Category Archives: Romance

Review: A Inked in Blood by Danielle L. Jensen

A Fate Inked in Blood
Saga of the Unfated #1
Danielle L. Jensen
Publisher: Del Rey
Publication date: Feb. 27, 2024
Genre: Fantasy Romance
Rating:

A shield maiden blessed by the gods battles to unite a nation under a power-hungry king—while also fighting her growing desire for his fiery son—in this Norse-inspired fantasy romance from the bestselling author of The Bridge Kingdom series.

Bound in an unwanted marriage, Freya spends her days gutting fish, but dreams of becoming a warrior. And of putting an axe in her boorish husband’s back.

Freya’s dreams abruptly become reality when her husband betrays her to the region’s jarl, landing her in a fight to the death against his son, Bjorn. To survive, Freya is forced to reveal her deepest secret: She possesses a drop of a goddess’s blood, which makes her a shield maiden with magic capable of repelling any attack. It was foretold such a magic would unite the fractured nation of Skaland beneath the one who controls the shield maiden’s fate.

Believing he’s destined to rule Skaland as king, the fanatical jarl binds Freya with a blood oath and orders Bjorn to protect her from their enemies. Desperate to prove her strength, Freya must train to fight and learn to control her magic, all while facing perilous tests set by the gods. The greatest test of all, however, may be resisting her forbidden attraction to Bjorn. If Freya succumbs to her lust for the charming and fierce warrior, she risks not only her own destiny but the fate of all the people she swore to protect.

 

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Review: A Malicious Menagerie by Josie Ryann

A Malicious Menagerie
Fangs & Fables, #1
Josie Ryann
Publisher: Self-published
Publication date: Sept. 1, 2025
Genre: Fantasy Romance
Rating:

Welcome to the menagerie, and please, mind the fangs…Twenty-two-year-old Anna Carmichael is down on her luck. Even juggling three dead-end jobs, she’s struggling to keep herself and her ailing grandmother afloat. When she’s offered a position as caretaker for an eccentric rich man’s collection of exotic animals, she jumps at the opportunity despite the ominous nondisclosure agreement. The reason for all the secrecy is revealed when Anna discovers that the residents of Mars Mathis’s Mystical Menagerie aren’t exotic—they’re mythological.

Her boss’s chilling warnings leave no doubt—these creatures are his property, and he’ll protect them at any cost. Anna’s moral compass shatters as she befriends the very beings she’s meant to cage. And an unexpected but irresistible passion ignites with Chase, the enigmatic wolf, as powerful and protective as he is trapped. Caught between her unwavering loyalty to her grandmother, the menagerie’s deadly threats, and a love bound by iron bars, Anna must decide—what is she willing to sacrifice?

 

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Review: Wed to the Orc Captive by Penny McMara

Wed to the Orc Captive
Orc Wed, #2
Penny McMara
Publisher: Self-published
Publication date: Sept. 7 2026
Genre: Fantasy Romance
Rating:

My village was desperate to stop the orc raids, and moved to force the only kind of treaty orcs one sealed with passion. They captured an orc and told the monster that he’d take a human bride, or he’d die.

I’m avoiding a slightly worse fate.

We’ve both made the choice to survive. Now, we’re saying our vows through prison bars, neither of us fully able to trust the other. Everything about him screams danger, from his chiselled body to his too-intelligent eyes. He’s called us barbarians; he’s mocked at our faith. He’s wary of me, as a magic user, as a human, as a weakling…though that doesn’t seem to have dampened his interest in taking me to his bed.

I want to hate him. I want to see him as a monster. I want him to be someone whose blood won’t weigh on my conscience, if I have to kill him.

If only he didn’t show me more tenderness than any man I’ve ever known.

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Review: Nine Month Contract by Amy Daws

Nine Month Contract
Mountain Men Matchmaker #1
Amy Daws
Publisher: Canary Street Press
Publication date: Oct. 29, 2024
Genre: Romance
Rating:

Help Wanted: Grumpy mountain man seeks baby momma. Job is an incubator position only. Surrogate must be impervious to grunting as the form of communication and nosy brotherly neighbors. Rustic mountain range housing available upon request.

I wanted to pummel my irritating brothers when they posted their own version of a wanted ad to help me with my life.

But I can’t fault the results once the right woman lands in my lap.

Becoming a single father is not a decision I made lightly. In fact, it’s the biggest decision of my entire life.

Which is why when I interview Trista, I know she’s perfect.

She’s wild, she’s opinionated, she wears cowboy boots. Even my pet goat loves her…

She’s the exact type of person I was holding out for.

And to my great horror, I realize on our first night of attempting this baby-making dance—when the lights are low, the cheap wine is flowing and the home-insemination supplies are laid out on the kitchen counter—I want to do a lot more than just make her my surrogate.

I want to make her mine.

 

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Review: The Cursed King by Abigail Owen

The Cursed King
Inferno Rising #4
Abigail Owen
Publisher: Entangled
Publication date: Oct. 25, 2021
Genre: Fantasy Romance
Rating:

Airk Azdajah, the rightful King of the White Clan of dragon shifters, spent half a millennium being tortured by the false High King Pytheios. The only reason he’s alive is a the man who kills Airk will be consumed in his own fire. So Airk was kept alive—barely—and unable to shift in his prison cage, driving the creature half of him into madness. Airk escaped, but he’ll never be truly free. Because what good is a king who can never let his feral dragon loose, never fly, and never lead his people?

Angelika Amon is the last unmated phoenix. The problem? She has no powers. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Angelika hates being dormant, especially now that her three sisters are blissfully mated to powerful dragon shifter kings and are very much part of the fight to take down the rotting king Pytheios. What good is a completely powerless phoenix in a battle to save the dragon kingdom?

Desperate to find some way to help, she offers herself to Airk as a mate—just for political leverage. Now a dormant phoenix is mated to a dragon who can’t shift. But the balance of power is about to change when Pytheios decides to claim Angelika for himself…

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Review: Gladiator by Anna Hackett

Gladiator
Galactic Gladiators #1
Anna Hackett
Publisher: Self-published
Publication date: Oct. 23, 2016
Genre: Fantasy Romance
Rating:

Fighting for love, honor, and freedom on the galaxy’s lawless outer rim…

When Earth space marine Harper Adams finds herself abducted by alien slavers off a space station, her life turns into a battle for survival. Dumped into an arena on a desert planet on the outer rim, she finds herself face to face with a big, tattooed alien gladiator…the champion of the Kor Magna Arena.

A former prince abandoned to the arena as a teen, Raiden Tiago has long ago earned his freedom. Now he rules the arena, but he doesn’t fight for the glory, but instead for his own dark purpose—revenge against the Thraxian aliens who destroyed his planet. Then his existence is rocked by one small, fierce female fighter from an unknown planet called Earth.

Harper is determined to find a way home, but when she spots her best friend in the arena—a slave of the evil Thraxian aliens—she’ll do anything to save her friend…even join forces with the tough, alpha male who sets her body on fire. But as Harper and Raiden step foot onto the blood-soaked sands of the arena, Harper worries that Raiden has his own dangerous agenda…

 

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Review: Winterbourne by A.M. Blythe

Winterbourne
A.M. Blythe
Publisher: Self-Published
Publication date: July 15, 2026
Genre: Fantasy Romance
Rating:

Three rules keep a memory thief alive.

Rule #1: Don’t touch skin.
Rule #2: Don’t look too long.
Rule #3: Don’t let them see what you really are.

Tonight, I’m breaking all three.

Kira Shadowmere is the best memory thief in Vespera — a city where memories are bottled, sold, and savored like wine, and the people they’re stolen from are left to rot. One touch, one pull, thirty seconds: she can lift the worst night of your life right out of your head. The Guild pays in silver. Her conscience pays in everything else.

But memory thieves don’t live past twenty-four. Tomorrow is her birthday.

One last job should buy her way out. Instead, it binds her — soul-deep, unbreakable, fatal — to Lysander Winterbourne: the last son of a slaughtered house, the lord who executes thieves like her, and the only person in the world whose presence quiets the curse that’s been drowning her since she was three years old.

She should run. He should kill her. Neither of them does the smart thing.

Now the Guild’s master wants her caged, a power no Null should have is waking in her blood, and the deeper Kira digs, the clearer the truth becomes: she isn’t the only memory thief in this story. Someone has been inside her head. Someone has been editing. And what they took will cost her the only family she has left.

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Review: Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston


Red, White & Royal Blue
Red, White & Royal Blue #1
Casey McQuiston
Publisher: St. Martin’s Griffin
Publication date: May 14, 2019
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Rating:

First Son Alex Claremont-Diaz is the closest thing to a prince this side of the Atlantic. With his intrepid sister and the Veep’s genius granddaughter, they’re the White House Trio, a beautiful millennial marketing strategy for his mother, President Ellen Claremont. International socialite duties do have downsides—namely, when photos of a confrontation with his longtime nemesis Prince Henry at a royal wedding leak to the tabloids and threaten American/British relations. The plan for damage control: staging a fake friendship between the First Son and the Prince.

As President Claremont kicks off her reelection bid, Alex finds himself hurtling into a secret relationship with Henry that could derail the campaign and upend two nations. What is worth the sacrifice? How do you do all the good you can do? And, most importantly, how will history remember you?

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Review: Not His Dragon by Annie Nicholas

Not His Dragon
Not This #1
Annie Nicholas
Publisher: Self-published
Publication date: July 25, 2016
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Rating:

Eoin Grant hasn’t encountered a female of his race in decades, and this crazy person’s scent declares her unmated. Fate set her in his path, and he won’t let this opportunity slip through his claws. No matter how wary she is of him. After all, how many chances does a dragon have at finding love? But fate can be a crueler mistress than his perfect mate. Of all things, she thinks she’s human.

Business is taking off for Angie Weldon. She put her freakishly sharp nails to good use when she opened her back-scratching spa in downtown New Porter City. The local shifter community pounced on her skills and she’s knee-deep in shed fur. By the end of the year, if lucky, she could afford to move out of her crappy apartment.

Dollar signs flash before Angie’s eyes when a dark, brooding stranger books her solid for a week but she notices the possessive fury in his glare. She’s been around enough shifters to know the look, and she won’t go down that road again. Angie is literally swept off her feet by the intense shifter and he wants more from her than she’s willing to give. She figures it’s best to avoid eye contact and back away slowly. Until he changes her life by insisting she’s a dragon.

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Review: Kissed by Iron and Glass by E.V. Everest

Kissed by Iron and Glass
E.V. Everest
Publisher: Golden Bird Press
Publication date: April 23, 2026
Genre: Fantasy Romance
Rating:

When my stepmother sold me at auction, I thought I’d experienced the cruelest fate. I was wrong.

Because now I belong to the Iron King, a fae with a heart as cold and unyielding as the cursed iron that encases it. To keep his throne, he needs a queen–his fated mate. And I’m supposed to use my ability to protect him, to see through deception… by posing as one of his potential brides.

Assuming I can survive.

The Iron King’s Bridal Trials are a glittering nightmare of cutthroat fae and deadly secrets. His kingdom is on the brink of rebellion, and every fae lady is willing to kill for the crown.

But when the clock strikes midnight during my first dance with the Iron King, everything changes. Because maybe, just maybe the man I loathe might also become the man I love…if two hearts can break a curse of glass and iron.

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