This is a Pride and Prejudice variation in which Darcy and Elizabeth meet at Pemberley, and Darcy invites her and the Gardiners to stay at the house. He's trying to do everything he can to show Elizabeth that he's changed, and it's working! They're on their way to falling in love when they discover a mysterious treasure, and things (and people) around Pemberley start getting weird and suspicious.
This is a super engaging and funny novella that explores Darcy and Elizabeth's shaky new relationship in a sweet, lighthearted way, like all of Melanie's work in this series of novellas has. (They're all standalones so you don't have to read the previous to understand this one.) An Accidental Meeting is out now on KU!
'Til All the Seas Run Dry by Eliza MacArthur
Listen, if you want a masterclass in yearning and pining and longing, let me introduce you to Callum McLeod.
The man yearns for a THOUSAND years for his lost love (oops, did I mention he’s a vampire?) and arranges his entire life to make the world a better place as she would have wanted—and then finds out that hey, she didn’t die a thousand years ago and ALSO she’s not human.
She’s actually a selkie and he’s kept her skin all these years, not realizing that’s what it was. So now Jory has a chance to go back to her selkie life—that she originally gave up for him—even though her lost love Callum (who she also thought was dead for a thousand years) is right there. Which one will she choose?
Eliza MacArthur writes beautiful, aching emotion so well, and you will fall in love with Callum and Jory! ‘Til All the Seas Run Dry is out now!
A Darling Aviator by Lark Holiday
Food influencer Elle does NOT want to be on her fiancé’s dream trip to Alaska, yet here she is. It’s really a relationship of convenience, but he’s done so much for her that she wants to do something for him. But when he runs off into the wilderness, he throws off all of her meticulous plans for her life.
The additional complication? The grumpy pilot and guide who she finds herself attracted to. She enlists Mac to help find her wayward fiancé, but in their search, she discovers that she might need to blow up her carefully curated life in order to be happy...and that Mac might be the key to that happiness.
Grumpy-sunshine, NO cheating (promise!), lighthearted fun in this small-town Alaska sweet romance! A Darling Aviator is available everywhere in print, ebook, and audio now!
Rising Courage by Heather Moll
How do we feel about kidnapping in our romances? How do we feel when the hero and heroine are kidnapped together?
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This is a Pride and Prejudice variation where Darcy still makes his terrible proposal to Elizabeth and gets shot down. Elizabeth takes herself out for a walk after this, and kidnappers mistake her for Anne de Bourgh. Darcy sees her getting kidnapped and he gets taken along with her so that he can protect her (and also ‘cause he’s rich and can be ransomed for $$).
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Now, stuck together (gotta love that forced proximity!) and desperate to escape, Darcy and Elizabeth have to work together, get past their misunderstandings, and save themselves from danger.
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Adventure and angst await! Rising Courage is out now on KU!
Sex, Lies and Sensibility by Nikki Payne
Nora is not having a good year. She’s just discovered that she and her sister Yanne are her late father’s secret family, all they got left in the will was a barely habitable house in MAINE of all places, and oh yeah, her sex tape just went viral. With no options at home, she and Yanne head to Maine with hopes of fixing the place up and making it a viable inn before they run out of money.
Bear has a habit of taking on more responsibility than he can handle, and the weight of his Abenaki community rests on his shoulders. If his tourism business fails, the community fails too—and it’s not looking good for business right now, especially since the abandoned house they use as a home base is suddenly un-abandoned by a beautiful woman and her sister. But maybe if they work together, all of them can succeed—or maybe it’ll bring all of them down?
This is a modern retelling of Sense and Sensibility, and in Nikki’s capable hands, it’s fresh and funny and sexy. It’s out everywhere today!
(I’m not the editor on this one—just worked with Nikki on an early version of the story. But I’m always happy to hype her up!)
With This Witch by Isla Winter
Petra thought she’d have ages before she’d have to take over the role of Premier Witch, the leader of the witches in her small community where supernaturals and humans live together, but a family emergency means she’ll have to step up sooner. The Premier Witch, though, traditionally has to be married, and Petra thought she’d have ages for that as well. But if she can’t find a spouse in 30 days, the supernatural council will give the Premier Witch title to her family’s long-held enemy.
Her friend Lachlan, the demon representative on the council, who has secretly been pining for her for years, offers to fake-marry her for the good of the council (sure, babe). Petra, of course, thinks they’re just friends and doesn’t want to ruin anything, even though her new husband is hot and sweet and has HORNS, you guys.
Family, legacy, politics, small town, friends to lovers, witches and demons and vampires (and more), oh my! With This Witch is out today!
Call of the Sea by Emily B. Rose
Princess Kenna has one dream: adventure on the ocean to find out if mermaids are real. But her parents won’t let her anywhere near the water, AND for the good of her kingdom, she has to get married, dooming her to a boring life on land. To make matters worse, suitors from around her kingdom have been sent to the castle so she can choose one of them as her husband, but she has no desire to marry someone who only wants to be king.
There is one man, though, who seems like an attractive option, but he mysteriously disappears before she can choose him. She chases after him on a boat, and wouldn’t you know it, they end up getting shipwrecked on an island together. There, Kenna learns about herself and about a truth long hidden, and tries to figure out how she can do her duty to her people while also being true to her own desires.
Big Little Mermaid/Moana/Brave vibes and fat/demisexual/ADHD rep in this NA fantasy! It’s out today, and there is also a GORGEOUS exclusive hardcover edition from ERRA Books that you can preorder!
An Accidental Proposal by Melanie Rachel
This is a Pride and Prejudice variation in which Darcy doesn’t quite get the chance to put his foot in his mouth when proposing to Elizabeth for the first time (oops, spoiler for a 211-year-old book) because someone ELSE barges in and accidentally proposes (not to Elizabeth).
But as Darcy and Elizabeth sort out the implications of this other proposal between their friends, they get to know each other better, and both of them start to understand where they’ve gone wrong with each other in the past. But will they fall back into their old patterns before Darcy can propose properly this time?
Melanie always writes unique and banter-y Austen variations, and this one is no exception. An Accidental Proposal is out on Amazon and KU now!
An Old Acquaintance by Cat Andrews
Surprise! A brand-new release dropping from Cat Andrews just in time for Christmas!
This is a Pride and Prejudice-inspired modern second chance romance, where our Darcy is a musician trying to make it big and he meets Elizabeth at a Christmas frat party when they’re at college in the ‘80s. Except we start with them separated in the ‘90s.
We see the Christmases when he makes a disastrous first impression to their happier holidays together and then how things fracture and the awkward post-breakup run-ins in holidays following. So can they make it back together at a future holiday season?
As always with Cat’s stories, this gets deep into emotions and angst, plus the chemistry and heat that she brings to every book. An Old Acquaintance is available now on Amazon and KU!
Hold Fast by Eliza MacArthur
It’s release day for Eliza MacArthur’s Hold Fast, and can we have some commotion for the old-schoolness of this cover??
Una has just ended a handfast marriage with a terrible man she is desperate to be free of. A gifted healer, she takes off to the neighbouring/rival clan when she saves the laird’s brother and finds safety and purpose there. After suffering a year of abuse in her marriage (check the CWs!), she wants nothing to do with men.
Meanwhile, the laird, Ewan, is deeply impressed with Una’s competence and her determination. He’s got his own issues, though, and has promised himself to never marry.
As much as both of them are scarred from their pasts, they’re still drawn to each other, and when they’re forced to handfast each other, they have to work through their trauma together and separately so they can stand against an old foe. But that trauma isn’t quickly healed by love or sex—so how much will their trauma get in their way and potentially tear them apart?
If you love old-school historical Highlander romance but want a more modern sensibility behind it, you HAVE to check this out! Hold Fast is on KU and Amazon now!