Adult Fiction

Audiobook: Star Shipped

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by Cat Sebastian
Read by Joel Leslie
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Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: There are a couple of on-page non-graphic sex scenes, and swearing, including multiple f-bombs. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Simon and Charlie have been co-stars for the past seven years, working on a space TV show called Out There. They have fought constantly, griping at each other. Simon doesn’t particularly like Charlie, and is convinced that the feeling is mutual. But then, Charlie needs help on a road trip to Arizona, and suddenly Simon’s life is turned upside down: maybe what he was thinking/feeling wasn’t right at all.

There’s more to the story than that – mostly because Sebastian does an excellent job with Simon’s issues: he has migraines, he is very anxious, and he has mild OCD. Charlie has panic attacks. They are real people with real problems (even if they are rich and semi-famous actors), and Sebastian does an excellent job weaving that into this romance. Simon started off cold and distant, and it was delightful to watch him grow and open up as his and Charlie’s relationship grew.

It was also a love letter to fandoms (I was describing this to my husband when I realized that it was very much a Kirk-Spock fanfic), and the impact that having stories that center queer characters have have in the lives of queer kids.

I absolutely loved it, and I’m definitely going to seek more of Sebastian’s books out!

Sunlight Finds You

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by Laura Moriarty
First sentence: “I’m named Eleanor because I was born a week after Eleanor Roosevelt came to Kansas City to campaign for her husband.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: August 4, 2026
Review copy provided by the publisher.
Content: There is some mild swearing, talk of extra-marital sex, as well as some off- page sex, and some spousal abuse. It will be in the Fiction section of the bookstore.

Nora is an outgoing teenager. Leonard is a shy one. He’s an only child from a wealthy family in St. Petersburg; she’s from a working-class blended family. It’s an instant attraction. But that’s just the beginning. As they get older, both Nora and Leonard get trapped in lies that their parents tell them, discraces that they did nothing to earn, and choices that they made with the best of their knowledge they had at the time.

It’s really hard to describe the plot of a book that covers 16 years.

My coworker tried to sell me on this one by saying it’s a romance. Except that it’s not. Sure, there’s a love story – Nora and Leonard have a Passion, and yet Well=Meaning Adults tell them NO, and yet they defy them to live their passion (sort of) (but throw in the Korean War) (and an abusive husband). It was… fine. It was well-written; Moriarty knows how to tell a story. The problem was I didn’t care. (Well, I cared enough to finish.) I wanted to feel something for Nora and Leonard. I wanted to feel the tragedy of their situation, the heartbreak of so many lies being told to them, the joy when they eventually found a way to live together. But it all felt so impassive. So distant. Even though it was told from a first-person perspective (Nora’s). Maybe it was because she was reflecting on things when she was older, and there was distance between the events and the narration. But whatever it was, I didn’t feel anything when reading this.

So, in the end, it was just fine. Which is sad because it could have been more.

Audiobook: How to Fake it in Society

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by KJ Charles
Read by Will Watt
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Or listen on Libro.fm
Content: There is some swearing, including multiple f-bombs, and some fade-to-black sex. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Titus Pilcrow is the fifth son of a wealthy (now dead) English landowner, and so has had to make his own way in the world. He was given an apprenticeship in making paints for artists, something he has come to love, and even has his own ship. Except that his landlord (a former lover) is raising the rent. Titus is pretty despondent, and when he goes to collect a bill from a wealthy customer, he is roped into her dying wish: marry her, inherit her fortune, so she can cut her despicable nephew off.

The problem was: she was going to marry Nicolas-Marc, Comte de Valois de La Motte. So when Nico comes back from a business trip to find the woman dead and another man in his place, he’s a bit… upset. Especially since he and his cousin owe a money lender 2,000 pounds. So, of course, he’s going to find his way into Titus’s good graces. What he didn’t expect was to fall in love.

There was so much silliness in this one, and I found it absolutely delightful. Titus goes from a beleaguered and battered man – a terrible father and older brother as well as a cruel lover will do that to a man – to a more confident person because of Nico’s influence. And Nico learns to trust. And in between there are fabulous clothes, art, outrageous French accents, and a whole lot of delight. I really enjoyed this one a lot. It was silly, yet there was an undercurrent of seriousness (especially when Titus’s former lover was trying to blackmail him) and the reminder that not even wealthy people are exempt from people taking advantage of them.

An absolute delight of a book.

The Deal

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by Elle Kennedy
First sentence: “He doesn’t know I’m alive.”
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Content: There is some on-page sex, lots of swearing including f-bombs, and mention of rape and emotional and physical abuse. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

After two years at Briar University, Hannah Wells has a crush: on a football player of all things. She hasn’t talked to him, but he’s amazing to look at, so of course she’s infatuated. He’s even in her Ethics class. Then again, so is Garrett Graham, star hockey player of Briar’s winning team. And he’s discovered that Hannah is brilliant at Ethics (she got an A when everyone else failed) and he needs her help getting his grades up. She needs someone to help her get the football player’s attention. It’s a match. And it works fine until they realize they’ve caught Feelings for one another.

I picked this up because my co-worker (who is Very Knowledgeable in all things Romance) told me I needed to read it before I read next month’s Romance Book Club Book (Love Song, by the same author). She said I need the backstory (we’ll see if I agree when I get around to reading that one!). And even though it’s so very 2015-coded, I enjoyed this. Hannah was raped when she was 15, so she’s dealing with issues surrounding trust and vulnerability, and Garrett, bless him, was super mature (for a 21-year-old). Especially since he’s dealing with his own trauma surrounding the emotional and physical abuse from his father. Either way, these two “broken” people are able to find something in each other that is healing, and I can’t fault that.

There were some humorous parts, and I think Kennedy got the whole college experience – especially at an elite private school – down. Am I going to read the others in the series (all surrounding Garrett’s best friends)? Probably not. But I did have fun with this one.

Platform Decay

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by Martha Wells
First sentence: “Space was okay to look at but not super fun when you were out in it.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date May 5, 2026
Review copy provided by the publisher
Others in the series: All Systems Red, Artificial Condition, Rogue Protocol, Exit Strategy, Network Effect, Fugitive Telemetry, System Collapse
Content: There is violence, swearing (including many f-bombs) and intense moments. It will be in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

One of Dr. Mensah’s marriage partners, their daughter, and her partner’s mother have been captured by some corporation executives, and Murderbot is commissioned to get them out of the torus surrounding a dead planet. It’s a quick in-and-out, with Three’s help, and it’s confident that everything will go wrong. Which it does. Starting with the request (demand?) from B-E corporation executive Leonide (whom I don’t really remember, but no matter) that Murderbot extract her family. Which, of course, sigh, it does. Tasked with keeping so many humans safe while traveling through hostile territory avoiding corporation security is exhausting. Especially when there’s media to watch.

It’s been a while since we’ve spent time with Murderbot… and I’ve missed its voice. It created an Emotion check program, which was constantly, well, checking – which was quite amusing. And it has all the elements of a good Murderbot story: humans in peril, sometimes doing stupid stuff, interesting wolrds – the travels through the sections of the torus were interesting – and Murderbot snark. What more can I ask for out of a Murderbot story?

Nothing. It was perfect.

The Rally

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by Carla Voss
First sentence: “It’s not the betrayal that stuns me.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: September 29, 2026
Review copy provided by the publisher. The cover image is not final.
Content: There is some on-screen sex, lots of drug use, and swearing, including multiple f-bombs. It will be in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Charlotte (call her Charlie please, unless you’re an old rich man, and then you can get away with calling her Char-Har) was a co-founder of a start-up dating app. She was the face of the app, she was a lot of the brains behind the app, so when her partner – and college friend – decides to work with a venture capitalist firm and force Charlotte out, she felt betrayed. Luckily, her best friend Lina is off for a two-week adventure, driving classic cars (nothing newer than 1992, thank you very much) across Europe with a group of wealthy people. It’s the perfect break while Charlie tries to figure out her next steps. It doesn’t hurt that the son of the man who organized the Rally is incredibly hot. And attracted to her.

I won’t go into the reasons why I read this one, but let’s just say that I walked away thinking this is a white Crazy Rich Asians. The thing is, Kevin Kwan does the outsider looking in on the decadant world of the ultra-wealthy SO much better. I’m not sure if it’s because I actually care about the not-quite-as-wealthy reader stand-in when I’m reading Kwan’s books (and I have read quite a few), or if he makes his wealthy characters more sympathetic. Either way, I found myself just not caring about Charlie, Lina, the betrayal, the app, the cars, the scenery, or the food. I did finish it, on the hope that maybe it would get better, and it just didn’t. I was disappointed, because I like European scenery, classic cars, and a good romance. The problem was that this didn’t give me any of it.

Which is too bad. It had potential.

Heir of Illusion

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by Madeline Taylor
First sentence: “I cradle my lover’s head in my hands, longing to shatter it against the hardwood floor.”
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Content: To take from the content advisory at the beginning of the book, there is: violence, strong language, sexual content (on page), PTSD, mentions of self-harm, mentions of grooming, sucidial ideation, suffocation, drowning, emotional and physical abuse, murder, attempted sexual assualt, unwanted touching, abuse of power, and depictions of grief. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Ivy (actually Iverson, which is a stupid name) has spent the last 15 years as the special “pet” of the King of Illusion. She wears a collar that binds her to the king’s will – and if she defies him, he uses the collar to choke her. After 15 years, Ivy is fed up and wants to escape. All she has to do is find the sword that is paired with the collar and cut it off. Which she absolutely can do, except the God of Death, Thorne, has shown up demanding the sword and is in her way. A fractious meeting turns into a tenuous partnership, which turns into a budding romance. Will it hold, though, when the dust settles?

On the one hand, I liked this enough to finish it, which is more than I can say for the last two Romantasies that I read for book group. The world-building was intriguing enough to keep me interested, and I liked that Ivy was pushing and pulling against the “norm” of her world. That said, Taylor isn’t a great writer, and this book could have easily been 100 pages shorter. She repeats herself often, and uses the same descriptive words over and over again. Yes, we know Thorne is often angry and looms. Yes, we know Ivy can turn invisible. Yes, we know the king is a bad man. Do you need to tell us every single chapter?

I don’t know if I’m curious enough to read the sequel, but I didn’t outright hate this one.

Once and Again

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by Rebecca Serle
First sentence:”I landed, he texts me, and I feel the ground underneath my feet once again.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Review copy provided by the publisher.
Content: There is swearing and some on-page but vague sex. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Lauren is at a crossroads. Her husband, Leo is a filmmaker and has a job opportunity in New York. So Lauren moves back into her childhood home, on the beach, with surfing and her ex-boyfriend Stone. It’s a glorious summer. But, the women in Lauren’s family have this gift to turn back time, to re-do one event. Her mother used it to save her father’s life when Lauren was 15. And when Lauren makes an earth-shattering mistake, it’s up to her to decide what to do with her chance.

Firt off: this is NOT a romance. There is nothing about it that is romance-y at all. It’s a love story, sure, in the sense that Nicholas Sparks books are a love story. It’s a family drama. It is not, on any level, a romance. And with that said, although I have lliked Serle’s books in the past, I didn’t enjoy this one. Well, that’s not true. I liked it enough to finish it, but I was dissatisfied with the ending, and I felt unfulfilled by the book as a whole. Perhaps it was because I went in expecting a romance and didn’t get that, or maybe it was just not what I was in the mood for. Either way, this was a miss for me.

Audiobook: Pole Position

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by Rebecca J Caffrey
Read by Joshua Chase & James Joseph
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Or listen on Libro.fm
Content: There’s a lot of swearing, including many f-bombs. There’s talk of sex and on-page sex scenes. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Are we here for gay sports books? Yes. Yes, we are.

Kian Walker is the reigning F1 World Champion, and he has so much going for him. He’s methodical, prepared, focused, and the best in the world. Harper James is the exact opposite. A talented driver, but a party boy – he’s determined to never let anyone close enough to find out what demons he’s chasing. So when he ends up in the second driver position with Kian, sparks fly. And it doesn’t help that they feel this…. attraction. It’s not going to be an easy season for either of them.

I picked this up – I’ve had it kicking around for a while – because F1 started up again! So why not celebrate with a little gay F1 romance? It’s not deep, though they deal with abandonment issues and the trauma from bad parents, as well as the death of a parent. I did like the F1 references- sure, the teams were made up, but I think Caffrey captured the intensity of the sport and the way the drivers make decisions on and off the track. It’s probably not entirely accurate, but for a mid-level fan like me, it fit the bill. And I did like Kian and Harper’s relationship. I liked the push and pull and the way they eventually came to trust one another. And the narrators kept me engaged when the plot wasn’t as good as I wanted it to be.

So, was it great? No. But it was a lot of fun, which was excatly what I was looking for.

Audio book: French Windows

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by Antoine Laurain
Read by Alex Wyndam
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Or listen on Libro.fm
Content: There is mention of infidelity and murder, and there’s some mild swearing. It’s in the Fiction section of the bookstore.

Doctor Faber is a pretty run-of-the-mill psychologist. No remarkable clients, nothing remarkable to speak of. That is, until Nathalia Guitry comes into his office, saying that she has lost her artistic drive ever since she photographed a murder. Faber suggests an unorthodox treatment: why doesn’t she tell the stories of the people in the apartment building where the murder took place, and she can work out what’s bothering her. There’s a reclusive cartoonist, a social media influencer, and on and on as Nathalia spins her stories.

This is all about the power of fiction. Are Nathalia’s stories true? Maybe. Maybe there are some elements that are. But mostly, she’s getting at the heart of what makes people do the things they do. There’s also a twist that I kind of saw coming. Even so, it felt satisfying. Wyndam was a good narrator as well, though I kind of struggled to figure out when he was in “story mode” and when he was in “Doctor Faber narration” mode. That said, it was a short book, and an intriguing one at that.