BOOKLOVES

Some enemies-to-lovers stories tiptoe up to the line. This one body-checks you into the boards on page one and grins while you find your teeth. Tempting Venom by Rina Kent is the third book in the Vipers series, and it hands the microphone to two of the most gleefully unhinged narrators in her whole catalog. […]

Content warnings: rape, serial killer An intense historical thriller set along the Alaskan Northern Railway Now that Josh Spark has come of age, he’s going to work harder for a better life. He can’t stay working on Uncle Harry’s fox farm any longer. To gain more opportunities, Uncle Harry encourages Josh to pursue rigorous work […]

A tenderhearted owl romance that’ll have you screeching with happiness Grumpy the iguana is trying to sleep, but a persistent screeching out of his treehouse door won’t let him. When he ventures outside, long dangly arms in tow, he sees Screech Owl, calling for his sweetheart. It’s April—screech owls’ month for mating—and he promised his […]

A striking historical novel about a supernatural guardian arising during humanity’s darkest chapter Historical fiction set during the Holocaust must walk a fine line, balancing storytelling with respect for the real suffering that forms the backdrop of the narrative. With The Golem’s Holocaust, Scott Eveloff powerfully fuses the historical horror of Nazi persecution with one […]

Some novels announce their comedy on the first page. The Shampoo Effect does it with a stepped-on jelly donut, a fuchsia smear across a pair of jeans, and a stranger who hands over napkins and casually mentions he minored in women’s studies. Within a paragraph you know the register you’re in: sharp, silly, a little […]

A smart, steamy book about a woman who comes to D.C. on a mission and ends up running the show Heidi Scherzinger lives an enchanted life, almost like Forrest Gump except not at all like Forrest Gump. She, too, is in all the right places at all the right times, often meeting with people who […]

There is a particular kind of thriller that keeps its menace folded as neatly as a fitted sheet, and Natalie Barelli has written one of the sharpest examples in recent memory. The Housewife by Natalie Barelli hands you a narrator who irons her tablecloths twice, knows three ways to lift a blood stain, and tells […]