A thrilling, sexy, and modern take on forbidden fruit.
A cardiologist falls for an enigmatic stranger in Obuobi’s seductive paranormal romance.
When it comes to matters of the heart, Sean Sullivan prefers operating tables over heartbreak. Her job as an interventional cardiologist in Chicago keeps her busy enough, and at 38, she doesn’t feel any burning desire to find “the one.” Almost all her male colleagues are on their second or third wives, anyway—including her best friend Winny’s ex, Brandon—which leaves Sean with little faith in the existence of true love. But at Brandon’s wedding to his new, much younger wife, Leila, the bride’s man of honor piques Sean’s interest. Julian Conrad is younger, ethnically ambiguous, and devastatingly handsome, and he appears to have taken an interest in Sean as well. After they share a heated moment at the wedding, Sean can’t get Julian out of her head—and then he starts showing up in her dreams. Even after going over all the reasons she should avoid dating a man 11 years her junior, she feels an undeniable urge to give in to him. When they’re together, Sean can’t get enough of Julian, to the point that she starts exhibiting flulike symptoms when they’re apart. The withdrawal she feels is slightly terrifying, and the ever-present air of mystery and sadness surrounding Julian soon makes Sean question whether she really knows the man she’s fallen in love with. Obuobi’s latest is a sleek and gripping tale of temptation and seduction that begs to be finished in one sitting. Obuobi puts her own twist on a classic monster romance, with an older, more formidable heroine who is neither clumsy nor simpering but entirely relatable. She dedicates her book to “Black girls who squinted at the pages of the paranormal romances of the early aughts, wishing to see themselves there,” breathing new life into a well-trodden genre.
A thrilling, sexy, and modern take on forbidden fruit.Pub Date: July 14, 2026
ISBN: 9780143139188
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Penguin
Review Posted Online: May 4, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2026
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 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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