Fire and Water


Amanda Kayhart - 2020
     No one knows this better than Diane Hollenbeck, who has the settlement papers and scars to prove it. Determined to salvage her life from the ashes, Diane starts fresh, beginning with a long sabbatical in New England. A retreat to her friends' lake house seems idyllic--to ignite her writing career, rediscover herself, and rekindle her confidence along the placid shores of Lake Champlain. Until Diane encounters her new neighbor--a sexy recluse with a strong and stormy personality. Now navigating the small island town and finding her much-needed solace is impossible. Conflict swells. And sparks erupt. But as Diane draws closer to this fiery acquaintance, as discovers there's more behind her neighbor's stinging flames--a shared loss and longing that fuses them together.

Mine


Georgia Beers - 2007
    She’s even dated half heartedly over the past year, but no one is able to penetrate her emotional barricades until she meets aggressive real estate broker Rachel Hart. Despite Rachel’s cool facade, Courtney is drawn to her—when she isn’t furious with her. Still, despite an undeniable attraction, Courtney has given her heart once and doesn’t have room for that kind of love in her life again. Rachel isn’t looking for love, especially not with a woman who belongs to someone else, and taking second place has never been her long suit.

Alcestis


Katharine Beutner - 2010
    Taking center stage in this debut novel is Alcestis, the fabled ‘good wife’ who sacrificed herself in order to save her much loved husband, King Admetus. In this reworking of the classic legend, a decidedly more complex and restless Alcestis is provided with an intriguing backstory involving her childhood and the untimely death of her favorite sister, Hippothoe. When Admetus is too cowardly to face his own death, Alcestis, hopeful of reuniting with Hippothoe, agrees to take his place in the Underworld. It is here in death that Alcestis wrestles with the true nature of love and loss, as she falls under the seductive spell of Persephone...” --Margaret Fuller, Booklist

Love on Location


Lisa Girolami - 2008
    There she meets Dawn Brock, a beautiful, deeply spiritual artist, who sets off sparks that Kate can not allow to ignite. But just how can she quell what burns so intensely and seems impossibly unavoidable?

Spring Tide


Robbi McCoy - 2012
    Her plans are to get the craft seaworthy and then sail into the snaking waterways—alone.Life for a veterinarian in Stillwater Bay is good. Jackie Townsend is fond of the quirky inhabitants and loves the natural beauty. The newcomer working on the dilapidated boat could become much more than a random acquaintance, but it’s clear that the moody Stef harbors a grim secret and wants to get lost in her pain, not found by romance.The waterways of the Delta tangle and weave for hundreds of miles, hiding secret coves, serene vistas and fragile depths. But they are no match for the tides of a woman’s heart.

Patience & Sarah


Isabel Miller - 1969
    Ultimately, they are forced to make life-changing decisions that depend on their courage and their commitment to one another.First self-published in 1969 (titled A Place for Us) in an edition of 1,000 copies, the author hand-sold the book on New York street corners; it garnered increasing attention to the point of receiving the American Library Association's first Gay Book Award in 1971. McGraw-Hill's version of the book a year later brought it to mainstream bookstores across the country.Patience & Sarah is a historical romance whose drama was a touchstone for the burgeoning gay and women's activism of the 1960s and early 1970s. It celebrates the joys of an uninhibited love between two strong women with a confident defiance that remains relevant today.Features an appendix of supplementary materials about Patience & Sarah and the author, as well as an introduction by acclaimed novelist Emma Donoghue.

San Francisco


Suzanne Falter - 2016
    And he’s having a midlife crisis.Charley gets suspended by the Agency after forgetting to pay his taxes. Only days earlier, yet another marriage proposal has been spurned. In his grief and confusion, Charley befriends Electra, a high-powered Manhattan socialite-turned-dominatrix rebuilding her life in San Francisco. Then he meets Frankie, a disgruntled lesbian police sergeant who has been demoted by the SFPD for being a whistle blower.Together they uncover a Christian fundamentalist’s lethal plot to destroy the ‘hedonists’ of San Francisco. Yet, neither the SFPD nor the CIA will take the threat seriously due to the trio’s outsider status. Can they get anyone to listen to them? Or are they on their own? Find out in this funny thriller filled with San Francisco’s spectacular scenery and inimitable, quirky characters.

Finlater


Shawn Stewart Ruff - 2008
    Cliffy, black, and Noah, Jewish, are teens of their time, segregated by neighborhood, skin color and opportunity, yet neither boy has ever had a friend like the other.

The World Unseen


Shamim Sarif - 2001
    When she meets the rebellious Amina who confounds the Indian community by driving a taxi and setting up a cafe with a black man, her world is turned upside down.

Not Single Enough


Grace Lennox - 2007
    A funny, sexy modern romance about two lonely women who bond over the unexpected and fall in love despite their determination to do the opposite.Giselle was having a ero week, in fact, she was having a ero life. Her ex had finally copped to the affair she’d been having for months and they’d broken up, Giselle had just watched an idiot get the promotion she wanted at work, and her mother had showed up for lunch with a gigolo she is set to marry.Life gets even more complicated when, after drowning her sorrows at her local bar, Giselle finds a newborn baby in a dumpster a block from her house and decides to keep it. Two days later, after she’s being calling in sick to work, her best friend Sandy visits, only to discover a fridge full of baby formula and Giselle reading a book on motherhood.Sandy has to act but she doesn't want to get Giselle in trouble, so she gets in touch with a friend who can deal with the situation, Detective Dale Porter. Dale has heard it all before. Nothing surprises her and she has no problem with the idea of picking up a dumpster baby, no questions asked, from a rescuer who got “carried away.” Only, Giselle seems so distressed when the baby is taken, avowedly single Dale finds herself wanting to make it up to her.

Snow Moon Rising


Lori L. Lake - 2006
    Every day since her birth, she and her extended family have been on the road in their vardo wagons meandering mostly through Poland and Germany. She learned early to ignore the taunts and insults of all those who call her people "Gypsies" and do not understand their close-knit society and way of life. Pauline "Pippi" Stanek has lived a settled life in a small German town along the eastern border of Poland and Germany. In her mid-teens, she meets Mischka and her family through her brother, Emil Stanek, a World War I soldier who went AWOL and was adopted by Mischka's troupe. Mischka and Pippi become fast friends, and they keep in touch over the years. But then, the Second World War heats up, and all of Europe is in turmoil. Men are conscripted into the Axis or the Allied armies, "undesirables" are turned over to slave labor camps, and with every day that passes, the danger for Mischka, Emil, and their families increases. The Nazi forces will not stop until they've rounded up and destroyed every Gypsy, Jew, dissident, and homosexual. On the run and separated from her family, Mischka can hardly comprehend the obstacles that face her. When she is captured, she must use all her wits just to stay alive. Can Mischka survive through the hell of the war in Europe and find her family? In a world beset by war, two women on either side of the conflagration breach the divide-and save one another. Snow Moon Rising is a stunning novel of two women's enduring love and friendship across family, clan, and cultural barriers. It's a novel of desperation and honor, hope and fear at a time when the world was split into a million pieces.

In Her Hands


Rebekah Blackmore - 2020
    She works as a pediatric nurse at a local hospital, and she is engaged to a wonderful man. When Ronnie meets Amy Vascar, the mother of one of her patients, she realizes just how quickly someone's life can change in an instant of meeting just the right person, and how quickly friendship can morph into something more.

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.

Rite of Summer


Tess Bowery - 2015
    Like falling in love.Violinist Stephen Ashbrook is passionate about three things—his music, the excitement of life in London, and his lover, Evander Cade. It’s too bad that Evander only loves himself. A house party at their patron’s beautiful country estate seems like a chance for Stephen to remember who he is, when he’s not trying to live up to someone else’s harsh expectations.Joshua Beaufort, a painter whose works are very much in demand among the right sort of people, has no expectations about this party at all. Until, that is, he finds out who else is on the guest list. Joshua swore off love long ago, but has been infatuated with Stephen since seeing his brilliant performance at Vauxhall. Now he has the chance to meet the object of his lust face to face—and more.But changing an open relationship to a triad is a lot more complicated than it seems, and while Evander’s trying to climb the social ladder, Stephen’s trying to climb Joshua. When the dust settles, only two will remain standing…when they’re not flat on their backs.Warning: Contents under pressure. Contains three men, two beds, one erotic piercing, and the hottest six weeks of summer the nineteenth century has ever seen. (m/m/m - m/m).

Bottle Rocket Hearts


Zoe Whittall - 2007
    Riot Grrl gets bought out and mass marketed as the Spice Girls, and gays are gaining some legitimacy, but the queers are rioting against assimilation; cocktail AIDS drugs are starting to work, and the city walls on either side of the Main are spray-painted with the words YES or NO. It's been five years since the OKA crisis and the sex garage riots; revolution seems possible when you're 18, like Eve. Eve is pining to get out of her parents' house in Dorval and find a girl who wants to kiss her back. She meets Della: mysterious, defiantly non-monogamous, an avid separatist, and ten years older. Initially taken in by a mutual other-worldly sense of rapture, they hole up in Della's apartment, trying to navigate spaces of jealousy. On the night of the 1995 referendum, politics and romance come to a head and Eve's naiveté begins to fade. From naive teenager to hotshot rough girl, Eve decides her own fate.