Dear readers,
Before we get to today’s newsletter, we have a couple of announcements.
IHL Reading Challenge
Yesterday we kicked off the first category of the IHL Reading Challenge. You can click here for reading suggestions. Some of the books are on sale, which are on the reading challenge suggestions page, but can also be found right here.
Remember, you can join the I Heart Lesfic Facebook reader group. Every Monday we will announce the category for the week, and every Wednesday you will have the opportunity to post what book you are reading and be entered into the monthly drawing for a $25 Amazon gift card. (For those who are not on Facebook and still want to enter, remember you can email your reading selection to tbm@iheartlesfic.com).
Second, we have created a Goodreads group where readers can discuss books, swap recommendations, and generally have a good time.
Free book alert!
Today is the last day to grab All Manner of Hats by Elva Birch for free.
ALL MANNER OF HATS
by Elva Birch
Available in Kindle Unlimited
All Manner of Hats is a short, sweet lesbian enemies-to-lovers romp of manners with magic, ghost horses, and cunning hats, in a steampunk-flavored world of dirigibles, duels, and cityships.
Free though January 11th.
New Releases
Now, here are this week’s new ebook and audio releases.
Please click on this link for how to submit books (ebook and audio) for the newsletter. IHL will not include books unless they receive an email from either the author or publisher.
Happy reading and listening,
TB & Miranda
ROMANCE
WHIPPED
by J.J. Arias
Available in Kindle Unlimited
If she can’t get through to her in the office, she’ll smash into her on skates. . .
Newly minted lawyer Cheyenne Flores-Moore is excited to start her career at one of the most prestigious law firms in Miami. That is, until she meets her mentor Erica. It seems that no matter what she does, she can’t win her over – something the perennially sunny Cheyenne has not experienced before.
Just when Cheyenne is ready to accept that she will never thaw the frost between them, opportunity strikes. Cheyenne discovers that the very uptight and hyper-professional Erica plays roller derby and decides to join an opposing team. She hopes competing with Erica on neutral ground will show her mentor a different side.
Erica Torres is laser-focused on making partner at her firm. When her boss tasks her with mentoring a new lawyer to demonstrate her leadership skills, she jumps at the chance. But her bubbly mentee is too nice to survive in the shark-infested waters they swim in, and she soon regrets her assignment. What’s worse, the human Golden Retriever has discovered Erica’s secret passion for roller derby.
Tensions rise until Erica and Cheyenne are forced together and start to see each other for who they really are. In this new light, something unexpected blooms. The only question is can Erica get out of her own way and let Cheyenne penetrate her icy exterior?
This excruciatingly slow-burn, workplace romance is hot enough to melt any ice queen’s frosty shell.
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Categories: Ice Queen, Grumpy / Sunshine, & Slow Burn
AT FIRST GLANCE
by Melissa Tereze
Available in Kindle Unlimited
Faye Holmes’s life is the polar opposite from her racy, bestselling romances. It’s quiet, routine, and, at the moment, plagued with writer’s block. If only just a little of the passion burning up the pages of her books would warm her lonely bed. But to be honest, one-night stands aren’t her thing.
When her best friend buys her a lap dance to celebrate her latest bestseller, Faye is more than shocked. She’s intrigued by the stunningly beautiful dancer whose gentle eyes seem vaguely familiar.
Talia isn’t surprised that her favorite coffee shop customer doesn’t recognise her. Few would connect Talia, mild-mannered barista, with Adria, pole dancer and star of Liverpool’s hottest new strip club. And that’s how Talia wants it. It’s safer this way.
In the glaring spotlight though, no truth can hide for long. For two women from different worlds, falling in love can be a delicious dance—and a dangerous game. Not only for their careers, but for their hearts.
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Category: Age Gap
THE WEDDING SETUP
by Charlotte Greene
Ryann is thrilled when her friend Stuart asks her to help him plan his last-minute wedding. He moved across the country over a year ago, and she misses him like crazy. As an executive with event planning experience, Ryann’s the best person to help him fulfill his wildest wedding dreams.
However, things in Colorado are not what she expects, especially Maddie, the maid of honor for the other groom. Maddie is attractive, and while she’s certainly Ryann’s type, she has some different ideas about the wedding. Also, flirting with her is incredibly distracting, especially when Ryann just wants to keep things professional. With just two weeks to the big event on Valentine’s Day, can Ryann help Stuart to wedded bliss, and avoid his well-intentioned attempts to set her up with Maddie?
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Categories: Forced Proximity, Friends to Lovers, & Holiday Romance
LEARNING TO LOVE AGAIN
by M. E. Tudor
Available in Kindle Unlimited
Houstonian Ava White finds herself alone after her wife, Sheila, leaves her for a younger woman. Sheila verbally, emotionally, and physically abused Ava for more than thirty years. Drinking lots of alcohol became Ava’s way of coping with the pain and loneliness, but she is ready for change.
Ava’s friend, Emily Rios, convinces her to spend two weeks at Emily’s vacation home in Ouray, Colorado. Ava is excited about being away from Houston and Sheila. She wants to clear her head and reimagine her life.
Ava meets Emily’s friend and neighbor Melody Graves in Colorado. Emily asked Mel to encourage Ava to visit some interesting sites in and around Ouray. Mel is happy to help, but she didn’t expect to fall for Ava.
Ava discovers a new love for the outdoors and finds confidence in herself as she and Mel become close.
Ava returns to Houston feeling good about her life and ready to move forward, but Sheila is not giving up control. Ava must make some tough decisions to build a new life with the possibility of a relationship with Mel.
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Category: Love After 50
SNOWED UNDER
by Nicolette Dane
Available in Kindle Unlimited
Alone in her cabin, during an increasingly snowy winter, novelist Emma Doughty has a lot to work through. As she struggles to complete the latest book in her on-going series, Emma must also contend with remnant feelings of heartbreak and abandonment. And now, after turning forty and spending another Christmas by herself, she’s feeling completely lost in life and in love.
Emma’s neighborhood is mostly summer homes, and winter is a quiet season around the lake. So when Marian Taggart moves in across the street, Emma finds herself immediately interested in her pretty new neighbor. Marian, recently divorced, is feeling lost, too. But she has a much different story than Emma, and she’s eager to escape her past, figure out what’s next, and finally live her life true to herself.
Both Emma and Marian feel buried by an avalanche of life’s difficulties. As their relationship heats up, can this new romance survive the winter blues, an intolerant family, and an old flame?
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Category: Holiday Romance
THE COLOUR OF MY LOVE
by Susie Ray
Available in Kindle Unlimited
Nina could never have imagined the dramatic impact that dying her hair, shocking pink, to raise funds for a worthy cause, would have on her life…
Wherever she goes, she struggles to cope with all the unwanted attention she gets, and her boss suspends her from work, but there are upsides too – she might never have made a connection with Sandie, or have made the discovery that was about to change her life, if she hadn’t…
Nina puts everything at risk in a moment of madness, where lust takes over, as she gets lost in the rush of emotions with a total stranger, whilst trying to cope with the new reality, that her discovery affords… Should she confess everything and throw herself on Sandie’s mercy or keep a devastating secret? Unable to regret the joy she experienced and be truly remorseful, Nina is ready to give up a possible future with Sandie, but Sandie has other ideas…
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Categories: Friends to Lovers & Hot & Steamy
HISTORICAL ROMANCE
WILDFLOWER WORDS
by Sam Ledel
Hazel Thompson prides herself on being a beacon of earnest goodwill in Cedar Springs, Utah, where she works alongside her mother as a cook in a raucous restaurant and dance hall. But lately, Hazel wonders if she hasn’t clipped her own wings by always putting her family and neighbors first, leaving no time for her own wants.
Lida Jones, the daughter of roving Eastern European immigrants, treks West with her father in search of a better life on the rapidly developing American frontier. To help make money, Lida takes a job in the Pack Horse Library and gets to know the rowdy, tough residents of Cedar Springs. Getting close to anyone is a waste of time, though. She won’t be here long.
Hazel and Lida can’t help but get to know one another as Lida travels through on her route. When Lida’s father begins to struggle at work, Lida fears she’ll have to leave Cedar Springs—and Hazel—behind. But how can she when, finally, she’s found a place, and a person, to call home?
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Category: Historical Romance
HISTORICAL FICTION
AWAKENING HEARTS
by Angie K. Love
Available in Kindle Unlimited
Two women, two lifetimes, a powerful attraction. Will they choose love or safety?
Soulmate love is the most transformative and by far the most thrilling—but also the most challenging.
2014 California: Sage Morales has a strict rule against mixing her personal life with her professional one. But when her attractive new massage client, Alex Fischer, asks her on a hike, she’s tempted to make an exception. Her stormy blue eyes awaken something dormant in Sage, and there’s a familiarity—as if they hadn’t only just met.
Torn over indulging this new friendship, Sage doesn’t realize Alex being a client is far from their greatest obstacle. She’s still oblivious to her deeply-held religious beliefs and the vow Alex made to herself almost two decades prior.
1862 Ohio: Lizzy’s mundane life on the farm becomes infinitely more interesting the day Claudia arrives. A faint smile hints at the bright spirit hiding behind those guarded blue eyes, kindling a deep desire to uncover it.
When unexpected feelings bloom between the two young women, Lizzy is eager to explore them—while Claudia struggles to reconcile the dizzying sensations in her body with her unquestioned faith and need for safety.
Will the two women risk their hearts and home for a taste of their forbidden love?
Do soulmates meet again to heal old wounds from lifetimes past?
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Category: Historical Fiction
THRILLER
A SHAMEFUL AFFAIR
The Nikki Sinclair Spy Thriller Series: Book 3
by Jaye Rothman
Available in Kindle Unlimited
HOW CAN YOU SURVIVE IF YOU CAN’T TRUST THE PEOPLE CLOSEST TO YOU?
The Stasi, the East German Secret Police, are everywhere. The wrong word to the wrong person could result in arrest and interrogation. This desolate world is home to British spy Nikki Sinclair during her latest operation.
Nikki is in East Berlin to find information on covert dissenters. When Katerina, a fellow student, befriends her, Nikki believes she’s on the right path. But doubts linger. Is the emotional price she’s paying too high? And is she walking into a trap?
Then Dagmar, Nikki’s intriguing neighbour, reveals her link to the Stasi, raising more questions. Is her interest in Nikki truly romantic or is she only keeping the British spy under surveillance?
Nikki walks a tight line while she attempts to discover the truth.
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Category: Thriller
PARANORMAL ROMANCE
V.A.M.P.
Book 2
by Kimberly A. Todd
Available in Kindle Unlimited
A family secret challenges everything Katerina Davenport knows to be real. Will it enlighten or destroy her?
Katerina fell madly in love with an 800-year-old lesbian vampire—that was the easy part. Now she must learn to navigate the seductive and dangerous consequences of the vampire world. Will her internal struggle to hold onto who she truly is and all that is pure, survive her cravings for blood?
Serena Vanderen already rescued the love of her life once from the vicious Hapsbergen family. Now she must fight to protect Katerina from herself and the terrifying threat of losing her forever. Can Serena stop the woman who is most precious to her from becoming a mass murderer?
Find out what happens next in Born the second book of the V.A.M.P. series, continuing the steamy epic romance and adventures of Serena and Katerina as they battle for love and family.
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Categories: Vampire & Paranormal Romance
SCI-FI ROMANCE
IF I WERE A WEAPON
All These Gifts: Book 1
by Skye Kilaen
Available in Kindle Unlimited
See the future. Set things on fire. Fall in love? A superpowered sci-fi romance.
When dying alien ships materialized across the Earth, their nanite infection knocked Deneve Wilder out cold. She woke up with the ability to see the future. Determined to keep anyone from using her visions for evil, she took to the road. Giving up everything was a small price to pay for freedom.
The ship that hit Jolie Betancourt’s town gave her the power to set things on fire. It was safer to start over in a new city. Then one terrible mistake demonstrated far too clearly that for her, solitude is safer. For everyone.
So when Deneve shows up after a vision of Jolie being kidnapped, Jolie wants little to do with the frustratingly attractive drifter. Deneve’s surprised by how much she wants to thaw the pretty shopkeeper’s chilly attitude, but the idea of staying in one place sets off her alarm bells.
If they can’t evade whoever’s abducting people with powers, however, the growing connection they both feel anyway might be the least of their problems.
The first novella of a near-future science fiction F/F romance series, which is slow burn to high heat with a guaranteed HEA at series end.
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Categories: Slow Burn & Sci-Fi Romance
VELOCITY
The Dennamore Scrolls: Book 2
by Gun Brooke
When Holly Crowe, an outsider in Dennamore, learns of the extraordinary discovery of alien artifacts, she stuns the inner circle of the space mission set out to unlock their mysteries by claiming she is meant to be their captain.
Claire Gordon lives for fixing cars in her father’s workshop, hiking the Adirondacks, and reading science fiction, but it’s not enough. Desperate to find meaning in her life, Claire stumbles upon the secret space mission and may have finally found her purpose.
As Holly and Claire work toward an uncertain future, only one thing is for certain–they will have to risk their lives and their hearts to discover the truth.
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Categories: Sci-Fi, Sci-Fi Romance, & Speculative Fiction
NEW AUDIOBOOKS
THE SHOW MUST GO ON
by Nicole Pyland
narrated by Blair Baker
Baker Eagan has just wrapped the TV show she created and ran for the past five years of her life. She’s ready for a break and to refocus on her writing, and the last thing she wants to do is go to her agent’s birthday party. Little does she know that her agent plans to play matchmaker.
Casey Jinx is the lead actress on a hit TV show. She’s also out and proud and happy to be playing a lesbian character on network TV. When she goes to a birthday party for her agent’s wife, she’s almost immediately introduced to Baker. Within minutes, Casey finds herself completely taken with the somewhat shy writer.
The two women hit it off instantly and discover they want more than just a chat at a birthday party. Unfortunately for them, though, Baker was just offered the job of executive producer on Casey’s show, making Baker Eagan her new boss.
Their romance begins quickly and intensely, but once Baker takes the job, their relationship is left behind. Will they find a way to get back what they’ve lost? Or will they let the show get between something they’ve both felt so strongly about? After all, the show must go on.
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Categories: Celebrity & Forced Proximity
HOPE
by Prudence MacLeod
narrated by Laura English
The tale of Mary Hope MacLaren is a story of hope. It is the story of a young woman’s hopes and dreams, shattered, as her new husband turns violent. It is the story of hope enduring over the years, but of hope renewed at his untimely death. Most of all, it is the tale of a woman’s fight back to who she had been before and of her renewed hope for the life she once wanted, dreamt of having.
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Category: Loss / Grief
OF IRON AND GOLD
The Kingdoms of Gyldren: Book 1
by Lexa Luthor
narrated by Alexandria Wilde
Omega Princess Kinsey will one day rule the Kingdom of Tharnstone—as long as she secures the next heir to the throne. Her father has given her four Alpha slaves to choose as the sire. In exchange for her pregnancy, the slave will be granted freedom. At first Kinsey believes it’ll be an easy transaction until she meets a rare female Alpha.
Warnings: The book has a female lead character with a penis.
2022 IHL Reading Challenge Category: Fantasy Romance,
Rich Girl / Poor Girl, Hot & Steamy, Speculative Fiction, & Erotic Romance
FRIDAY FEELS
Click here for the latest edition.
Wanna get involved? Readers and authors can participate. Find out how here.
VOTE FOR BOOK OF THE MONTH
WRITERLY WEDNESDAY
IHL launched a new feature called Writerly Wednesdays. TB and Miranda will share about some part of their creative adventure, whether it be inspirational, nitty-gritty how-to, or anything in between.
TB kicked it off with Mickey Mouse. Click here to read.
2022 IHL READING CHALLENGE
JAE’S SAPPHIC BOOK BINGO
FREE ANTHOLOGY
55 excerpts from published novels, each one featuring a first-kiss scene by a popular author of sapphic fiction. You can download the free ebook in the format of your choice (Kindle/mobi, ePub, or PDF) and you don’t have to subscribe to any newsletters.
BUY US A COFFEE
Running IHL takes the three of us many hours every single week. Also, the costs add up. Last year we setup a Buy Us a Coffee page, which allows people to help cover the expenses. When we first announced the page, we were blown away by the response. Not only were people willing to pitch in, but all of the kind notes and encouragement brought more than a few tears to TB’s eyes. If you’d like to support us, click here. Every cup helps immensely! If you’d like to learn more about TB’s initial response to the outpouring of support, click here.
Have a wonderful day!
Miranda & TB
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