Book picks similar to
Calumet by Ali Vali
romance
lgbt
arc
celebrity
Sweet Surprise
Jenny Frame - 2021
A variety of mental health issues—anxiety, OCD, and PTSD—make it seem impossible to find love. Instead, she seeks joy in the one thing that is safe and ordered: her sweetshop in Glasgow.Mack Sharkey is ready to start a new life after being released from jail. As part of the infamous Sharkey family, she took care of business on the edge of the law for the once criminal, and now legitimate, empire. After being sentenced to jail time her cousin should have shared, she’s promised a quiet life running her dream barbershop.Flora and Mack are bound together by a night that changed their lives two years before and never thought they’d ever see each other again. But when Mack opens up her barbershop right next to Flora’s sweetshop, their connection comes roaring back.Cover Artist: Tammy SeidickGenres: Contemporary / Romance Tags: Animals, Gangsters, Good girls/Bad girls
Strawberry Summer
Melissa Brayden - 2017
She hated her name, was less than popular in school, and was always cast aside as a “farm kid.” However, with the arrival of Courtney Carrington, Margaret’s youth sparked into color. Courtney was smart, beautiful, and put together—everything Margaret wasn’t. Who would have imagined that they’d fit together so perfectly?But first loves can scar.Margaret hasn’t seen Courtney in years and that’s for the best. But when Courtney loses her father and returns to Tanner Peak to take control of the family store, Margaret comes face-to-face with her past and the woman she’s tried desperately to forget. The fact that Courtney has grown up more beautiful than ever certainly doesn’t help matters.
Recipe for Love
Aurora Rey - 2019
A recipe for love: One cup of homespun country farmer Two dollops of hotshot city chef A sprinkle of funky little restaurant Increase the heat until romance sizzles. Hannah Little doesn’t have much use for fancy chefs or fancy restaurants, but that’s exactly what Three Willows Farm needs to survive. When a local restaurant wants to feature her produce, she’s thrilled. But the contract means working with an egotistical, and (let’s face it) drop-dead-gorgeous head chef from New York City. Chef Drew Davis can’t wait to run her own kitchen. If taking a job at some trendy farm-to-table restaurant in the middle of nowheresville will get her there faster, she’s on board. She has no intention of staying though, and that means the feisty farmer who keeps trying to tell her how to do her job can’t be anything more than a pleasant distraction.
Kiss Me Every Day
Dena Blake - 2020
Her career has made her rich, but her love life is sorely lacking. She’s okay with that until she spends her birthday dinner with the woman who could’ve changed it all. There’s only one problem. She’s married to Wynn’s sister. Carly Evans is tired of her wife ignoring her needs to put her career first. Family has always been important to her, and Jordan just doesn’t seem to care. A freak thunderstorm rages during the night, and Wynn finds herself catapulted back in time to the day she made the worst decision of her life―stepping aside to let her sister romance Carly. Reliving the day over and over again, Wynn must decide what is most important: success, loyalty, or love. Given a second chance at happiness, will she take the opportunity and change her destiny?
Hopeless Romantic
Georgia Beers - 2020
It’s why she became a wedding planner and worked so hard to make her business, Hopelessly Romantic, successful. But after the catastrophe of her own marriage, Teddi loses her heart, her hope, and half of her assets. She is officially jaded, but she needs every job she can get to make ends meet. When bride-to-be Kelly Scott walks in, Teddi is ready. Until she comes face-to-face with Kelly’s sister: Leah Scott, her ex-wife’s divorce attorney. The one who helped ruin her life.Leah Scott wears her heart on her sleeve, an odd characteristic for a divorce attorney. When her father left her stay-at-home mom with barely enough money to survive, she recognized her calling. But Leah still believes in happiness and no one deserves it more than her sister. If only Kelly didn’t insist on using a wedding planner who hates Leah’s guts...despite the unexpected and wholly unwanted chemistry between them.Cover Artist: Ann McManGenres: Contemporary / Romance Words: 79,000
Coming Home
K.J . - 2019
World famous actress Abigail Taylor is in Melbourne filming her new movie, and is accompanied by her nine year old daughter, Grace, because Abigail wants her to experience an Australian education for three months. Sam Markson is a teacher at one of the best schools in Melbourne, and is perfectly happy doing that, thank you very much, when she’s suddenly redirected from the classroom into the job as Grace’s teacher; a move so fast that even blinking would feel like slow motion. Sam has never met anyone like Abigail Taylor, and she starts to realise that her ordinary life might actually be missing something extraordinary.71,000 words
The Mandolin Lunch
Missouri Vaun - 2021
After all, how hard can teaching kids about art really be? Apparently, pretty hard, because her first day on the job is a complete disaster, and that has nothing at all to do with the fact that Tess Hill, the captivating and overly conscientious music teacher, shares the same classroom.Tess, a dedicated teacher and single mother focused on creating a stable life for her daughter, is immediately attracted to the handsome, cavalier Garet for all the wrong reasons. Everything about Garet says short-term, and Tess refuses to consider anything less than forever. She’s not about to give her heart away to someone she can’t count on.Can Garet and Tess survive three months sharing the same classroom without killing each other…or falling in love?
Table for Two
Kate Gavin - 2021
When another woman walks into the crowded restaurant seeking a table, Reagan offers to share hers.Jillian Jacobs just wanted a quick bite before she’d have to focus on a new and unreasonable deadline. Irritated by her empty stomach and by the prospect of waiting, Jillian resentfully accepts a seat at a stranger’s table.Their shared lunch is filled with hostility, snide comments, and shades of derision from Jill and Reagan finds herself relieved at the end of the encounter.But then the two are thrown back together when Jill becomes a catering client of Reagan’s. Soon navigating a professional relationship becomes complicated as their attraction begins to smolder. Will it get in the way and cause even bigger problems? Or will this be the start of something they’ve both been looking for all along?Genre: RomanceEditor: Ann RobertsCover Designer: Kayla Mancuso
Never Mine
Bryce Oakley - 2021
Sure, she’s a soccer star with World Cup trophies and Olympic medals, but she’s almost as well known for her rebellious behavior off the pitch. She’s left enough gorgeous women with broken hearts in her dust to fill a roster. That was, until she got injured. Now, her frustratingly-slow recovery means she’d better secure this new squeaky-clean endorsement deal in order to get back on top.Sweet, sunshiny Willa Bellamy has a crisis on her hands. She’s used to it — as an events coordinator for the Denver Zoo, it’s her job to handle crises. But when she receives an invite to her ex’s wedding, she’s not so sure it’ll be as easy to handle as an escaped emu during a Girl Scout sleepover. Even worse, when the bachelorette party invite mentions that couples are welcome, she realizes she’s the sole single person invited. Fifteen years ago, Willa and Sage roamed the same halls of Edgelake High School. When their paths cross again, they decide to team up to solve both their problems — a stable, albeit fake, relationship to snag the endorsement deal and a hot soccer star to make the couples getaway sting a little less… But when the lines between real and fake start to blur, will they be able to keep the growing heat between them just a game or will they start playing to win?
Scent
Kris Bryant - 2021
Her packaging company’s turning a profit and she’s just been labeled Chicago’s most promising up-and-coming artist. The only thing missing is love. When she meets a beautiful woman on the train with an indescribable sweet and sugary scent, Nico’s ready to make her move.Sophia Sweet doesn’t have time for distractions. Never mind how fit and tan Nico is, or how she has the most beautiful eyes ever. Sophia only has one goal: keep the family business alive. Her third-generation chocolatier shop, Sweet Stuff, is tanking. In a last-ditch effort, Sophia creates an upscale version of their product and needs the perfect package to ensure success.When Sophia recognizes Nico from the train but mistakes her for the packaging company’s warehouse employee, Nico doesn’t bother to correct her. She’s been burned by women in the past wanting her for her money. This time, she’s determined to win Sophia over with her charm.Cover Artist: Deb B and Sheri HalalGenres: Contemporary / Romance
One Weekend in Aspen
Jaime Clevenger - 2021
But she’s not exactly the let-loose type. When she gets invited to spend a no-strings-attached weekend in Aspen with eight other women, the words “good for you” come to mind. Maybe a fling with a charming stranger is just what she needs.Alex Murphy travels the world for her job. She has no trouble getting dates wherever she lands and life is full of short-term escapades and fantasy weekends. Yet finding someone to share life with feels impossible. Until she meets Emily.What happens on one snowy weekend in Aspen could change everything. But is a gamble on love worth all the risk?Genre: RomanceEditor: Heather FlournoyCover Designer: Kayla Mancuso
Create a Life to Love
Erin Zak - 2019
She has her past, but she doesn’t think about it. Ever.All that changes when she finds the child she gave up for adoption standing on the doorstep. Now sixteen years old, Beth Weber is resourceful, a blossoming artist, and a spitting image of her birth mom. To say Jackie is stunned is the understatement of the year.When Jackie meets Beth’s adoptive mom, Susan, they’re immediately attracted to each other, but there’s no way Jackie is getting involved with a married woman, especially Beth’s mom. But when Susan and Beth need a place to stay and end up back on Jackie’s doorstep, their lives change forever.Will these three women who share a past and face an uncertain future be able to forge a life of love together?Cover Artist: Melody PondGenres: Contemporary / Romance
Hopes and Dreams
P.J. Trebelhorn - 2020
There aren't many prospects for true love, but she keeps hoping she'll find it somehow. She dreams of owning the small movie theater she manages, but that takes money, which is hard to get when you live paycheck to paycheck.Victoria Thayer has fallen for a woman more interested in her money than her heart for the last time. When she runs into Riley, the first girl she ever had a crush on, at their high school reunion, she's hoping there might just be a chance for the kind of relationship she's always wanted. But Victoria can't help wondering if Riley too is only after her money, and Riley can't seem to forgive the fact that Victoria was part of a group of kids who used to bully her.When hopes and dreams are on the line, will true love find a way?
The Secret Ingredient
K.D. Fisher - 2020
Two very different restaurants. One recipe for love.For single mom Adah Campbell, the executive chef job at a posh restaurant in quaint South Bay, Maine is a dream come true—and the perfect opportunity to start over, far away from a home that’s never felt entirely hers. But fitting in has never been easy, and between a new town, a new boss, and the unexpectedly attractive owner of a rival café, things get off to a rocky start.Never did free-spirited Beth Summers think she’d still be in Maine. Travel the world gathering delicious recipes and finding friends and lovers? Absolutely. Step in to run her family’s small-town café? Not so much. However, once Beth commits to something, that’s it. Soon, The Yellow House is the hottest spot in town, but Beth’s out of energy—and out of ideas for moving forward.Until Adah Campbell walks into her life. As sparks fly, both chefs have to decide if they are willing to make sacrifices...or if it’s really too many cooks in the kitchen.Carina Adores is home to romantic love stories where LGBTQ+ characters find their happily-ever-afters.
VIP
Jackie D. - 2021
Never one for a scandal, she’s lived a predictable and well-manicured life. With each movie more successful than the last, she has the world at her fingertips. An undeniable connection with bad girl superstar Harlow Thorne was never in her plan.Harlow Thorne left her childhood trailer park with nothing but her guitar and twin brother. Those times are nothing but a distant memory now, and she’s consistently at the top of the pop music world. She has managed to keep her mother in her rearview mirror through all her success, but that all changes when her mother reappears with a family secret.Together these two could conquer the world―but in a town where careers are made and broken by the press, the secrets and lies may be too much to overcome.