This witty, unconventional small-town story could use a bit of renovation.
After a case of mistaken identity leads her to inherit a rundown Vermont inn, a lonely vampire struggles to adjust to small-town living.
Tiffenie Ruba has been trying to live under the radar as a vampire for the last 300 years, but maintaining the secret has led to some serious loneliness. Borrowing an identity from a human who shares her name—Tiffany Blair—she moves between a job at a blood bank and the LA apartment she shares with her cat. With nothing but eternity ahead of her, though, Tiffenie’s secretly longing for a more Hallmark-movie lifestyle. When she learns that the real Tiffany has inherited a Vermont inn, she seizes the opportunity to start over. Unfortunately, she’s bringing her own baggage on this unexpected road trip, chiefly a neighbor she sort of accidentally turned into a vampire, too. Settling in isn’t the cozy experience Tiffenie envisioned, since the inn is days away from being condemned and she’s forced to keep pretending to be someone she isn’t in a small town where everyone knows everyone else. At least there’s a deeply attractive Christmas tree farmer named Tyrone who seems genuinely interested in her, but the situation is made complicated when Tiffenie’s ex-boyfriend Vlad, the vampire who made her, decides to pay a visit—and his presence is a reminder of everything that used to be good about their relationship. Tschida’s latest is billed as a rom-com, but the romance takes a backseat to the comedy, in large part because Tiffenie’s quirky inner narration is so strong. The novel has all the makings of the Hallmark holiday love story Tiffenie longs for, but with limited space afforded to all sides of the relationship triangle that emerges—especially as even more characters and hijinks start to occupy the narrative—it’s hard to fully buy into her ultimate choice. More time spent building to that happily-ever-after would have given the ending more weight and significance.
This witty, unconventional small-town story could use a bit of renovation.Pub Date: Oct. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9781683694724
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Quirk Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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 fun, positively frothy friends-to-lovers romance.
While on her sister’s wedding cruise, a woman enlists her childhood best friend for help as she attempts to woo her longtime crush.
JoJo Burton is bad at love. After she leaves her terrible fiancé, Pearce Richmond, at the altar, she’s convinced she might never settle down. But during her sister’s wedding, which is being held on an eight-day cruise to the Bahamas and Cozumel, she and her family concoct a plan that will help her seduce her recently divorced childhood crush, Finn Turner. The two of them once shared a blindfolded kiss that might have ruined JoJo for all other men, and she’s never forgotten it. But then JoJo’s best friend, Cooper Watts, shows up. Cooper and JoJo were inseparable as children but didn’t talk for years after she got engaged to Pearce. She doesn’t know why he suddenly disappeared on her, but it doesn’t matter—he’s here now, and she needs him to help her get Finn to reenact that long-ago kiss. But after she and Cooper share a cabin, get thrown together for every wedding week activity, and even engage in the classic friendly flirting meant to make another man jealous, JoJo starts to realize that Finn might not be the man she’s been waiting for, after all. Center keeps things light, focusing on humor even when the subject matter veers into family drama. JoJo and Cooper find themselves caught up in the sort of tropes that are catnip for romance fans—he takes care of her when she has a sunburn, for instance, and they participate in a slow-dance contest. As Center reveals in an author’s note at the beginning, “Spoiler: This book will end well.” The destination may not be a surprise, but the journey is a delight.
A fun, positively frothy friends-to-lovers romance.Pub Date: May 19, 2026
ISBN: 9781250408051
Page Count: 336
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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