A sexy, science-filled, and surprising romance full of warmth and wit.
A DNA–based dating company matches a harried single mom with the company’s gruff founder—but can their real relationship measure up to their statistics?
Jessica Davis isn’t interested in dating. She’s a busy single mom who’s raising her beloved daughter, Juno, with her grandparents (who also raised Jess since her addict mother wasn’t exactly a reliable presence). Between her job in statistics, helping Juno with school projects, and bailing her mom out whenever she gets into trouble, Jess’ plate is full enough. But one day, when she and her romance-novelist BFF, Fizzy, are working at a coffee shop, they start up a conversation with a grumpy regular they refer to as Americano (based on his drink order). It turns out he’s Dr. River Peña, the founder of a new matchmaking company, GeneticAlly, that matches users based on their DNA. When Jess capitulates to Fizzy by giving the company a spit sample, she finds out she has 98% compatibility with River, a man she already can’t stand, and she’s not interested in exploring anything. But between losing a big client and giving her mom another loan, Jess needs money, and GeneticAlly offers to pay her to date him. As Jess begins to get to know the real River, she starts to wonder if the data might be right. Lauren, the author duo behind The Honey-Don’t List (2020) and countless other rom-coms, not only introduce a fascinating and unique premise, but flawlessly execute it with their trademark humor and charm. Jess is a believable and sympathetic heroine—it’s easy to see why she’s skeptical of GeneticAlly’s promises but still willing to give it a try. And although River starts out a bit unlikable, his irritable facade conceals hidden depths and passions. As their relationship proceeds, each encounter ratchets up the sexual tension and the emotional stakes, creating a love story that keeps the pages flying. Although the romance is stellar, some of the most enjoyable scenes in the book take place between the other people in Jess’ life: her precocious daughter, her hilarious and irreverent best friend, and her sweet, dependable grandparents. Readers won’t want to leave these characters or this world.
A sexy, science-filled, and surprising romance full of warmth and wit.Pub Date: May 18, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-9821-2396-3
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2021
A surprisingly sensual sports romance.
A collegiate diver and swimmer secretly pursue kink together, and risk falling in love along the way.
Scarlett Vandermeer is struggling. Despite a successful recovery from the injury that almost ended her Stanford diving career, she hasn’t been able to get her head together, and it’s affecting her performance. Plus, she’s trying to stay focused on getting into medical school. A relationship would be out of the question. By comparison, Lukas Blomqvist is a swimming idol, a record-breaker who wins medals as easily as breathing, and Scarlett has long been convinced he would never look in her direction—until one fateful night when a mutual friend lets slip that they have something unexpected in common: Scarlett likes to be submissive in the bedroom, while Lukas prefers to take a dominant approach. Now, they both know a big secret about each other, and it’s something neither of them can stop thinking about. It’s Lukas who suggests they have a fling—purely physical, just to take the edge off, so Scarlett can get out of her own head and stop overthinking her dives. Initially, their arrangement is easy to stick to, but the more time they spend together, the more Scarlett starts to realize that what she feels for Lukas is more than physical attraction. Complicating the situation is the fact that Scarlett’s friend Penelope Ross used to go out with Lukas, and the longer Scarlett keeps mum about her true feelings for him, the more difficult it is to keep the situation hidden from another person she really cares about. While Scarlett and Lukas’ relationship does begin as a physical one, their deeper psychological connection takes a little too long to emerge amid all the other storylines, resulting in a somewhat rushed resolution. However, Hazelwood’s latest is proof of the depth and maturity that has emerged in her writing over the years, and it highlights her embrace of sexier, more emotional elements than were present in her original STEMinist rom-coms.
A surprisingly sensual sports romance.Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593641057
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2025
A satisfying crime novel with a side order of romance.
A TV producer and a detective try to stop a strange pattern of young women disappearing.
In “Auclair, Loooziana,” disillusioned detective John Bowie reluctantly meets in a bar with Beth Collins, producer for the true crime show Crisis Point. She needs to interview him about the disastrous case of the missing Crissy Mellin, but he refuses. The teenager disappeared three years ago on the night of a blood moon and hasn’t been found, but a suspect hanged himself in jail after signing a confession. Case closed, says John’s boss. But John is convinced that their prisoner could not have been guilty, and he’s deeply upset at his failure. “The Mellin case messed up your life,” Beth tells him. She persuades John that Crissy’s disappearance is the latest of a series that happen on the night of a blood moon, the colloquial term for a total lunar eclipse. “It’s going to happen again,” she predicts. And wouldn’t you know, another blood moon is coming in four days. Tick, tick, tick. Beth’s boss at Crisis Point insists on airing an update on the case, but Beth knows the show is going to get it wrong, and its reputation will be ruined. Meanwhile, there’s an electric sexual tension between Beth and John that the author toys with nicely—do they, or don’t they? The answer plays out in detail more than once. The characters are fun if easy to pigeonhole: the detective angry at his failure, the honest (and beautiful) outsider eager to do her job but susceptible to love, the hero’s corrupt (to say the least) boss, and the ogre who carries out said boss’s dirtiest deeds. Even John’s dog, Mutt, plays a small but vital role. When John found him, he’d been “a flea-bitten hide wrapped around a skeleton that whimpered.” Little plot devices are easy to spot, like the phone that rings at a crucial moment, or the handgun that John places in Beth’s hand for her protection. Does Chekhov’s guideline apply here? The romantic angle leavens the dark theme, and readers will have plenty of incentives to turn the pages.
A satisfying crime novel with a side order of romance.Pub Date: March 4, 2025
ISBN: 9781538742983
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2025
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