A long-running series continues its exploration of the way love can help people survive and thrive through trauma.
A man falls in love with a woman who has information about a criminal he’s investigating.
Azelie Vargas is alone in the world after her family members were victims of a violent crime. She’s making her way, finishing college and finding success as a romance author. Unfortunately, she also has a job she can’t quit: When she was 16, her late brother-in-law recommended her as a bookkeeper to Alan Billows, a local club owner who was in a jam. He’s a violent man, and Azelie suspects he’s a criminal. One day, Azelie is approached by Andrii “Maestro” Federoff at the local coffee shop they both frequent. He’s incredibly handsome and she can’t believe he could be interested in her. Maestro was raised in Russian schools where the staff abused children with the goal of turning any who survived into emotionless assassins. Decades later, a small group of men and women who survived the torture banded together to form the Torpedo Ink motorcycle club. Now they use their deadly skills and talents to track down criminals and bring them to vigilante justice. Maestro has approached Azelie as part of Torpedo Ink’s investigation into Billows, who they suspect is running a human trafficking ring. He’s attracted to Azelie but decides not to tell her the truth about his investigation. Feehan’s ninth Torpedo Ink book follows the standard formula for the series: instant love plus a sidecar of trauma for everyone. Azelie and Maestro fall for each other immediately, and their story explores how lovers heal in the face of betrayal, even if the cause was just.
A long-running series continues its exploration of the way love can help people survive and thrive through trauma.Pub Date: Aug. 20, 2024
ISBN: 9780593638781
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: May 31, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2024
A powerfully strong romance for readers who like their love stories full of torment and passion.
Best friends confront feelings for each other when they take a honeymoon trip together.
Francesca Gardiner and George Saint James have always been best friends—just like Jo and Laurie from Little Women, which they both love. Frankie has a big, complicated family and George was the boy next door who’d moved in with his eccentric grandmother. Their friendship survived childhood, awkward teenage years, and living together as young adults without ever venturing into the romantic—well, except for one kiss, but they don’t talk about that. When Frankie gets engaged to an older professor named Nate, George isn’t happy and a huge fight ensues. Despite his misgivings, George shows up to be her best man, but Nate leaves Frankie right before the wedding with only a cryptic letter. Devastated, Frankie goes to a friend’s house to recuperate, but her honeymoon is already planned and paid for—so she decides to travel to Tofino, a picturesque town on the coast of Vancouver Island, with George taking Nate’s place. Frankie wants to fix her friendship with George, but now that they’re in a romantic suite in a beautiful location, things are more complicated than ever. She’d always thought a relationship would be a bad idea, but she’s slowly beginning to realize they’ll never be able to go back to being kids. Maybe the only way forward involves forging a new kind of relationship. Fortune, the author of romances like This Summer Will Be Different (2024), returns with another love story full of longing and intense angst. The many allusions to Little Women are charming, and Frankie is a delightfully headstrong, feisty character. She and George have explosive chemistry, and Fortune manages to make the “will-they-or-won’t-they” nature of their relationship feel like life-or-death stakes.
A powerfully strong romance for readers who like their love stories full of torment and passion.Pub Date: May 5, 2026
ISBN: 9780593953242
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A romance that could have used significant rethinking.
Childhood friends, almost-sweethearts, a misunderstanding, and a funeral.
Blair Lang and Declan Renshaw were best friends who went on one date before a disagreement and an accident sent them in different directions after high school. Now Blair is back from college to be with her great-aunt Lottie, who’s dying, and to support her single mother in small-town Seabrook, California. Finding a job at a coffee shop puts her in the path of her former boyfriend, since he turns out to be its owner. Can the two get past their mistakes? The novel uses the popular second-chance romance trope, but Pham fails to energize it through interesting characters. Blair’s grief over her great-aunt’s death and her plan to help her mother are overshadowed by internal monologues about her feelings, the way her friends aren’t paying attention to her, and the novel she plans to write. Declan’s distinguishing characteristic, besides being a former high school quarterback, is his skill at building birdhouses. Unsurprisingly, the couple doesn’t have much chemistry; when they embrace, their “bodies meld like…memory foam.” The wooden characters, unusual word choices (“conglomerate of pedestrians,” “litany of plants”), and odd turns of phrase (“tension melting from his eyebrows like butter melting in a warm pan”) are almost enough to obscure the lack of plot development. What passes for stakes is easily defused when Blair comes into an inheritance that saves her from working as a consultant at Ernst & Young in New York—so she can write a romance novel.
A romance that could have used significant rethinking.Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781668095188
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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