AVOA - A Vow of Ash and Ruin

By: E. L. Ashmore

• Dark
• Fantasy
• Medieval
• Science Fiction
• Suspense

She came to free her father. She didn’t plan to stay. The Otherworld had other ideas.

When Saoirse Ren comes home to find a cold hearth and a burned mark on the flagstone floor, she knows two things: her father is gone, and the debt that took him is one she never knew existed.

The mark leads her to the Veil — the threshold between mortal Ireland and the ancient, treacherous Otherworld — and through it to Ciaran, lord of the Ashen Court. Cold, precise, and exactly as dangerous as everything she has ever read suggested. He offers her a bargain: complete the Trials of the Hollow Crown, three tests no mortal has survived in four centuries, and her father goes free.

The terms are written down. Saoirse reads every word. She signs anyway.

What she doesn’t know — what nobody told her — is that she is the last living descendant of a bloodline a very powerful woman has spent three centuries trying to extinguish. That the trials are not designed to break her but to find out what she is. And that the lord who built them has been waiting, with the patience of something very old and very deliberate, for exactly her.

A Vow of Ash and Ruin is a Celtic mythology romantasy for readers who like their slow burn slow, their love interests dangerous and principled, and their heroines sharp enough to read the fine print.

TRUSTING TUSCANY

By: KRIS LUNDLEY

Who doesn’t want to fall in love in Italy?
Sophia Fairbourne—that’s who.
She’s arrived in Siena for one reason: to sell her inheritance and repay her employer for a costly mistake before it’s too late. No distractions. No detours.
But nothing about this trip is simple.
Enter Peter Belli—annoyingly handsome, co-owner of the property, and her family’s long-time rival. He’s also the one person standing in her way.
When a family trust pushes them to settle things once and for all, Sophia and Peter turn it into a competition to decide the future of the estate. But as rivalry turns into something far more complicated, ignoring their slow-burning chemistry becomes nearly impossible.
Set against the sun-drenched hills of Tuscany, this enemies-to-lovers, dual POV romance is filled with tension, charm, and the kind of sparks that are impossible to ignore.
They say all roads lead to Rome—but what if some hearts take a detour through Tuscany?

Butterflies and Hazel Eyes

By: Katie Mettner

• Suspense

When the Lady of the Lake speaks, she expects you to listen…

Never one to linger, computer security expert Charity Puck doesn’t expect to be romanced by the small-town charm of her latest job. But when her RV rolls into Plentiful, Wisconsin, nestled along the breathtaking shores of Lake Superior, she’s convinced nothing could be more alluring—until she gazes into the delectable hazel eyes of her new client.

Underestimated due to the crutches on his arms and braces on his legs, CEO and researcher Gulliver Winsome doesn’t expect his job to put his life in danger. But as he rushes to bring an eco-friendly pesticide to market, in an attempt to save the pollinators, he finds himself the target of a sinister plot—uncovered by the tiny blonde dynamo he hired to fix his servers.

Someone is trying to steal Gulliver’s research, and they’ll stop at nothing to bury the evidence. With feelings in bloom and the would-be couple’s lives in peril, it’s up to Charity to decipher the clues before they both end up in the Lady of the Lake’s cold-water castle.

Kotik: a Russian Mafia Romance

By: Alina Dobrova

• Bad Boy
• Dark

The first time I met Vitali Konstantinov, he broke a man’s hand for touching me on the bus.

My name is Katya Petrovna.

Once, I was a girl who imagined a better life while navigating a gritty, cold, and economically depressed 1990s post-Soviet Russia ruled by political corruption and organized crime.

Then, Vitali came into my life.

His coworkers considered him a psycho, but to me, he was everything a girl could want—roses, dates, and Mama greeting him at the door.

But I found out why no one tells Vitali ‘no,’ and that I was no exception. Now, there is no way out—not for me, and not for my family.

I never thought this would be my story. I went from an office desk at the Administrative Building to my shaking fingers on the grip of a Makarov pistol pressed up against a man’s throat. From cabbage pirogi to caviar and fur coats.

To wearing his collar made of pure gold.

My name is Katya Petrovna.

Vitali was my best decision.

And he could be my last.