlet… Isaac Pierce is from the ‘wrong side of the tracks.’ The town bad boy. Girls pine for his attention and guys are in awe of him. That he’s an acting prodigy only adds to his charisma. Isaac utterly disappears into his characters; the stage is the only place he feels safe from his own traumatic home life. He wants nothing more than to escape to Broadway or Hollywood, and leave Harmony behind for good. No one can play Hamlet but Isaac, and when the director pairs him with Willow in acting class, they clash again and again—neither willing to open their hearts to anyone. But clashing leads to breaking, breaking leads to the spilling of terrible secrets, and soon Isaac and Willow find Shakespeare’s words mirroring their lives. When they are cruelly torn apart, neither know how this play will end—with madness and heartache? Or healing, love, and the discovery of who they are truly meant to be. In Harmony is a standalone NEW ADULT love story, and is intended for readers 18 and up. PLEASE NOTE, this book contains sensitive material such as physical abuse, and the aftermath of sexual assault (off the page). Reader discretion is advised.

The Light Through the Leaves


Glendy Vanderah - 2021
    But when she returns, Viola is gone. A breaking point in an already fractured marriage, Viola’s abduction causes Ellis to disappear as well—into grief, guilt, and addiction. Convinced she can only do more harm to her family, Ellis leaves her husband and young sons, burying her desperate ache for her children deeper with every step into the mountain wildernesses she treks alone.In a remote area of Washington, a young girl named Raven keeps secrets inside, too. She must never speak to outsiders about how her mother makes miracles spring from the earth, or about her father, whose mysterious presence sometimes frightens her. Raven spends her days learning how to use her rare gifts—and more important, how to hide them. With each lesson comes a warning of what dangers lie in the world beyond her isolated haven. But despite her mother’s cautions, Raven finds herself longing for something more.As Ellis and Raven each confront their powerful longings, their journeys will converge in unexpected and hopeful ways, pulled together by the forces of nature, love, and family.

Dangerous Secrets


Abbie Zanders - 2014
    one passionate love story. Taryn Malone is stranded, broke, and desperate for help. But even if the sexy bartender she's been eyeing offers her a job for the evening... even if he seduces her with his impossibly intense blue eyes... even if every fiber of her heart tells her to stay with him... she can't. Because Taryn Malone doesn't exist.Jake Callaghan has been running the family's Irish pub for years now. When he sees Taryn standing out alone in the rain, he does what he's been trained to do as a SEAL - he rescues her. It has nothing to do with her full, firm curves, or her loose, golden-blonde hair, or the way she brushes against him that sends lightning bolts through his body. It's just the right thing to do. Really. But both Taryn and Jake are hiding secrets from each other. Dangerous secrets. And neither one of them knows just how dangerous it can be to fall in love...

Never Date Your Brother's Best Friend


Jules Barnard - 2014
    My friend needed a date, and my brother's best friend was single. Problem solved.Until I saw Jaeger for the first time in years, and sparks flew in the wrong direction.Jaeger has grown up and bulked up. But that shouldn't matter, because I have the perfect life. Really.Only my plans are beginning to unravel and now visions of Jaeger's hard abs, broad shoulders, and intense green eyes fill my head.I should hold back in case my friend is interested. Or in case of a million other reasons. But if Jaeger isn't willing to play by the rules, I don't think I can either.