contemporary romance

Cover of The Cafe By the Sea: shows scene of outdoor cafe seating in European village

The Café By the Sea

By Jenny Colgan

Rated by Emily D.
Oct 13, 2020

London based paralegal, Flora, has desperately pined over her American boss for years. He doesn’t know she exists. Flora has all but resigned herself to unrequited love, until one day he calls her into his office. But the love affair of her dreams doesn’t start there, instead she is sent on assignment to the island of her origins, Mure. The Scottish island is not somewhere she planned on returning, but maybe she’ll get a love affair after all.  

Continue Flora’s story along with her brothers and friends in Colgan’s sequel: The Endless Beach. The story just gets sweeter in this follow-up to Th

The Two Lives of Lydia Bird

By Josie Silver

Rated by Library Staff (not verified)
May 18, 2020

For Lydia Bird, love can overcome anything, even death.  

When Lydia's fiance, Freddie Hunter, is tragically killed in a car accident she cannot imagine life moving on without him. Unable to sleep, her mum finds a doctor who is conducting trials on a new sleeping pill. This magical pink pill allows Lydia to fall asleep and jump back into her old life with Freddie. Her dream life with Freddie is continuing on without her.  

New things are happening to the couple and the people around them. Trying to juggle these two worlds is overwhelming and difficult at first. However, Lydia cannot resist

A Year of Reading Harder: Chapter Two


Rated by Library Staff (not verified)
Dec 13, 2019

As part of my 2019 reading goals, I’m working my way through the Book Riot Read Harder Challenge. So far, so good (read part one here). My progress is slow, but I’m back with part two of my reading challenge round-up.

In the midst of a teen reading kick at the time, I decided to find a teen book that would fulfill a task. Amie Kauffman and Jay Kristoff’s Illuminae fit the bill nicely for task #1: an epistolary novel or collection of letters. The space opera story tells the tale of teens Kady and Ezra, whose home planet is destroyed by a menacing megacorporation. They escape onto two different

The Wall of Winnipeg and Me

By Mariana Zapata
Star Rating
★★★★★

Rated by Shannon G
Oct 8, 2018

I've reread Mariana Zapata's The Wall of Winnipeg and Me more times than I could count and I've laughed out loud every single time. This quirky romantic comedy tells the story of Vanessa, the ex-assistant/housekeeper/fairy godmother to Aiden, the top defensive end of the National Football Organization. For the two years that Vanessa worked for the man known as "The Wall of Winnipeg," he lived and breathed football, leaving no room for common decency or polite human interaction with Vanessa. Now? Now, he’s asking for the unthinkable and she can’t believe she’s actually considering his offer.

Z

Hate to Want You

By Alisha Rai

Rated by Library Staff (not verified)
Jun 29, 2018

I think I would have come around to romance novels years earlier if I had only realized how much angst could precede the genre's requisite happy endings. Hate To Want You nailed both angst and satisfaction.

This steamy tale follows Livvy and Nicholas, once-lovers separated by family disapproval and time, who find that years of miscommunications and misunderstandings loom as large as ever . . . but so does the sizzling chemistry between them. I started out feeling somewhat lukewarm toward the characters but had heard enough praise of Alisha Rai's books to keep me going. I was a little afraid

The Light We Lost

By Santopolo, Jill

Rated by Library Staff (not verified)
Mar 19, 2018

Lucy Clark meets Gabe Samson in a Shakespeare class on September 11th. The pair spend the day together anxiously watching the news and later viewing the holes in the skyline where the Twin Towers once stood. This day shapes their lives. After a turbulent year apart, the couple reunites and begins dating. Their idyllic love is passionate, deep, and all consuming. But their careers pull them apart. Lucy wants to stay in New York working on a children's television show. Gabe wants his photography to show the world the Iraq War. The Light We Lost is Lucy and Gabe's love story and the story of life

The Light We Lost

By Santopolo, Jill

Rated by Library Staff (not verified)
Mar 11, 2018

Lucy Clark meets Gabe Samson in a Shakespeare class on September 11th. The pair spend the day together anxiously watching the news and later viewing the holes in the skyline where the Twin Towers once stood. This day shapes their lives. After a turbulent year apart, the couple reunites and begins dating. Their idyllic love is passionate, deep, and all consuming. But their careers pull them apart. Lucy wants to stay in New York working on a children's television show. Gabe wants his photography to show the world the Iraq War. The Light We Lost is Lucy and Gabe's love story and the story of life

Heart of Fire (Audiobook CD)

By Linda Howard

Rated by Library Staff (not verified)
Sep 26, 2016

Heart of Fire is the perfect summer read if you like movies like Indiana Jones, Romancing the Stone, or Six Days Seven Nights. Linda Howard takes us deep into the Brazilian rainforest on an exhilarating adventure up the Amazon River, as an archaeologist on a mission and a guide with no attachments butt heads while leading an expedition in search of a lost civilization and ancient treasure. It has a very cinematic feel that would make for a great movie, with the lush setting, perilous adventure, and steamy romance. It not only brings the jungle alive, it makes you want to pack up and go!

Archa

Love Irresistibly

By Julie James
Star Rating
★★★★★

Rated by Traci M.
May 6, 2015

Julie James is quickly becoming one of my favorite go-to romance authors. Why? She consistently creates smart characters who engage in witty dialog while falling in love. Love Irresistibly is the fourth book in the FBI/US Attorney series and, if you’re a fan of the series, you will enjoy catching up with some of the earlier couples. If you’ve never read a Julie James book, don’t worry. The books in the series don’t necessarily have to be read in order.

In Love Irresistibly we meet Cade Morgan and Brooke Parker, two professionals living and working in Chicago. Cade, an assistant U.S. Attorney

Feb 8, 2013

When a serious injury sends Evie Stryker to Fool’s Gold where her estranged brothers and mother have made their home, Evie finds herself at a crossroads.  Evie left Fool’s Gold, and the family where she never seemed to fit in, at the age of 17 to study dance at Julliard and she never looked back.  Then Evie was injured and her mother and brothers moved her to Fool’s Gold for her recovery and rehabilitation.  Now, as recovered as she is going to be, Evie is chafing at the close quarters to her family in the small California town where everyone knows everyone.  She has taken a job at the local