We all sometimes have to put up shields between ourselves and the rest of the world. But safety leaves us solitary — we need love and understanding, and both those things require us to be open and vulnerable. The characters in this month’s romances are unusually closed-off, leading to uncommonly glorious endings when they finally drop those shields.
Fan Service
By Rosie Danan
FAN SERVICE (Berkley, 431 pp., paperback, $19) introduces Devin Ashwood, who soared to youthful fame as the lead werewolf on a supernatural soap. Now he’s a washed-up 42, hoping to drum up interest in a reboot. When he’s caught on video running through L.A. sporting claws and howling at the full moon, everyone assumes it’s a stunt or a breakdown.
It’s neither. Devin is suddenly an actual werewolf and has no idea what to do about it. His only hope is Alex Lawson, a vet tech and ex-moderator of a fan archive who carries a grudge against Devin after a long-ago encounter. She’s snarky and dismissive; he’s an ego monster with a terminal lack of self-awareness; together they’re a nonstop disaster of sore spots, misunderstandings and inconvenient but irresistible lust — and it is all such a good time.
Danan’s one of the best at breaking your heart with a single sentence: “Devin often observed normal families when he had the chance, trying to collect pieces of what it meant to be loved so that he could better play a son in future roles.” Because as romance readers we want to feel just as shattered — and just as redeemed — as the people on the page.
A Gentleman’s Gentleman
By TJ Alexander
Alexander’s first Regency romance, A GENTLEMAN’S GENTLEMAN (Vintage, paperback, $18), is all shy emotion amid an orgy of historical men’s wear. Christopher Winterthrope, the orphaned Earl of Eden, must marry before his 25th birthday or lose his lands and title. Marriage is a complicated prospect, since Christopher is trans.
Determined to make a good show for prospective brides, Christopher asks his lawyers to send him a valet. And what a valet they find: James Harding is stern, hard-working and unutterably handsome. Christopher is dazzled, but he doesn’t believe love is a possibility for someone with his unique masculinity. The reader knows better — and can spot the subtle early signs of James’s affection before Christopher does. It’s the most savory kind of anticipation, a very readerly having your cake and eating it too.
The Love Simulation
By Etta Easton
In THE LOVE SIMULATION (Berkley, 305 pp., paperback, $19), the sequel to Easton’s excellent “The Kiss Countdown,” the middle school vice principal Brianna Rogers is brutally strict about work/life boundaries. Especially because the hot science teacher Roman Major is also the principal’s son and a rival for Brianna’s job. The elder Major has been vengefully thwarting Brianna at every turn, even redirecting her library funding to a new football field — so when Brianna finds a fellow teacher is putting together a team to do a simulated Mars mission for a cash prize, she sees a chance to get that library budget back.
Unfortunately, Roman also ends up on the team. Brianna’s sure Roman’s there to sabotage her on his dad’s orders, even though he insists otherwise. As simulated Martian dangers and close quarters turn up the heat, it’s up to the two of them to decide how much they can trust each other — and if they can be more to each other than merely colleagues. Easton’s books are a blend of family tension and bubbly fun, with a spark of chemistry at their hearts.
Wooing the Witch Queen
By Stephanie Burgis
The walls in Burgis’s WOOING THE WITCH QUEEN (Bramble, 294 pp., paperback, $19.99) are magical ones — Queen Saskia of Kitvaria is a powerful sorceress and has cast an enchanted border around her kingdom to keep all her enemies at bay. Enemies like the tyrannical Archduke Felix Augustus von Estarion, supporter of the usurping uncle from whom Saskia just reclaimed her throne. It’s a tense political moment while everyone’s armies are still in the field, and alliances are fresh and fragile.
So when the dark wizard Fabian finds his way through the barrier, Saskia is relieved to have someone she can appoint to organize her mess of a magical library while she looks for more permanent defenses. But Fabian is actually Felix, the archduke himself; his reputation as a tyrant is a fiction. He knows revealing his true identity will put him at risk, but he’s increasingly drawn to brilliant, beautiful Saskia and her loyal cohort. This book delightfully upends the gender dynamics of romantasy while staying true to the core appeal: a warmhearted innocent falling prey to someone hot and sinister.
The post 4 Shattering Romance Novels With Glorious Payoffs appeared first on New York Times.
