Before we get to today’s new releases, including gems by Nancy Ann Healy, Harper Bliss, Jenny Frame, Jade Winters, and many others, we have some announcements.
AUTHORS SUBMIT YOUR BOOKS!
2023 I Heart SapphFic Reading Challenge
SAPPHIC ROMANCE GIVEAWAY
ONLY 8 DAYS LEFT TO ENTER!
FREE BOOK
Stockholm Syndrome
by Miranda MacLeod
Also Available in Kindle Unlimited
When a spy dials a wrong number, could it be the connection of a lifetime?
A case of mistaken identity sends an ordinary American office temp on the run with a beautiful and mysterious international spy in this tongue-in-cheek romantic spy caper!
Deal ends August 23.
NEW RELEASES
Here are this week’s new ebook and audio releases and announcements.
Please click on this link for how to submit books (ebook and audio) for the newsletter. IHS will not include books unless they receive an email from either the author or publisher.
Happy reading and listening,
TB, Em, Faith, & Miranda
ROMANCE
Until There Was You
by Nancy Ann Healy
Available in Kindle Unlimited
Macie Colon spent the last twenty-nine years building a thriving business and raising her daughter, Emma. She made herself one promise. When Emma flew from the nest, Macie would take the adventures she put on hold. It would be her chance to make time for whatever piqued her curiosity. She might take up sailing, travel the world, or get her pilot’s license. Macie never considered falling in love with a woman three years older than her daughter.
For five years, Ryan Lynch planned extravagant weddings and corporate events. No one expected her to leave a lucrative business to become a high school English teacher. But that’s exactly what she did. Ryan is reluctant to agree when her cousin Brendan asks her to help plan his wedding. Until she glimpses the bride’s mother. Something about Macie Colon captivates Ryan. A spirited conversation with Macie convinces Ryan to accept her cousin’s offer. Macie is about to become her constant companion.
Macie and Ryan’s friendship blossoms as they traverse New England to find the perfect romantic wedding venue. Something else is building between the pair that Macie is determined to resist. Attraction. The leaves are not the only thing to about to change. Can Ryan convince Macie some risks are worth taking? Maybe it isn’t Emma and Brendan’s Happily Ever After they’ve been looking to create. To find their way together, Macie must admit the truth to Ryan. Life was going according to plan. “Until there was you.”
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Categories: Single Parent; Age Gap
A Family Affair
by Harper Bliss
Available in Kindle Unlimited
Best-selling lesbian romance author Harper Bliss brings you a deliciously impossible love story about falling for the one person you can’t have.
Kate has been married to Kevin for ten years, but their failed journey to parenthood has left their relationship on the brink. As Kevin tries to heal by remodeling their home, Kate finds herself living in her mother-in-law’s pool house. And having to spend a lot of time with Kevin’s spoiled sister.
Stella is preparing for a career-defining audition, but is happy to welcome her brother and his wife to the house—even though she thinks Kate doesn’t like her all that much.
With Kevin away, Kate and Stella bond over secret crushes, hot movie stars, and glitzy celebrity parties.
Until one night, after too many shots of tequila, their bonding goes a step too far…
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Categories: Toaster Oven; Celebrity; Hot & Steamy; One Night to Forever
Slow Burn
by Missouri Vaun
Firefighter Grayson Reeves barely survived a harrowing California wildfire, and the experience has shaken everything she believes about herself. Returning to her hometown of Sky Valley, NC, to heal and regroup seems like a good idea, but past mistakes and a small town that never forgets are painful reminders of why she left.
Faith Owen didn’t grow up in Sky Valley, but when an opportunity arises to relocate to one of her favorite childhood haunts, she jumps at the chance. A new environment is just what she needs to refocus on her art and regain her confidence after her last ill-fated relationship left her with loads of self-doubt.
When Faith meets Gray, she sees a suffering soul in need of saving. Gray can only see a woman for whom she could never be enough. Despite their misgivings, their mutual attraction ignites passions neither can fight.
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Categories: Return to Hometown; Ladies in Uniform
Falling Blindly
by Abigail Taylor
Available in Kindle Unlimited
Shay is an attractive tomboy with everything going for her except self-belief.
She works from home as a statistical analyst but spends all her free time working on her popular cult fan page, Lost-and-Found Girl, which doesn’t leave much time for socializing.
But everything changes when Shay meets Charlotte, an enthusiastic fan, who lives life to the fullest and loves Shay’s individuality.
As their online friendship develops, Shay’s confidence rises, and she begins to claim her life back, starting with finding her self-worth and eliminating people who didn’t belong in her life no matter how long they’d been there.
The ultimate romantic journey, Falling Blindly, addresses the importance of emotional connection and meaningful relationships over casual encounters.
If you’re looking for an intimate love story of longing and understanding, Falling Blindly will warm your heart and lead you to your happy place.
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Category: Friends to Lovers
Royal Exposé
Royal Generations: Book 1
by Jenny Frame
Poppy King wants to save the world, but if she can’t do that, then she’ll save her own little corner of it. The realities of a career in the fashion industry leave her disillusioned and, after years working with UNICEF to improve the working conditions of families exploited by the unethical garment industry, Poppy returns home to start her business degree and create her own ethical clothing brand.
Undercover reporter Casey James has spent her career exposing the worst vices of humanity. After witnessing so much corruption, greed, and death, she’s losing sight of who she truly is. When Casey is tasked with a royal exposé on the court of Denbourg, she only has one way in, the Crown Consort’s sister, Poppy.
Poppy meets Casey during her night classes and is instantly annoyed, distracted, and intrigued. When they’re grouped together for a class assignment, Poppy’s enthusiasm for life and love may just save Casey’s soul. But will she ever forgive Casey for using her to expose royal secrets?
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Categories: Celebrity; Enemies to Lovers
Her Irresistible Target
Arranged to Love: Book 6
by Alexa Woods
Available in Kindle Unlimited
A rich thug’s young daughter. A seasoned undercover operative set on digging up dirt on her dad. But what happens when the sparks fly for real?
They call her Ghost Eye because nobody can dig up dirt better than Navilla Abrams. And nobody has more skeletons in the closet than Earl Brocks. To take the master manipulator out for good and put an end to his reign of terror, Navilla is on a mission to uncover his darkest secrets. And she knows exactly how. By seducing his beautiful airhead of a daughter into giving up his secrets. What Navilla hadn’t counted on was Sylla – because not only is she no dumb brat, she’s also everything Navilla ever craved in a woman. But she’s young. And a job. The ultimate taboo. Yet, as the fireworks between them keep exploding will Navilla endanger her mission and her life for the woman she’s hopelessly fallen for?
Sylla Brocks would do anything for her old man. Even if that means having no independence and living in the shadow of his goons day after day. The only glimpse of freedom he allows her is at his nightclub. Surrounded by his security, she’s safe there. Or so they thought. Sure enough, when some thug attacks her at the club he’s swiftly taken out – but not by a bouncer. Her savior turns out to be a gorgeous, raven-haired, older woman. Navilla is tough as nails, hot as sin – but as Sylla falls head over heels for her, she can’t shake the feeling: Is Navilla hiding a secret that could blow up both their worlds?
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Category: Age Gap; Enemies to Lovers; Ice Queen; Forced Proximity
Parallel Paradise
by Mayapee Chowdhury
To appease her mother and against her better judgment, Bindi leaves England to visit her relatives in India. They’re not thrilled she’s given up her legal career to pursue her dreams in music, but all her troubles take a back seat when Bindi discovers things are not as they seem between her cousin Dhona and his long-suffering wife, Rimli.
Publicly, Dhona and Rimli are the image of a wealthy, enviable couple with a perfect marriage. When Dhona’s drunken womanizing gets too much for Rimli, she seeks comfort in Bindi, and they engage in a passionate love affair. Bindi has never felt so much for a woman before, and soon she’s falling head over heels for Rimli.
In the months that follow, Bindi’s music career takes off, Rimli has an opportunity to study in England, and their journey of self-discovery is only just beginning. But their relationship is put to the test by the homophobia of their family, community, and culture, and Bindi and Rimli will need to fight for a chance at love.
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Categories: Coming Out; POC Character
EROTIC ROMANCE / EROTICA
Once a Month
by Nicole Pyland
Available in Kindle Unlimited
She has a fantasy she wants to explore and has the means to do it. Joining a monthly sex club was never part of her big life plan, but the desire to explore that part of herself is too intense, the pull – too strong. The first month she goes, she meets a woman who is every bit her type, but flees. Each month she returns to find the same woman working the event to enjoy one night with her. One night per month is all she thinks she’ll ever get. Only she finds herself wanting more than one night, wanting to know her name, learn about her life, see her outside of their arrangement. Should she risk it, or keep things just the way they are?
In Once a Month, there’s a Member and an Escort. Each month, there are two sides to the story of their time together, and over the course of the year, they discover the fantasies they’ve not shared with others before. They also discover that this might be more than just fantasy.
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Categories: Erotic Romance; Hot & Steamy
Lesbian Shorts: Volume 4
by Sam Kestrel
Available in Kindle Unlimited
This sexy series of standalone lesbian erotic short stories continues. In After the Party, two women meet on the ultimate frisbee pitch and hook up later, with their story continuing in Friends With Benefits; a woman leading horseback rides in the mountains goes off trail with one of her clients in The Ranch Hand, single moms slip away into the woods in Sex in the Woods; lovers stalk each other for a day, planning the most public place to have sex without getting caught in Another Pursuit, and more!
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Category: Erotic Romance; Single Parent; Hot & Steamy; POC character
Crimson Rose: Book Nine
by Scott Kujawa
Available in Kindle Unlimited
For nine weeks, May explored her relationship with Catherine after she visited Crimson Rose. May agreed to move in with Catherine, changing their relationship. May’s plans for her future changed, having moved her accounting business to their home she shared with the woman she loved. Being together meant the experiences May desired when she visited the club would continue.
Catherine’s pleasure in living with May increased the longer they spent together. She never expected to live with May when she met her, but the changes in their relationship were perfect. Her desire for May increased when they visited Crimson Rose and shared an event on the stage designed for their reason.
With the trust they learned from being together, May and Catherine settled into the future they discussed during the conversations they shared.
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Category: Erotic Romance; Musician; BDSM
MYSTERY / THRILLER
Meeting over Murder
Lessons in Murder: Book 1
by Edale Lane
Available in Kindle Unlimited
Two women, a dead teen, and a cruel killer at large…
Jenna Ferrari is a tough-to-the-bone homicide detective with no patience for stupidity and an Italian’s penchant for displays of emotion. While she excels at catching criminals, she continues to strike out at relationships. At thirty-two, she wonders if she’ll ever find the right woman.
A brilliant, creative college literature professor, Miranda McLeod is respected by her peers and loved by her students. After years of walking an ambiguous line, she wants to come out but doesn’t know how.
When the two meet over the case of a murder on campus, could they have both found what they’ve been looking for, or will the unknown killer on the loose foil their chances for romance?
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Categories: Slow Burn; Girl Next Door; Toaster Oven; Cute Pet; Romantic Suspense; Sweet Romance; Mystery
Chasing a Ghost
All the Right Wrong Reasons: Book 2
by Jacqueline Ramsden
Available in Kindle Unlimited
The two-billion-dollar question: Who is Ghost Guy and how is he connected to Laird Hill?
Norah Rosenberg works hard to keep her distance from her family. But when her half-brother, Laird Hill, comes into two billion dollars, Norah, Perry, and the team are on the case to figure out how he’s suddenly in possession of the kind of money he’s spent his life chasing.
As their investigation links Laird to an unidentifiable man Norah’s been following in her latest case, a questionable bank, a library from her past, and big money, they realize something larger is at play and it’s putting all of them in danger.
With Perry arrested and her freedom on the line, will Norah, Rhodes, and Kevin be able to figure out what’s going on in time to save her, or will they need help from some unexpected sources?
Set several months after the events of All the Right Wrong Reasons, Perry and Norah are back alongside Rhodes, Kevin, and Delta in this 49k thriller. Content warnings for reference to HRT injections being difficult in chapter one, references to abusive family dynamics, references to sex, and an attempted knife attack.
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Categories: Suspense; Thriller; Speculative Fiction
ROMANTIC SUSPENSE
Sixty Seconds
An Ashley McCoy Novel
by Jade Winters
Available in Kindle Unlimited
Four years ago, Amy’s world was turned upside down. Now, she and her niece Kirsty are finally putting their lives back on track. That’s until tragedy strikes when Kirsty mysteriously disappears.
DC Ashley McCoy is determined to solve the case but what starts out as a straightforward investigation leads to the uncovering of lies, deceit and family secrets.
Jess, Amy’s ex-partner, returns to the fold to help find out what happened to Kirsty on that fateful day. But as they search for Kirsty, they’re forced to confront the demons of their past and Amy discovers the line is blurred between love and hate.
Can Jess and Amy put aside their differences to find Kirsty? Or will the pain of their loss destroy them both?
Trigger warnings: Kidnap and abuse of a child (not sexual) & drug abuse.
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Categories: Suspense; Second Chance; Single Parent; Romantic Suspense; Loss/Grieving; Return to Hometown; Mystery; Thriller; Ladies in Uniform
NEW AUDIOBOOKS
Pride Festival
I Heart SapphFic Pride Collection: Book 5
by Nicole Pyland
narrated by Caz Everly
When Ruby Simon wanted something, she usually got it and didn’t mind working hard for it. Her small town had never done anything for Pride Month, and she was determined to change that. Starting with a parade would be a little much, so Ruby started planning a festival.
Chance Curtis was used to always being pulled into her best friend’s orbit. She was an ally to the community, believing that love was love and that she’d find her person one day, but she never had anyone in her life like that, so it didn’t matter anyway.
Jo Hemsworth never fit in. When Jo’s single mother decided to move to a small town toward the end of Jo’s junior year, Jo planned not to talk to anyone and just hoped to go to college one day. Never feeling like fitting in, and only in part because of being gay, Jo had no idea Chance was helping to plan a festival and would change Jo’s life.
Jaden Hugo had been the girl with two gay dads ever since they adopted her, and she’d been questioning things about herself for a while. When her dads volunteer themselves and her to work at a Pride festival in another town, Jaden is completely taken aback because there was Ruby Simon, the girl who had made it all happen.
On the cusp of their high school graduation, Ruby and Chance were about to leave this place they’d called home and wanted to leave it better than they found it. In planning this first Pride event for their community, their lives also end up changing for the better.
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Categories: YA; Coming Out
In the Shadow of Love
Shadow Series: Book 2
by J. E. Leak
narrated by Abby Craden
She was prepared to lose her life. She was not prepared to lose her heart.
Reporter Jenny Ryan didn’t believe in love at first sight. Until it happened to her. An encounter with a sultry nightclub singer led to a secret job at the Office of Strategic Services and an unlikely romance with the woman of her dreams.
OSS agent Kathryn Hammond knows she doesn’t deserve love or happiness. But having fallen for her former assignment, she’ll do anything to keep her safe—including staying away. When ghosts from her past emerge, and Jenny waltzes into headquarters as a new recruit, all of Kathryn’s fears materialize.
With Jenny’s protection out of her hands and society, the war, and time against them, will their love survive?
In the Shadow of Love is the second book in this lesbian historical romance series. If you like secrets, spies, and love against all odds, you’ll love this emotionally sweeping love story.
Note: As this is a series, listening to the books in order is recommended.
Trigger Warning: This novel contains instances of PTSD from war experiences. While it is not the central theme of the story, it is woven into the tapestry of the characters’ lives, and I am mindful that for many, such forewarning is appreciated.
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Categories: Historical Fiction; Historical Romance
Sweet Sweet Revenge
Friends and Lovers: Book 3
by Lyn Denison
narrated by Cat Gould
Clancy Deveril’s life was not messy. She never allowed it to be. She simply moved on. It was what she did and it always worked. So why wasn’t she doing that now?
Perhaps because this time it wasn’t just about her. It involved her family, particularly her much younger sister. And, as Clancy saw it, she knew where to lay the blame: the entitled Hunter family. Specifically, Abigail Hunter. So with revenge in mind, Clancy drew closer to Abigail Hunter’s flame. But too late, she realized she could get badly burned.
Abby Hunter had her life in order. After her divorce, she returned home and made a satisfying life with her young daughter. She had a high-profile job, was happily single, and hadn’t had the time, or the inclination, to change that status. Quite frankly, romance had never been on her agenda.
So how could a chance meeting suddenly jolt her ordered, well-balanced life completely off its comfortable center? She knew she had to get herself back onto firm ground. But was she sure that was what she wanted?
Trigger warnings: Teen pregnancy & reference to rape.
2022 IHS Reading Challenge Categories: Toaster Oven; Single Parent; Enemies to Lovers; Coming Out
JAE’S SAPPHIC BOOK BINGO
BUY US A COFFEE
Running IHS takes the four 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!
TB, Em, Faith, & Miranda
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