• Home
  • Reviews
  • Ratings
    • 3 Stars
    • 3.5 Stars
    • 4 Stars
    • 4.5 Stars
    • 5 Stars
  • About Us
  • REVIEW POLICIES AND DISCLAIMER
  • Our Rating System
  • Contact
  • New Releases

TheBookBellas

  • Home
  • Reviews
  • Ratings
    • 3 Stars
    • 3.5 Stars
    • 4 Stars
    • 4.5 Stars
    • 5 Stars
  • About Us
  • REVIEW POLICIES AND DISCLAIMER
  • Our Rating System
  • Contact
  • New Releases

Chapter Reveal: SALT by MARA WHITE

June 12, 2018

Amazon

AP new - synopsis.jpg

Salana Livingston did everything right, from taking her multi-vitamin to kneeling before bed to say her prayers every night. She followed the path her parents had planned before she was born, never questioned the role until the day a bus-load of sweaty kids from the Bronx got dropped at her parent’s horse farm.

Tiago Alcazar knew a life of hard knocks. An incarcerated father, a missing and strung-out mother who left him to rely on his aged grandmother for most of his life.

Tiago runs the mean streets of the neighborhood that raised him, living hand-to-mouth, everyday a gift, if he can just make it.

Burdened by a world that only wants to see her as perfect, Salana finds her greatest confidant in a boy society has labeled as worthless. Their paths cross too many times for their stubborn hearts to deny the connection, but can the delinquent and the debutant defy the odds and overcome the social constructs that condemn them?

Tiago

“I’m telling you, homie! As soon as this bitch-ass arm heals we’re going back to Connecticut. You got the code for the garage, we roll out a Lamborghini and we’re set for life mother fucker!” They were sitting in Chico’s living room. The air was hot and sticky circulated by only a lazy ceiling fan that was covered in years of greasy dust and the dangling remnants of some bygone party streamers. They’d ordered a pizza and demolished the whole thing. Chico was only gaining more of gut rendered immobile by his collarbone break. He had pizza sauce on his tank top. A real gem. A catch—this kid. But the horse ranch trip, the fall, and Tiago’s ride home from the princess were still high on their list of the most exciting things to happen that summer. They rehashed it all, spilling the details to their friends.
“I don’t want to steal her car. I liked that chick,” Tiago said in weak protest. He flipped through the channels now that Chico’s mom had gone out to get groceries and relieved them from endless Telemundo. He left the television on a basketball game and did his best slam dunk swoosh leaping up from the couch.
“Mano, we won’t be stealing from her really if you think about it. That’s her parent’s car—not hers. And what the fuck would she care, she’s got so much money anyway? We’d be doing them a favor taking one of those off their hands.”
“That’s pushing it, Chico. Why don’t we just steal a different car from someone else in the same neighborhood?”
“Cause you got the code for her garage fuck face! Jesus Christ!” Chico hit his forehead exaggeratedly. “How many cars can one family even drive?”
“What you don’t have the guts to break in?”
“Neither do you, bitch. Can you help me take my shirt off so I can take a shower?”
“Fucking baby, you are on your own for that shit cause you stink. Check you later. I gotta go home and check on my Ma anyway.”
“I’d help you if it was the other way around!”
“Never will be, cause I ain’t fucking stupid, bro!” Tiago punched Chico hard in the arm that wasn’t in a sling. He got up and threw the remote at Chico’s belly. “I’ll fucking go if you park that shit downtown and the fuck away from my building. I’ll drive it, but I don’t want to sell it.”
“Deal!” Chico said, smiling triumphantly. Tiago wasn’t giving him a bath. He had to draw the line somewhere.

The tickets for the metro north just about cleaned them out. There must have been irony in the deal, spend all your money on transportation to go steal something that could help you get around and then sell it to make money. Tiago was so nervous his sweat stunk, Chico however, was riding on cloud nine, already ticking off the list of things he was going to buy in his head. Tiago would buy a washing machine for his grandmother, so she wouldn’t have to lug laundry down to the corner, or wash it in the tub with her arthritic hands like she sometimes did.
“’Mijo, there was no laundromat when I was growing up. My mother scrubbed the clothes on a board in the yard, hung it to dry on a line between two trees.”
“Look at your hands, Ma. You not even sixty but your hands are eighty. That’s why.” He kissed her on the cheek and grabbed his book bag off the back of the chair. “I’ll be home late, don’t wait up.”
Tiago had spent countless hours in school daydreaming about being able to provide for his grandmother. Visions of washing machines with a red bow on top, a new refrigerator that didn’t drip or smell. He never imagined what he’d get for himself, just fantasize about the amenities that would make her life easier.
“Shit, this train is huge. The seats look like couches!” Chico couldn’t play it cool to save his life. The kid was green as fuck, not a seasoned car thief. The only thing Chico was good at was remembering stats on baseball cards and eating everyone under the table.
“Bro, we’re trying to not call attention to ourselves, you hear me?” Tiago sat down by the window, the uneasy feeling creeping through his belly. They stuck out like sore thumbs with the evening commuters. Everyone in suits and blazers, reading newspapers, scrolling through stocks on their phones. How could they pull off a car theft with so many witnesses? Every single one of these jerks would remember them. Nobody who looked like them was on their way to Connecticut. Tiago’s gut felt heavier with each mile gained toward their destination. How fucked up was it that they were gonna go after the girl who’d been so kind to them? Rip her off in return? No wonder people branded them as thugs, maybe that’s what they were.
They filed off the train with a million commuters, it was nearing dark when they arrived and everyone rushed to the park and ride lot to get home to their families. Must be nice, Tiago thought. A house and a car, back yard and people acting happy you came home, a jumping dog, kids with spelling tests to show you. Probably a fucking pool to swim in. He’d seen it in the movies and on TV. That wasn’t what happened in his neighborhood. Broken families were the norm, functional ones, the exception. At least half of his friends were being raised by their grandparents. A parent in jail, addicted to drugs, never made it to the States, was plain old down-on-their-luck, were the stories he heard on his block. Domestic violence, child abuse, neglect—those were the cuts that tore families apart.
The park and ride lot emptied just as fast as the train to leave Tiago and Chico standing under the bright sweep of street light looking caught in the headlights. Tiago started walking toward the street and Chico followed him. He had a good sense of direction and he knew Salana’s house, her estate, was walking distance from the train station. Walking distance in a town where nobody walked. Again they stuck out like strobe lights ambling along the side of a residential street with no fucking sidewalk.
“These people probably gonna call the police on us just because of how we look. Probably got cameras set up.”
They walked for twenty minutes, the houses bordering the streets becoming more and more opulent, the gates taller, the security tighter. Tiago recognized Salana’s house as soon as they neared. Not because he’d cased the place to steal, but because he’d wanted to see her again, to return to the spot under different circumstances. He’d imagined himself as her boyfriend countless times in his head.
“It’s this one up here with the all the lights on. How we gonna stay hidden when they got that place lit up like a stadium?”
“We crawl on the border and then stand up and sprint to get to the garage.” Chico flicked his cigarette and the cherry bounced on the street and spewed sparks. The kid had watched too many action flicks.
“Bet the fucking gate is wired,” Tiago said. He was getting cold feet.
“We move fast. That way if we trigger the gate, by the time they get there to check it out, we’re basically already in the garage with our pick of cars.” Tiago thought Chico was being unrealistically optimistic. Grand Theft Auto had inflated his ego to carjacker extraordinaire, when in reality the most he’d ever stolen was a handful of cash out of the collection plate at church. Their luck peaked in the unexpected arrival of a car, it’s lights looming larger out of the darkness. The driver signaled and pulled into Salana’s driveway. A young man stuck his head out and said something into the intercom. He smiled like a million bucks and Tiago already hated him. Fucking Hitler haircut, first car—a Tesla. But what really made him want to smash the guy’s head in was the idea of him touching Salana, her laughing at his jokes. Tiago would fight with bloody fists for her, that douche would throw his money in the air as a distraction and start crying before someone even hit him.
The boys crouched and ran, slipped through the gates right before they closed. As they approached the house, it became apparent they’d crashed some kind of party. The half-moon driveway was crowded with parked cars, not a Ford or a Toyota in sight. The sickest cars Tiago and Chico had ever seen. They stared openly, the lighted up mansion, the driveway turned car showroom. Drake was sounding from a top of the line stereo reverberating through the walls and bursting forth into the still night and the silence of the suburbs. They were slow to process that this was real life. Sure they’d seen it in music videos and placed themselves in the role of protagonist in plenty of daydreams, why not? Honey’s with string bikinis, pouring out label Champagne into the hot tub, the ice and gold, the cars, the clothes, the sunglasses that cost as much as their family’s annual food budget. But that was fantasy and this was someone’s real life.
“Salt is a fucking pimp, bro. She’s straight up balling that bitch,” Chico said, jaw on the floor.
“Good. They won’t even miss the car,” Tiago said. His voice was full of rancor. He felt jealously swim in his bloodstream—toxic—like the sewage that overflowed into the Hudson during a rainstorm. He strutted across the brightly lit, meticulously manicured lawns like a boss, pimp limp fired, repping the dignity of who he was in the face of this great wealth.
“Yo, Tiago, wait up!” Chico yelled. Chico’s ambling limp was real on account of his one arm still braced in a sling and useless. They were a ramshackle crew. No guns, knives or experience, just hood attitude bolstered by the accomplishment of seeing the task this far through—they’d made it to Connecticut, it was worth something.
Tiago’s hair stood on end and nerves seesawed in his stomach. He wasn’t afraid, but rather on high alert, excited, reckless and ruthless, ready to take someone down just for looking at him the wrong way. A car door slammed and Chico and Tiago both froze. A tall blond guy in a sweater vest looked at them inquisitively.
“Who the fuck are you?” he asked. The guy threw his joint to the ground. Tiago could smell the sweet burn of weed, but to his seasoned nose he could also tell it wasn’t good. Not like the premium he could get these rich kids. Sell it for more, take them all for a ride and then roll around in cash like a dog in mud from the profits.
How the hell would they pull off taking a car now? Tiago didn’t even know what they were there for anymore. What if they missed the last train back to the city? Would they sleep in the station like bums? And what if they got arrested? His grandmother wasn’t capable of making a trip all the way to Connecticut to bail him out for trespassing.
“Salana around?” Tiago asked the guy staring them down. The way the words took a bite out of his heart made him realize stealing cars was pretense all along. He’d only wanted to see her, to stroke her blonde hair, to rub his nose against her little one and have his insides turned out. But if he had to break the law to see her, he would.
“It’s her fucking party. She know you’re coming?”
The guy was wearing loafers. He had to answer to a guy wearing loafers and a sweater vest. A fucking asshole Mr. Rogers was what he was.
“Dude, what are you doing?” Chico screeched at him. Tiago’s pants felt heavy, his kicks impossibly clunky, he couldn’t remember if he’s put on cologne or deodorant for that matter. His shirt was clean, but it was old and suddenly felt so cheap to have Billionaire Boy’s Club emblazoned across the front of his chest, when he was in the presence of the real Billionaire’s Club. It didn’t help that the guy stared at them like unsavory rats that had wandered across his clean pasture.
“Can you get Salana for us? Tell her we’re in the garage when she gets a chance?”
“Why don’t you wait here,” the guy said quickly texting on his phone. Tiago walked toward the garage anyway; he couldn’t stand to be scrutinized by the judgmental mother fucker anymore.
“Ti, bro. I swear to fucking God you lost your mind!” Chico said as Santiago disabled the alarm on the garage. There were cameras, two he could see plainly right over the door. “Let’s bounce. This is crazy,” Chico said. He didn’t want to go to jail he liked his mother’s cooking too much. He loved sitting in the sun and playing basketball in the park for twenty-three hours a day as opposed to one. “I’m out!” Chico said, turned on a dime and ran.
“Ditch me, why don’t you, when the going gets tough?” Tiago wanted to scream, Unleash the hounds! But he wasn’t so mean he’d want his friend to pee his pants.
Tiago decided to go through the motions. He chose the Rover for the resale ease and value. It was unlocked and the door opened smooth like honey. All the keys were in the lockbox by the door, just as they had been when Salana did it all in front of him. Like a temptress, like an invitation to take one.
Here’s the big red juicy apple. I know you’re starving. Bite it!
There was something about the feel and smell of brand new that was extraordinarily pleasing, that gave an air of authority and power without doing a thing. Wealth and pipe dreams of attaining it could be as addictive as a drug and probably just as dangerous. He was about to slide into the driver’s seat when someone grabbed him from behind. He cursed, angry at himself for having let his guard down. One held him back against the car, while the other, the blond, knocked his fist into Tiago’s face, hitting him just below the nose. Not a trained fighter, just beginner’s luck that he made contact. It was a weak punch but it landed and stung like a bitch. Tiago heaved his shoulders forward to throw off the one he couldn’t see. The taste of blood in his mouth made him vicious and he landed a punch right in Vest and Loafer’s gut that promptly knocked the wind out of him. Tiago was used to fighting dirty and street. He’d been in scuffles on the corner since first grade. The boys in Connecticut had never taken a real beating.
“Call the police!” the guy shouted at his friend.
“Don’t fucking call the police!” Tiago responded almost casually. “Why call the cops? Because we hit each other? Come on! Don’t be a pussy.”
“Then get the fuck out of here right now! Leave!” Loafer’s feathers were ruffled, his face was red and his hair disheveled.
“Did you tell Salana like I told you too, bitch?”
“I’m right here,” she said. Salana walked into the garage and put her hand on Loafer’s arm.
“I just wanted to talk to you,” Tiago said. “Alone.”
He wiped his hand across his mouth, it felt warm and burned. There was blood on the back of his hand and he spat blood on the floor gaining a look of fury from the handsome boys.
“Brandt, just go. It’s fine, I know him.”
“If you fucking touch her, you’re a dead man,” Brandt pointed his finger at Santiago like his threat carried weight. Tiago spat again. “Piece of shit, thug,” Brandt muttered as he turned to go.
Once alone, the silence between them rose up and expanded like leavened bread in an oven, filling even the dark corners and the ceiling above them. They stood ten feet away from one another and took the other in. Tiago clenched his fists and Salana watched blood drip from his split lip. She cut across the space first and grabbed his chin so as to better inspect his face.
“You’re bleeding,” she said. “Come inside, we can put something on it.”
“Give me a minute to cool down so I don’t kill your friend, Salt.”
“Why did you come here, Tiago? You should have at least called.”
“To steal a car. You let me see that code. It was an invitation I couldn’t resist.”
She crossed her arms across her chest and looked relatively unaffected by what he said.
“Take one if you want, but I’m sure there will be repercussions.”
“Naw, when I got here, I realized what I really wanted was to steal you instead.”
He saw her pupils dilate. He heard how her breath caught in her chest. He felt tingly all over like he might pass the fuck out at her feet after one bitchass punch.
“Come on, let’s get your face cleaned up.” She took his hand and led him around the side of the huge estate.
“We’ll just go downstairs and that way we can avoid Brandt and the others.” Salana punched in another code and allowed Tiago to see it. He felt like he had to memorize those numbers because they were symbolic of her letting him in. Seeing those numbers meant something. Code for: trust. Cipher for: I accept you just as you are.
He followed her down a sweeping staircase and into what looked like a basement entertainment room. A pool table, leather couches, a full bar and a fireplace. Basically a space he and his friends would sacrifice their left nuts for. Salana flicked on stained-glass low hanging lights in the basement room which was bigger than his entire apartment.
“The bathroom is right there, I’ll grab the first aid kit.”
The lights rose by themselves as he stepped into the bathroom, a room so spotless and sparkling it nearly strained his eyes. Salana’s life looked like a Hollywood set whereas his looked like a public service announcement for the dangers of drug use. He ran his hand underwater to wash off the blood.
“Sit up here,” Salana said, patting the counter sink. She ran a white washcloth under warm water and brought it to his lip. “I’m sorry he punched you,” she whispered as she dapped at the gash.
“Probably deserved it,” he said through the towel. “What’s the occasion for the party?”
Salana squirted some ointment on her finger and brought it to his upper lip.
“Oh, my friend Justine’s birthday. She’s upstairs. My parents are in Europe so everyone decided to come here.” She tried to touch the bleeding gash and Tiago grabbed her wrist. She stopped and made eye contact.
“You’re so fucking fine, Salt. I can’t stop thinking about you. I wouldn’t steal from you. I just wanted to see you.” His grip on her wrist was tight, because his confession felt important. He usually let a girl know he was into her with body language, lingering hands and soft words in her ear, but with Salana he told her as if he were in the confessional. “I like you and I don’t know what the fuck to do about it.”
Who knew honesty could feel like getting run over by a steam roller. Cracking your head open and letting the rabid butterflies escape to fly upwards in a swarm. It was almost too much for him. Butterflies? They were bats and he was a goner.
Her lips were parted and she stared intently at his face. Her blue eyes flared with emotion and his searched her face for even a hint of reciprocation. “I know it ain’t even possible. I just wanted to let you know how I felt, and shit.”
“I—” was all she could get out
“You can go back to your party, back to Branch. I don’t know what the hell I’m doing.”
Salana blinked and her eyes were filling with tears. She closed them and leaned into Tiago. He caught her face in his hands and his lips found hers. The kiss was so soft and ghostly like a whisper—almost nothing—until it wasn’t and then, it was real, it was perfect, it was fucking everything.
She gasped when he took her whole mouth, prying open the seam of her lips with his tongue. Tiago kissed like a carnivore. Wolf-mouth. No rich-pansy orthodontist’s dream. He came from real life. His cut was the ghetto. He kissed projects and food stamps and lives that were cut short. He kissed give.it.all.to.me.now because punk-ass-bitches steal what doesn’t belong to them. His hands went to her hair, soft like silk and cool like the flip side of a pillow. He wanted to eat her, make a meal out of her flesh and touch the raw center of her heart after he’d consumed her.
“Fuck,” he whispered into her mouth. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”
His dick was already hard, pressing against his jeans with an urgency that was painful. He’d blow his load from her tongue alone like a fucking kid looking at a Hustler under the covers with a flashlight.
“God, I want you so bad,” he lamented. Was he kissing for the first time? No, but it fucking felt like it.
His fingers speared through her hair cupping her ears and the back of her skull as he devoured her mouth and pulled her to him, registering nothing, only desperate for more. Tiago hopped down from the counter, scooped Salana up and placed her where he’d been. Jerking her forward by the hips he brought her flush with his erection. Salana opened her eyes wide suddenly, the blue piercing right through him. Her eye contact sent a surge of power to his groin. He leaned into her again and thumbed her nipples through her white cotton shirt. Salana tipped her head back and mewled. The heat coming from her center made him lose control. He couldn’t stand how erotic she looked, head thrown back, nipples tipped to the ceiling and her long hair almost touching the sink behind her. His blood smeared on her full lips made his stomach muscles clench with something forbidden and primal.
“Stop,” she said still kissing him. “Stop!” she pushed at his chest this time and he backed all the way up to the wall.
“Fuck, I’m sorry. Shit, Salana. I’m sorry, I lost control.” His longing was so fierce that kissing her felt like survival. He was the hunter, she was the doe. He didn’t want to kill her, but he wanted to make the damn shot even if it killed him in the process.
She shook her head and wiped at her mouth with her fingers.
His chest heaved like he’d been running, but he was standing there in her bathroom, palms upturned like a fucking idiot. That kiss meant the world to him.
“I’ll show myself out. I shouldn’t have come.”

AP  new -about the author.jpg

Mara White is a contemporary romance and erotica writer who laces forbidden love stories with hard issues, such as race, gender and inequality. She holds an Ivy League degree but has also worked in more strip clubs than even she can remember. She is not a former Mexican telenovela star contrary to what the tabloids might say, but she is a former ballerina and will always remain one in her heart. She lives in NYC with her husband and two children and yes, when she’s not writing you can find her on the playground.

Author Links
Twitter  Facebook  Amazon Page  Goodreads  
Instagram  Huff Post    NYDailyNews

ArdentProse_LogoMain.jpg

Categories : Contemporary Romance, Erotic Romance Tagged : Excerpt, Mara White, Salt

SALT by MARA WHITE

June 2, 2018

 

Synopsis

 

Salana Livingston did everything right, from taking her multi-vitamin to kneeling before bed to say her prayers every night. She followed the path her parents had planned before she was born, never questioned the role until the day a bus-load of sweaty kids from the Bronx got dropped at her parents’ horse farm.

Tiago Alcazar knew a life of hard knocks. An incarcerated father, a missing and strung-out mother who left him to rely on his aged grandmother for most of his life.

Tiago runs the mean streets of the neighborhood that raised him, living hand-to-mouth, everyday a gift, if he can just make it.

Burdened by a world that only wants to see her as perfect, Salana finds her greatest confidant in a boy society has labeled as worthless. Their paths cross too many times for their stubborn hearts to deny the connection, but can the delinquent and the debutant defy the odds and overcome the social constructs that condemn them?

My Review:

 

“I’ll never be good enough. Smart enough. Have enough money. Your parents would hate me and it’d make them hate you too. I’d ruin your fucking life, Salt. Whatever picture you always had, it’d be fucking different with me, and probably not in a good way,” he confessed into her neck, her sweaty hairline, but not to her face.

Sexy, gritty and emotional – trademark Mara White style. Loved it!

I have always loved Mara White’s books. Her Heightsbound series made me a fan for life. Her stories explore class differences, modern urban landscapes and difficult social issues. ‘Salt’ is no different. The wealthy and privileged Salana could not be more different from street-wise Tiago. From two very different worlds, their lives collide over and over again.

“But there was no way of getting around who they were—she was born into a life of elite privilege and he, into the cold, hard fist of poverty.”

Salana was born into wealth but she also has a strong sense of social responsibility. A physician, she only wants to hep others less fortunate. That doesn’t go over very well with her family or her current boyfriend. But she feels likes she can be herself with Tiago, even though he is from the rough streets of the city.

“She felt conflicted by all the warning bells going off in her head. He wasn’t dangerous, at least not in the way that her friends thought him to be. He posed a threat to Salana only by being so desirable. She’d never met a guy who made all of her baby hairs stand on end. A boy who was so hard, but so vulnerable that he made her loins ache. Somehow she wanted to both fuck him and mother him.”

This is forbidden romance at its best. Sensual, emotional and very, very sexy, Mara White writes about two characters that do not seem to stand a chance at happiness together. But Tiago never gives up and stands his ground with Salana and her family and friends. These two have a deep connection that withstands time and distance and class differences.

“That boy was the kind who would make your mother sob and your father open up the door with a shotgun. She didn’t want to disappoint Tiago with her naiveté. She didn’t want him to know how much his kiss meant. How it would be marked down in her diary as, by far, the most erotic moment of her sixteen-year-old life. But dating a guy like Tiago was something her parents would never accept. Santiago was the epitome of bad in all the ways that a boy can be bad. He will grow from bad into wild into uncontrollable and then he will be a bad, bad man. Her parents wanted perfection from her and he certainly wasn’t it.”

If you love a gritty, urban romance that is about very real characters fighting very real battles, then you will love ‘Salt.’ The love scenes between Salana and Tiago are beautifully sensual and very steamy. And the Epilogue was fabulous. I look forward to more books like this from Mara White!

“Be kind, Tiago. Do the work. The salt of the earth will be the light of the world.”

 

About the Author:

 

Mara White is a contemporary romance and erotica writer who laces forbidden love stories with hard issues, such as race, gender and inequality. She holds an Ivy League degree but has also worked in more strip clubs than even she can remember. She is not a former Mexican telenovela star contrary to what the tabloids might say, but she is a former ballerina and will always remain one in her heart. She lives in NYC with her husband and two children and yes, when she’s not writing you can find her on the playground.

 

Author Links
Twitter  Facebook  Amazon Page  Goodreads  
Instagram  Huff Post    NYDailyNews

 

Categories : 4.5 Stars, Contemporary Romance, Erotic Romance, Reviews, Urban Erotica Tagged : Mara White, Salt

SALT by MARA WHITE Cover Reveal

May 14, 2018

AP new - synopsis.jpg

Salana Livingston did everything right, from taking her multi-vitamin to kneeling before bed to say her prayers every night. She followed the path her parents had planned before she was born, never questioned the role until the day a bus-load of sweaty kids from the Bronx got dropped at her parent’s horse farm.

Tiago Alcazar knew a life of hard knocks. An incarcerated father, a missing and strung-out mother who left him to rely on his aged grandmother for most of his life.

Tiago runs the mean streets of the neighborhood that raised him, living hand-to-mouth, everyday a gift, if he can just make it.

Burdened by a world that only wants to see her as perfect, Salana finds her greatest confidant in a boy society has labeled as worthless. Their paths cross too many times for their stubborn hearts to deny the connection, but can the delinquent and the debutant defy the odds and overcome the social constructs that condemn them?

Coming June 4th

AP  new -about the author.jpg

Mara White is a contemporary romance and erotica writer who laces forbidden love stories with hard issues, such as race, gender and inequality. She holds an Ivy League degree but has also worked in more strip clubs than even she can remember. She is not a former Mexican telenovela star contrary to what the tabloids might say, but she is a former ballerina and will always remain one in her heart. She lives in NYC with her husband and two children and yes, when she’s not writing you can find her on the playground.

Author Links
Twitter  Facebook  Amazon Page  Goodreads  
Instagram  Huff Post    NYDailyNews

ArdentProse_LogoMain.jpg

Categories : Adult Romance, Cover Reveal Tagged : Mara White, Salt

Review + Excerpt: TOUCHED by MARA WHITE

September 25, 2017

 

 

 

Amazon
Amazon paperback

 

AP new - synopsis.jpg
–Does your sister let you touch her, Gemini?
-Barely, but, yes, more than anyone else. I remember even in preschool when the teacher would grab her hand, she’d stare at the spot where their skin connected as if it were an affront to her existence. Just stand there and glare like she wanted to hurt someone.
-Junipera suffers from a rare phobia.
-Please, what does June not suffer from?
-When did she start chasing storms?
-In third grade she started obsessing about the rain. Full blown? I’d say after hurricane Katrina she never looked back. And she didn’t just chase them, June became those wild storms.

Junipera and Gemini Jones, Irish twins born during the month of June, survive a childhood of neglect and poverty by looking out for one another. Destined for a group home, the girls are rescued by a rich aunt and uncle who move them from Northern Minnesota to Fairfield, Connecticut. One sister thrives while the other spins out of control. A violent assault leaves Gemini searching for clues, but what she finds might be questions that are better left unanswered.
Praise for Touched


“Fresh, raw, relevant. TOUCHED slips under your skin with lush prose, unforgettable characters, and a story like no other.”
        -Leylah Attar, New York Times best-selling author


“Hauntingly beautiful and downright emotional, White grabs you by the soul in her latest novel, Touched, and leaves an indelible mark.”
-K. Bromberg, New York Times best-selling author

“Mara White has crafted characters so real and complex, they live and bleed. Watching their story unfold was heartbreaking, beautiful, and riveting. Touched is stunning work.”
    -Nikki Sloane, Best-selling author of the Blindfold Club Series

“Touched is a truly beautiful book. It’s raw, real, and possessing of a quiet poetry.”
        -Emma Scott, Best-Selling author of the Full Tilt Duet

“I can confidently say, without a shred of doubt, that this story and these people will stay with me for the rest of my life. I bow down, Mara White. You wrote a category 5 masterpiece.”
-BB Easton, Bestselling Author

“A phenomenal, mesmerizing and unforgettable masterpiece!
This story blew me away! I cannot put into words how beautiful this story was! Absolutely astonishing! A must read!”
    -The Book Queen

“The writing is voracious and hungry and insatiable. Touched is a story that will devour you as you stuff your face with it. I’m not only touched, I’m digested. Just read it.”
    -Suanne Laqueur, Best-Selling author of the Fish Tales Series

 

MY REVIEW:

4.5 Memorable Stars!!!

I am not sure how to categorize this beautiful and unforgettable story but Mara White really shows her writing skills with ‘Touched’. This is not so much a romance as a coming of age story, BUT there is romance and love in this beautiful story. The cover is a perfect rendition of the story inside: ethereal, tempestuous and achingly beautiful.

“Her sister was made exactly how she was supposed to be. Untouchable.”

This is the story of two sisters who grew up in abject poverty. But the author doesn’t write them as pitiful characters; instead they are resourceful, industrious and most of all, survivors. They suffer through an absolutely brutal childhood which leaves June damaged and unable to be touched by anyone. But there is most definitely lots of love and devotion in this story. The sisters cross paths with Alaric and there are many tender moments between the sisters and their new young friend.

“June was a free bird; no cages could withstand her. Escape or die trying.”

I read this story in mid-Summer, before the advent of Hurricanes Harvey and Irma. So the story is especially relevant now, as it deals with the terrible impact of Hurricane Katrina on the citizens of Louisiana.

I realize this review is vague but this is an epic story that spans years and locations and jumps back and forth in time. I can’t really write any more detail without spoiling the plot. And the ending!! This is Mara White’s BEST book yet and should not be missed. If you are up for an epic story with love and suffering and beauty and multi-dimensional characters, then read ‘Touched’. You won’t soon forget it!

“The good Lord made us the way he intended us to be. There are no mistakes in His divine hands.”

(ARC provided by the author in return for an honest review.)

 

 

 

Kettling, Minnesota
1985


If she lined her spine up perfectly with the porch railing, she could balance. One leg on the porch, the toe of her sneaker just touching, the other dangling maybe two feet above the scraggly grass and the house’s foundation. Her view when she rested her head all the way back was half of the porch roof overhang and half of a deceptively sunny blue sky that wasn’t as warm as it pretended. Still, she wore shorts and a t-shirt with a stretched-out neckline. Some other kid’s faded camp shirt, found at the Goodwill, advertising a canoe ride Gem never in her life got to go on.
Fuck them. Who cared? She didn’t want their stupid camp anyway.
It was summer and Gem wasn’t going anywhere except to the front porch, the creek, the gas station for candy and maybe to the lake to swim if she were lucky. Her sister June wouldn’t be going either. But June had Maggie and Maggie’s mom Charlene who was generous and responsible; she’d pick June up and bring her over to their house for the day, feed her, and sometimes even give her clothes.
Smack!
Gem struck a mosquito on her exposed thigh. Her legs were bruised. Scabs decorated her knees like a relief map, little brown islands on a white sea of skin.
Both girls had birthdays this month. Gem would be turning ten and her little sister June, nine. They were Irish twins, born twelve months apart. They left their father when they were just babies, or maybe their father left them. The story changed every time their mother told it.
Charlene beeped the horn of her rusted Buick as she turned onto 5th Street. All the windows in the car were wide open and neither Maggie nor June wore seatbelts. Charlene blasted the radio and sang along to “Eye of the Tiger,” while smoke from her cigarette swirled through the car. Both girls slid across the long backseat as she took the corner. They were too wrapped up in their Pretty Ponies to notice. Charlene beeped again once she was in front of the house and Gem sat up on the railing. The world swung at a dangerous angle so she locked her thighs around the railing and pushed one sneakered toe between the rungs as she waited for the dizziness to subside.
“Hey pretty girl!” Charlene sang to Gem. She waved from the car but didn’t get out or turn down the radio. Gem watched her light another long skinny cigarette as soon as she extinguished the smoking one in the ashtray. Charlene smelled like cigarette smoke, Charlie perfume and Aqua Net hairspray. Charlene’s hair was naturally big and she teased it even higher.
“Hey Charlene, hey Maggie.” Gem waved back at them as June knocked open the car door with her hip and stuck one bare foot out onto the curb.
“Shoes are in her backpack,” Charlene said to Gem. Maggie was up on her knees, half of her whole body leaning out of the car window as she said goodbye to June. “I can take her all day on Saturday. You can come too if you want. You don’t have to play with the girls, just watch TV if you want?” Charlene said. Gem would love to jump at the chance. Have someone to talk to, watch her and June, feed them—it all sounded too good to be true. She always had a nagging feeling in the back of her mind that Charlene must want something from them if she was so nice.
“I’ve got stuff to do,” Gem lied. “But thanks. June can go if she wants to.” Every time she spoke to Charlene she felt like an amateur, a fraud. She was used to pretending to be nice, to be happy, two things she felt very rarely. Instinctively she knew that those were qualities adults desired from her and her sister, so she put them on like ill-fitting clothes in their presence and shrugged them off as soon as they were out of earshot. Charlene never questioned why it was always Gem taking care of June and the one to give permission. She didn’t ask questions about their mother; she’d heard it all in town. The woman was a deadbeat—too wrapped up in herself to take care of her own.
“Have fun?” Gem asked June as she marched up the steps. June stepped gingerly on the third one because it was rotten in the middle and a heavy foot on the suspect step could easily crash through it. Her dirty pink bag with the long strings was thrown over her shoulder. A stripe of sunburn swept across her nose and cheeks. Her lips were chapped and her hair was tangled.
“Did Charlene feed you lunch?” Gem asked. June was a quiet kid, not much of a talker. She nodded instead. Gem wanted to ask her what she’d eaten but she was afraid of making herself hungry. June liked kid food. Mac ‘n’ cheese, Spaghetti-Os, grilled cheese on Wonder bread, crinkle cut potato chips, even hot dogs. Luckily, those were the kinds of things Charlene usually fed her. Gem, on the other hand, had a taste for real food. She rarely got it.
Gem slid down to the floor, where June sat and emptied out her bag. She had treasures from Maggie’s house. Some marbles, a few Pretty Ponies, their hair braided and twisted in a tangle of elastic bands. There was a Jolly Rancher that looked like it had been sucked on once and then slipped back into the wrapper.
“Mom home?” June asked her.
“Nope,” Gem answered. Their mother Anne was out most of the time. She worked a lot, she got lost, she met men and forgot she had kids at home, or at least that’s what Gem and June deduced from her behavior. They sat on the porch brushing through the pony’s hair, stretching their legs out to the railing, both of their backs up against the house.
“Want to jump rope?” June asked. She pulled a wound-up jump rope out of her backpack. The girls stood and stretched their arms and backs, sauntered down the steps to the sidewalk. The apartment building across the street was filled with “lowlifes” as they’d heard their mother call them. Young people, poor people, who got drunk and rowdy more often than not. They were coming out now, sitting on the steps or the folding chairs on the lawn. A boom box attached to an orange extension cord ran back in through the front door like a snake’s tongue.
June jumped to the beat of the music instead of the rhymes they usually chanted. Her blond hair bounced all over her face; she needed a bath. Gem could see that the bottoms of her feet were covered in dirt and it was thick under her nails. She probably hadn’t brushed her teeth last night either, fallen asleep sucking on a Jolly Rancher in the middle of her tongue. Gem was too tired to care. She counted to fourteen and June stumbled.

 

AP new -about the author.jpg

 

Mara White is a contemporary romance and erotica writer who laces forbidden love stories with hard issues, such as race, gender and inequality. She holds an Ivy League degree but has also worked in more strip clubs than even she can remember. She is not a former Mexican telenovela star contrary to what the tabloids might say, but she is a former ballerina and will always remain one in her heart. She lives in NYC with her husband and two children and yes, when she’s not writing you can find her on the playground.

 

Author Links
Twitter  Facebook  Amazon Page  Goodreads   Instagram  
Huff Post    NYDailyNews

 

ArdentProse_LogoMain.jpg

 

Categories : 4.5 Stars, Coming of Age, New Adult, Reviews, Romance Tagged : Excerpt, Mara White, Touched

Chapter Reveal: TOUCHED by MARA WHITE

September 13, 2017

AP new - synopsis.jpg
-Does your sister let you touch her, Gemini?
-Barely, but, yes, more than anyone else. I remember even in preschool when the teacher would grab her hand, she’d stare at the spot where their skin connected as if it were an affront to her existence. Just stand there and glare like she wanted to hurt someone.
-Junipera suffers from a rare phobia.
-Please, what does June not suffer from?
-When did she start chasing storms?
-In third grade she started obsessing about the rain. Full blown? I’d say after hurricane Katrina she never looked back. And she didn’t just chase them, June became those wild storms.

Junipera and Gemini Jones, Irish twins born during the month of June, survive a childhood of neglect and poverty by looking out for one another. Destined for a group home, the girls are rescued by a rich aunt and uncle who move them from Northern Minnesota to Fairfield, Connecticut. One sister thrives while the other spins out of control. A violent assault leaves Gemini searching for clues, but what she finds might be questions that are better left unanswered.

Coming September 25th

August 28th, 2005


June drove almost all night. The farthest south she’d ever been was Oklahoma, going after a tornado, and she’d flown past the Louisiana state line around four in the morning. She wasn’t exactly sure where she would stay since she’d heard on the radio that all of greater New Orleans had been placed under a mandatory evacuation order. Experience told her that there would be at least one hotel open downtown where reporters were holed up. She’d followed their lead before, pretending to be chasing the story and not the storm. They usually had the best intel and she would leech off of them if she could. The storm had been given a name when she turned into a hurricane—Katrina, they called her, and she’d become a category three when she hit land in Florida. But now she had free rein over warm open water. That meant her hunger would gain and when she touched Louisiana, she’d do it with a vengeance. She was expected to hit land around six in the morning, as a category five. June had never actually seen a five before, but she knew roofs, cars and trees would go flying through the air like paper dolls, sucked up into the vortex and spit out indiscriminately.
Traffic snaked away from the Gulf in impossibly long lines of chrome and glass, rubber tires packed full of momentum wishing they could go faster. June had the speed they wanted as hers was one of the very few cars racing in the opposite direction. She came down I-55, and when she hit the I-10 bypass, the seriousness of the evacuation became apparent. Anyone who could was getting the hell out of New Orleans.
Storm excitement felt very much like a hormone—tipsy, punch-drunk and out of control. June got high off the anticipation; she tuned out the radio and the long line of evacuees and listened to the storm. She spoke its language. June lowered the windows in the Beamer so she could feel the pressure in the air. Her blood surged in her body like the ocean tides do in response to its pull. Her extremities tingled; so did her nose. She could taste the storm on the tip of her tongue, like a spike, a live wire, a sharp blade laced with coppery blood. Katrina called to her and June’s thigh muscles quivered.
June laid into the gas. Sometimes municipal law enforcement would block incoming traffic as well. June knew how to pose as a news reporter, but she wasn’t the most convincing candidate. Stringy blonde baby hair, lithe body like a cattail reed, clothing that was two sizes too big for her. She looked more like a painter or a homeless person despite driving a BMW. But her passion was always convincing, and her hope was that if Katrina was as big as she promised to be, whoever was watching would be too distracted to waste precious energy on just one life when hundreds of thousands were at stake.
“You a chaser?” the man asked her. He was a plainclothes officer, or maybe a reporter? She couldn’t be sure. He was the third person to stop her since she’d made it into the abandoned city. Anyone left on the streets was in transit, looking for a way out. More than one person had flagged her down and asked for a ride to the Superdome.
“No, I report to the Weather Channel directly,” June snapped. She stuck her anemometer on top of her small rolling suitcase. “I’ve got a room at the Riverside Hilton,” she said. She’d parked Uncle Ben’s BMW in the closest parking garage, reserved the room with his Mastercard. The receptionist only asked her if she knew there was a city-wide mandatory evacuation in progress. June looked up at her as if she were insulted. She smacked a press card on the desk. It wasn’t hers and the receptionist didn’t check it.
The cop or reporter was sold with the card. He figured hustlers or chasers couldn’t afford digs like hers. She walked briskly past him and flashed him her key card. What was he going to do? Arrest her and take her to jail? They had bigger things to worry about. This city was about to get slammed and everyone who’d stayed knew their lives would be in danger.
There were maybe a hundred or so of them in the Hilton. June recognized all the chasers, and not just because she’d seen them at other storms. It was their wily nature, their eyes holding the spark instead of the dread that was written all over the faces of the real press in the crowd. Some were there for the historic record and others, like Junipera, were there for the fix.
The wind started to scream at around eleven that evening. June wrapped her camera and her meter tightly in Saran Wrap, then stuck them in Ziploc bags along with her paper and pens. She packed all of the tiny water bottles and soda, peanuts and pretzels from the mini fridge into her backpack. Rolled up her blue tarp, Swiss Army knife, extra pair of underwear, waterproof pants and windbreaker and stowed them alongside the food.
The rain lashed the windows and splashed against them in sheets as if her hotel window were the windshield and she was moving slowly through a vigorous carwash. June stepped outside onto the balcony around two in the morning; the rain seemed to have died down but the wind was picking up, the trees across the way bending and straining, at times leaning almost horizontally. Her anemometer picked up wind speeds over eighty miles per hour. It’s the eastern side of the hurricane that packs the power punch. When that came calling, the hotel would be bending like the trees.
The television in the room blared with the constant evacuation warnings. June watched the Doppler radar image on a loop, circling toward the city like a hanging jaw going from red to purple. Hungry, angry wind and water were coming. June filled the bath tub, reinforced the metal stopper with Saran Wrap, did the same to the sink. She plunked down on the bed, splayed her limbs wide and stared at the ceiling.
The demon bared its teeth, and the windsong progressed from scream to roar, drowning out the warnings on the television. The beast was in the room, she was everywhere, surrounding them. June flinched every time she heard glass pop and shatter.
The window shook with the ferocity of a King Kong tantrum. Junipera imagined the tall Hilton as a toy in a child’s diorama reproduction of the French Quarter. Her fingers dug in and she held tight to the edge of the mattress. The room went black and the television silent when the power failed. The roar got louder, filling up her ears to find a way inside her skull.
At six-thirty in the morning her windows finally burst; the shades flew into the room and danced a madcap jig, wrenching themselves from the sliding track. June watched, eyes wide, as the one on the left took flight, a flash of soaring white in the dark sky before it flew out of sight. She crawled along the carpeted floor that was now soaked in brackish water, rolled to her back and filmed the macabre sky. The center of the hurricane looked like the center of a starfish, opening and beckoning, then folding in on its own hungry embrace. If there were Gods they were angry, monsters immune to the rules of give and take. June’s ears popped with the pressure while debris flew over her head, sometimes inches from her face. Then the rain began to plop down again in enormous drops. She stuck her camera under her shirt.
No sun rose and daybreak came in without color. From white to grey to a drab blue, the subdued tones of pigeons colored the horizon. When the roar finally moved far enough west to quiet, her ears still buzzed with its scream as if it had taken up house in her head. June could hear the beating of propellers—Army, she assumed, and not meteorological. The sound of periodic gunfire she decided to tell herself was exploding transformers and not ruthless people taking advantage of a ghost city with only a weary skeleton crew to protect it. She washed her face and armpits in the water she’d saved in the sink. Brushed her teeth, spitting in the toilet. She drank from the bathwater as if it were a baptismal font. It tasted as warm as the humid air around her.
It was still a good storm raging outside but June figured she’d head to the command center and hang with the reporters, hear their assessment of the damage. Running her fingers through her tangled hair was the best she could do for appearances. Nobody would care. The room, which had probably been a continental breakfast concierge haven, was now buzzing with reporters using an antiquated form of dial-up to communicate with the greater world. With a crashed electrical grid, the means for direct communication were severed. Someone had made coffee from instant crystals and bathwater. June helped herself to two mugs full as she listened to their chatter and took notes. Analog reporting, they were relaying messages like it was 1984. June heard reports of levees breeched, ruptured, possible flooding, but no one seemed to know for certain. She left the command center and went back to her room, pulled on her waterproof pants and rain boots, and put a sweater on under her windbreaker even though the humidity was stifling. She walked out the door with nothing more than her equipment and tiny rations in a backpack.
“Which way is the ninth ward?” she asked the security guard standing by the sliding glass doors. He looked her up and down reproachfully and Junipera tried to stand even taller than her already generous five feet ten inches.
“To your left. It’s a long walk, and believe me, from what they’re saying you don’t want to go there. Head to the Convention Center instead.”
“Thanks,” June said. She stepped out into the dense fog and turned left.
“There’s still debris flying. Hurricane ain’t over yet!” the security guard shouted after her.
She disappeared from his view, swallowed up by the insatiable mouth that wasn’t yet finished feeding on New Orleans
AP  new -about the author.jpg

Mara White is a contemporary romance and erotica writer who laces forbidden love stories with hard issues, such as race, gender and inequality. She holds an Ivy League degree but has also worked in more strip clubs than even she can remember. She is not a former Mexican telenovela star contrary to what the tabloids might say, but she is a former ballerina and will always remain one in her heart. She lives in NYC with her husband and two children and yes, when she’s not writing you can find her on the playground.

Author Links
Twitter  Facebook  Amazon Page  Goodreads   Instagram  
Huff Post    NYDailyNews

ArdentProse_LogoMain.jpg

Categories : Fiction Tagged : Excerpt, Mara White, Touched

Cover Reveal: TOUCHED by MARA WHITE

August 28, 2017


 

AP new - synopsis.jpg
-Does your sister let you touch her, Gemini?
-Barely, but, yes, more than anyone else. I remember even in preschool when the teacher would grab her hand, she’d stare at the spot where their skin connected as if it were an affront to her existence. Just stand there and glare like she wanted to hurt someone.
-Junipera suffers from a rare phobia.
-Please, what does June not suffer from?
-When did she start chasing storms?
-In third grade she started obsessing about the rain. Full blown? I’d say after hurricane Katrina she never looked back. And she didn’t just chase them, June became those wild storms.

Junipera and Gemini Jones, Irish twins born during the month of June, survive a childhood of neglect and poverty by looking out for one another. Destined for a group home, the girls are rescued by a rich aunt and uncle who move them from Northern Minnesota to Fairfield, Connecticut. One sister thrives while the other spins out of control. A violent assault leaves Gemini searching for clues, but what she finds might be questions that are better left unanswered.

 

Coming September 25th
AP new -about the author.jpg

 

Mara White is a contemporary romance and erotica writer who laces forbidden love stories with hard issues, such as race, gender and inequality. She holds an Ivy League degree but has also worked in more strip clubs than even she can remember. She is not a former Mexican telenovela star contrary to what the tabloids might say, but she is a former ballerina and will always remain one in her heart. She lives in NYC with her husband and two children and yes, when she’s not writing you can find her on the playground.

 

Author Links
Twitter  Facebook  Amazon Page  Goodreads   Instagram  
Huff Post    NYDailyNews

 

ArdentProse_LogoMain.jpg

 

Categories : Coming of Age, Cover Reveal, Fiction Tagged : Mara White, Touched

Blog Tour + Giveaway: MALENTENDIDO (MISUNDERSTOOD) by MARA WHITE

July 29, 2017

Malentiendido (Misunderstood)

by Mara White
Publication Date: July 22, 2017
Genres: Contemporary, Taboo, Romance

Purchase: Amazon

Whatever force made Lucky, either God or the Universe, wrapped him so tightly around my heart that sometimes I’m suffocating.

Biologically, we are made of too many similar parts, yet our chemistry is like a meteor shower, raining bright sparks of light into the dark night.

But it’s not our biology or chemistry that worries me the most, it’s the physics of our love that goes against the cosmos.

Maldeamores (Lovesick)

by Mara White
Publication Date: June 22, 2015
Genres: Contemporary, Taboo, Romance

Purchase: Amazon

Belén: I’ve loved Luciano ever since I can remember, desired him before I even knew what it meant. He’s always been the only man in my life—my constant protector, and his rejection only intensifies my need.

Luciano: I’ve never known a love more fierce than the one I feel for Belén. But I force myself to deny her no matter how much it hurts.

Our love is a sickness and both of us are infected.

Because there’s no cure for being from the same family.

About Mara White

Mara White is a contemporary romance and erotica writer who laces forbidden love stories with hard issues, such as race, gender and inequality. She holds an Ivy League degree but has also worked in more strip clubs than even she can remember. She is not a former Mexican telenovela star contrary to what the tabloids might say, but she is a former ballerina and will always remain one in her heart. She lives in NYC with her husband and two children and yes, when she’s not writing you can find her on the playground.

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | Amazon | Bookbub

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Excerpt:

Four garbage bags full of old clothes and books for the Goodwill. I promised Mami I’d clean out my room so she can use it as a real guest room. I leave the boxes under my bed for last; they’re filled with letters and pictures, yearbooks and school notes from when I was a kid.
Every letter from Lucky that I ever received lies under this bed. I’m afraid to even touch them. Irma says it brings bad luck to touch things that belonged to the dead. So all I really end up doing is shuffling the boxes around, dumping some half-filled ones into others to consolidate the mess. I’m emptying one when a letter floats to the floor. Lucky’s handwriting. His words. My heart and all of my skin immediately catch fire.
I stare at it without breathing for what seems like an eternity’s worth of cascading memories scrolling through my mind. I pick up Lucky’s words with a trembling hand and hold the yellowed paper to my heart first before raising it to my eyes.
Belén,

You got me chewed up and spit out, girl. I can’t do this anymore. I’m twisted and fucked up, thinking about you more than is normal.
So what if I’m lit, who gives a fuck if I’m violent? Ese dolor is filling up inside me, sometimes spilling out and taking prisoners wherever it can find ’em. I’ve fucked people up for less than looking at you the wrong way. I can’t live my life like this. But I can’t stay away.
See, part of me wants to run and hide and take back everything we ever done, but there’s another side that won’t quit—that ain’t afraid of no shade they throw or no one.
Anybody would say that me and you ain’t right, that it’s evil—that we holding hands with the diablo mismo, going against God and what’s natural. I been around long enough to know that what I feel for you is real. People don’t get to feel that way, shit, sometimes never in their lives, so even if it’s wrong, I still want it—whatever it is that we got.
I know I’ll never give this to you. You got enough to deal with—y no quiero meterte en esa vaina. But still, for some reason, I need you to know how I feel about you.
Course we always been tight, you always been a mi lado far back as I can remember. Fuck. Then one day it changed and there was no going back from where my mind had taken me, from where my body was going. My feelings were moving forward no matter how much it cost me. Like the bridge done fell all the way down and there ain’t no going back across that water.
Sometimes I’m so lost, sometimes I get so fucking angry. And there’s nothing in this world that can soothe me ’cept the sound of your voice or the way that you touch me.
It’s like there’s a war taking place and the battleground is my life—there’s two sides to me, and all they ever do is fight.
Bey, I’m not a bad guy, it’s just that nobody gets me. I swear to fucking God. I’d do right by you if someday you’d let me.
No soy malo, sólo malentendido.
But you set that straight, Belén, you douse out the fire.
Ain’t shit in this world that can touch me when I know that you love me.

Lucky

I don’t remember reading this note and I wonder if I was supposed to, or if it was left here by accident. Maybe Mami found it and put it with my things. Maybe it’s been waiting here this whole time for the exact moment when my eyes would finally be ready to see it.
The bowl of milky, honeyed water fits right next to his photo. I light the white candle and with its flame, burn the note. I want to break the tether and set Luciano’s spirit free. He shouldn’t be chained to my memories, my need to hold onto the pain. God gave me a son and Luke is more than enough; I’m grateful. I’ve got to let go.
Lucky and I ignite one another’s hearts and I’m the only one left to put out the fire.
The flames lick higher and graze my fingertips, sending sharp bites of heat and singing the baby hairs on my wrist. I plunge the flaming letter into the bowl of goat milk and honey.
Go free, Luciano. You don’t belong to me.
My Lucky, born with fire on his heart, gave me the most exhilarating love for the first twenty years of my life. But it’s not fair to him, my husband or my son, for me to keep holding on to this so fiercely, clutching what’s now and forever left me.
Goodbye, Luciano.
My love spells didn’t work.

Categories : Blog Tour, Contemporary Romance, Giveaway, Taboo Tagged : Excerpt, Malentendido, Mara White, Misunderstood

New Release + Giveaway: MALENTENDIDO (MISUNDERSTOOD) by MARA WHITE

July 21, 2017

Malentendido (Misunderstood)

by Mara White
Publication Date: July 22, 2017
Genres: Contemporary, Taboo, Romance

Purchase: Amazon

Whatever force made Lucky, either God or the Universe, wrapped him so tightly around my heart that sometimes I’m suffocating.

Biologically, we are made of too many similar parts, yet our chemistry is like a meteor shower, raining bright sparks of light into the dark night.

But it’s not our biology or chemistry that worries me the most, it’s the physics of our love that goes against the cosmos.

Maldeamores (Lovesick)

by Mara White
Publication Date: June 22, 2015
Genres: Contemporary, Taboo, Romance

Purchase: Amazon

Belén: I’ve loved Luciano ever since I can remember, desired him before I even knew what it meant. He’s always been the only man in my life—my constant protector, and his rejection only intensifies my need.

Luciano: I’ve never known a love more fierce than the one I feel for Belén. But I force myself to deny her no matter how much it hurts.

Our love is a sickness and both of us are infected.

Because there’s no cure for being from the same family.

About Mara White

Mara White is a contemporary romance and erotica writer who laces forbidden love stories with hard issues, such as race, gender and inequality. She holds an Ivy League degree but has also worked in more strip clubs than even she can remember. She is not a former Mexican telenovela star contrary to what the tabloids might say, but she is a former ballerina and will always remain one in her heart. She lives in NYC with her husband and two children and yes, when she’s not writing you can find her on the playground.

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | Amazon | Bookbub

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Categories : Contemporary, Giveaway, New Release, Release Blitz, Romance, Taboo Tagged : Malentendido, Mara White

Book Blitz + Giveaway: MALDEAMORES (LOVESICK) by MARA WHITE

June 22, 2017

Maldeamores (Lovesick)

by Mara White
Publication Date: June 22, 2015
Genres: Contemporary, Taboo, Romance

ON SALE FOR 99¢ FOR A LIMITED TIME: Amazon

Belén: I’ve loved Luciano ever since I can remember, desired him before I even knew what it meant. He’s always been the only man in my life—my constant protector, and his rejection only intensifies my need.

Luciano: I’ve never known a love more fierce than the one I feel for Belén. But I force myself to deny her no matter how much it hurts.

Our love is a sickness and both of us are infected.

Because there’s no cure for being from the same family.

About Mara White

Mara White is a contemporary romance and erotica writer who laces forbidden love stories with hard issues, such as race, gender and inequality. She holds an Ivy League degree but has also worked in more strip clubs than even she can remember. She is not a former Mexican telenovela star contrary to what the tabloids might say, but she is a former ballerina and will always remain one in her heart. She lives in NYC with her husband and two children and yes, when she’s not writing you can find her on the playground.

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | Amazon | Bookbub

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Categories : Book Blitz, Contemporary Erotic Romance, Giveaway Tagged : Lovesick, Maldeamores, Mara White

Hot for Teacher Anthology Release Day Blitz

October 18, 2016




















Amazon





Amazon UK





Amazon CA





Nook





Kobo





iTunes





Goodreads




























Nineteen of today’s bestselling authors…

Plus

Nineteen tales of tempting teachers and seductive students…

Equals

One HOT anthology for an epic cause.

Sexy, spicy, romantic, angsty, funny, or sweet-however you like your fantasies, these nineteen original novellas guarantee extra heat.

100% of digital sales profits will go to ProLiteracy, promoting and supporting literacy programs for all ages, genders, and cultures.

















Lucky Chance by Carina Adams








Synopsis








Lucky is the golden boy in his college town.   A filthy talking bad boy, he can have any woman he wants.   Except Ms. Bernard.   A chance encounter. One unforgettable night.   Breaking the rules never felt so good.








Author Bio








Facebook   Goodreads








Carina Adams has been writing and creating characters for as long as she can remember, allowing her to fall in love with the next man of her dreams with every new story.








Thankfully, fate stepped in and granted her the ultimate wish – a life full of men. Carina lives in a picturesque New England town with her husband, the man who ruined the thought of all others, and two amazing sons who always keep her on her toes.








Carina received her MBA in May, but would much rather play with her imaginary friends (the voices in her head) than work her 8 to 5. When she isn’t trying to juggle being a working mom with karate and drama practices, surprising her children with her sci-fi movie knowledge, or writing, you can find her with her nose pressed against her kindle, on the back of her husband’s motorcycle, or living life vicariously as her Derby Girl persona, Writers Block.








Perfect Chemistry by Aria Cole








Synopsis








Devon Walsh is the chemistry teacher at the local high school, and in all his years teaching, he’s never looked at a student inappropriately. Until Karoline Kingston steps through his door, with the body of a goddess and innocent eyes that beguile him. He’s distracted throughout class but vows to keep his distance, despite every primal urge telling him to take her hard and mark her as his own.   Karoline and Devon count down the days until she’s eighteen and Mr. Walsh can finally touch the woman that he’s been waiting for his entire life. But when he finds another student assaulting her in a dark hallway, Devon loses his mind with rage. Threatening to expose the risky road Karoline and Devon had found themselves on, he vows to protect Karoline no matter the cost.    








 Devon walsh is brilliant, demanding, and lives life by a rigid set of rules. As chemistry teacher at the high school, his focus is single-minded, his expectations exacting, he has little interest in dating or relationships because nothing comes between him and the job. But Devon has one downfall that he never saw coming and she’s tall, curvy, and completely forbidden.   Seventeen-year-old karoline kingston spends more time in the library than she does at senior parties. She’s always managed to escape the attention of the cocky guys in her class, but this year she’s back with a new set of curves that can’t be hidden no matter how hard she tries. Awkward and uncomfortable, Karoline avoids the eyes of everyone, until she sets eyes on her new teacher, the brilliant, sexy and totally intimidating Mr. Walsh.   








They do their best to play by the rules, but the chemistry between them is too explosive, each desperate look, every fevered touch pushing them closer to the forbidden edge. Just when they think they’ve found everything , all they’ve worked at protecting is threatened in a single fevered moment, because Mr. Walsh broke his first rule: never bang a student.








Author Bio








Facebook   Goodreads  Twitter Instagram  Newsletter








Aria Cole is a thirty-something housewife who once felt bad for reading dirty books late at night, until she decided to write her own. Possessive alpha men and the sassy heroines who love them are common, along with a healthy dose of irresistible insta-love and happily ever afters so sweet your teeth may ache.








For a safe, off-the-charts HOT, and always HEA story that doesn’t take a lifetime to read, get lost in an Aria Cole book!





Follow Aria on Amazon for new release updates, or stalk her on Facebook and Twitter to see which daring book boyfriend she’s writing next!








Playing with Fire by Mara White








Synopsis








Out of all the shitty things that could possibly happen to you in high school… My parents got divorced and mom couldn’t afford the rent in Manhattan. So she did what any secure, sane and responsible adult would do, move back into the house she grew up in with her parents in Ohio. And where does that leave me? A dedicated dancer about to graduate from LaGuardia Performing Arts, a shoe-in for Juilliard who’s used to navigating the city streets she’s known ever since kindergarten? In Beaufort, Ohio—that’s where, sharing a bunk bed with my mom and starting a brand new school midway through my senior year.








Author Bio








Website  Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram








Mara White is a contemporary romance and erotica writer who laces forbidden love stories with hard issues, such as race, gender and inequality. She holds an Ivy League degree but has also worked in more strip clubs than even she can remember. She is not a former Mexican telenovela star contrary to what the tabloids might say, but she is a former ballerina and will always remain one in her heart. She lives in NYC with her husband and two children and yes, when she’s not writing you can find her on the playground.








Illicit by Ava Harrison

Synopsis








One night of passion with a stranger. My last escape before senior year. I was never supposed to see him again. But now I see him every day during first period. It’s against the rules to ever touch him. Because now that school’s in session, he’s off limits. Forbidden. Illicit.  








Author Bio








Facebook  Goodreads  Instagram  Newsletter








Ava Harrison is a New Yorker, born and bred.








When she’s not journaling her life, you can find her window shopping, cooking dinner for her family, or curled up on her couch reading a book.








“Shut Up and Dance with Me” by QT Ruby

Synopsis








Monkey wrenches and unicorns—two things that will change the course of Reggie Proctor’s last year of college.








Author Bio








Facebook  Goodreads Twitter








Q.T. Ruby, author of A Matter of Trust and its sequel A Moment of Truth, regularly escapes real-life to fall into make-believe worlds of her own design. Living in her native Connecticut with her two sweet kids, a wonderful husband, and a cat that doesn’t like to get picked up, she teaches tweens full time, hunkers down for cold winters, and tries to write like the wind in the summer.








Dirty Lessons by C.M.Steele








Synopsis








I fell in love/lust with the hottest senior in school. There was just one glitch…I was her teacher.








Author Bio








Website Facebook  Goodreads Twitter Instagram  Newsletter








C.M. Steele is a mother of three and a wife of one. Being a voracious reader of romance novels, she decided to create her own heroes to fall in love with. . Although, the process was harder than she expected. There were times when she wanted to throw in the towel and go back to work in the business world, but it was the few readers that kept her going.








Now she’s living her dream of creating characters she loves and sharing them with other readers. She’s had moments of doubt and disappointment, but the voices in her head want their stories told, so she must go on. They were always naughty, bossy male voices, and she just can’t disappoint them.








Stealing Miss Brooks by Sloane Howell








Synopsis








Jeremiah Jackson is about to be a first round draft pick right out of high school and sign a huge contract. Ashley Brooks refuses to let him skate by in her Lit class with minimal effort. Sparks fly after a chance encounter outside of school at a rock concert, but will they be able to fight their attraction until the end of the school year?








Author Bio








Website  Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram  Newsletter








Sloane Howell lives in the Midwest United States and writes hot romance stories. A former college baseball player turned author, when not reading or writing, he enjoys hanging out with his family, watching sports, traveling, and engaging his readers on social media. You can almost always catch him goofing off on Facebook or Twitter, and trying to convince Mrs. Howell that it is “work.”








Star Pupil by Rochelle Paige








Synopsis








Griffin Stone isn’t known for his patience, but he manages to endure the three months until Avery Rose’s eighteenth birthday to pursue her. The hot teacher has a plan…   Step 1: Get close to Avery by replacing her set teacher.   Step 2: Make the gorgeous young actress fall for him—just like he’d done with her at first sight from across the studio lot.   Step 3: Teach her the most important lesson of all—that she belongs with him.   Warning: The sweet story might be short, but it has plenty of sexiness and an alpha male who will do whatever it takes to get his woman.








Author Bio








Website  Facebook Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram  Newsletter








Rochelle Paige is the Amazon bestselling author of eleven books. She absolutely adores reading and her friends growing up used to tease her when she trailed after them, trying to read and walk at the same time. She loves stories with alpha males, sassy heroines, hot sex and happily ever afters. She is a bit of a genre hopper in both her reading and her writing. So far she’s written books in several romance sub-genres including new adult, contemporary, paranormal and romantic suspense.








She is the mother of two wonderful sons who inspired her to chase her dream of being an author. She wants them to learn from her that you can live your dream as long as you are willing to work for it.








Firecracker by Roya Carmen








Synopsis








A fun steamy rom-com. An uptight bookkeeper. A cocky French Canadian artist. Sammy gets roped into attending an art retreat in Québec City, and falls for her very sexy art instructor.








Author Bio








Website  Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter Mailing List








Mom of three little sweethearts, writer, bookaholic, Nutella-addict, artist, graphic designer, cartoonist, and hopeless romantic. When I’m not writing, I enjoy spending time with my family, reading, painting, yoga, camping and travel. I am a Northern French-Canadian, and currently live just North of Toronto.








There is nothing I enjoy more than sitting down at my laptop and making up my own stories – and if those tales should include beautiful men, a little romance, and a few steamy scenes, all the better!








Spring Fling by Elle Christensen








Synopsis








Abbi and Logan burn for each other the moment they meet. They spend spring breaks together and when it comes to an end, it’s clear they both want more.   But, when it turns out that Logan is a new teacher at Abbi’s school, will they be forced to stay away from each other? Making their time together nothing but a spring fling?








Author Bio








Website  Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram  Newsletter








I’m a lover of all things books, a hopeless romantic, and have always had a passion for writing. Between being a sappy romantic, my love of an HEA, my crazy imagination, and ok, let’s be real, my dirty mind, I fell easily into writing romance.








I’m a huge baseball fan and yet, a complete girly, girl. I’m an obsessive reader and have a slight (hahaha! Slight? Yeah, right) addiction to signed books.








I’m married to my very own book boyfriend, an alpha male with a sexy, sweet side. He is the best inspiration, my biggest supporter and the love of my life. He is also incredibly patient and understanding about the fact that he has to fight the voices in my head for my attention.








I hope you enjoy reading my books as much as I enjoyed writing them!








Salacious by A.Zavarelli








Synopsis








Keller Vaughn is everything that I aspire to be. An artist. A visionary. A creator. If ever a perfect man existed, it would be him. The only problem is… that perfect man? He’s also my professor.   I came here to teach. To absolve myself from the guilt of my past by doing good for others. That plan has worked out just fine. Until her. Chloe Abernathy. Because when I see the shy dancer in the back of my classroom, the man in me wants nothing more to corrupt her.








Author Bio








Website  Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram  Newsletter








A. Zavarelli is a romance book junkie, cat lover, and traveler when plagued by intense cases of wanderlust. She likes all things chocolate, books that come with warnings, and putting her characters through hell.








Her tales have been known to flirt with darkness and sometimes court it unabashedly altogether. Revenge themes and tortured souls are her favorites to write and this gives her an excuse to watch bizarre and twisted documentaries in her spare time.








She is slightly obsessed with Theo James and funny animal memes. If you don’t mind these things, you should add her on facebook. Even better, make sure you don’t miss a new release by signing up for the newsletter below.








In The Moment by Alison G. Bailey








Synopsis









One night.   One random meeting.   And one moment was all it took to bring Cadence Fletcher’s heart, soul, and body back to life.








Author Bio








Website  Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram  Newsletter








Alison lives in Charleston, SC. Her debut novel, Present Perfect, is an Amazon and International bestseller. The novel won Best Book at the 2014 Indie Romance Convention Awards. Both follow-up novels in the Perfect Series landed on many Best Of Lists for 2014-2015. Stop!, Alison’s first YA novel was named one of the top YA novels of 2015.








Defy by L.J. Shen

Synopsis








My name is Melody Greene, and I have a confession to make. I slept with my student, a senior in high school. Multiple times. I had multiple orgasms. In multiple positions. I slept with my student and I enjoyed it. I slept with my student and I’d do it all over again if I could turn back time. My name is Melody Greene, and I got kicked out of my position as a teacher and did my walk of shame a la Cersei Lannister from the principal’s office, minutes after said principal threatened to call the cops on me.








Author Bio








Website Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram  Newsletter








L.J. Shen is a former entertainment and music journalist, a recovering hipster, a hopeless romantic and a reformed Riot grrrl. She speaks three languages – four, if you include sarcasm. She writes everything from dark to comedy, as long as there’s enough love and romance involved. Shen lives in Northern California with her son, husband, cat and collection of designer shoes.








L.J. wants to be Tina Fey when she grows up. Keep your fingers crossed for her.








Riding Through by Dani Wyatt








Synopsis








Everything was going fine until I saw her ass in those riding pants. Constance Montgomery with her legs spread on the leather of the saddle. Her top half has my mouth watering and things inside me shift. Seems my program is about to change. All the years of indifference to any female form all come tumbling down. My hard rule to never get involved with a student is about to be broken. With her.   Reed Sawyer is at the top of his game. The top equestrian trainer around and I’m about to pass out because he’s looking right at me. Only, he’s not my trainer. I’m tired of being under my parent’s thumb. Maybe it’s time I pushed the envelope a little. And Reed Sawyer looks like just the right wall to start pushing on.   A naïve, sheltered girl. A brooding, perfectionist with years of pent up need. The sparks fly. The walls come down. Hot lessons are learned.








Author Bio








Website  Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram  Newsletter








Dani Wyatt used to feel bad about having such dirty thoughts. Luckily, one day she decided to starting writing them down. Her uber alpha heros have a wicked possessive streak and an insatiable libido. Her heroines are intelligent, quirky and worry about having too much muffin top. With her books, you can count on a heaping helping of HOT and always a happily ever after.








When she’s not writing (which is not often) she is probably laughing about some irony (like A-1 Steak Sauce is vegan), riding her horse, wondering why The Walking Dead can’t have a new episode every night, or looking cross-eyed at some piece of technology sent to ruin her day.








Break Point by Rachel Blaufeld

Synopsis





Juliette Smith, star tennis player, is starting over at a new university. Traumatized by hazing at her last school, all she wants is to attend classes, win tennis matches, and be left the hell alone.   She should have known her coach, Drew King, would be a problem from the moment he flexed his sexy-as-hell forearms.   What happens when you mix a pissed-off woman with a bunch of snooty teammates and a hot coach?   A heated match, complete with team politics and a forbidden game of singles with the coach.








Author Bio








Website   Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram  Newsletter








Rachel Blaufeld is a bestselling author of Coming of Age, Romantic Suspense, and Sports Romance fiction. She recently asked her readers to describe her, and the adjectives they came up with included: insightful, generous, articulate, and spunky. Originally a social worker, Rachel creates broken yet redeeming characters. She’s been known to turn up the angst like cranking the heat up in the dead of winter.








Turning her focus on her sometimes wild-and-crazy creative side, it only took Rachel two decades to do exactly what she wanted to do—write a fiction novel. Now she spends way too many hours in local coffee shops, downing muffins and plotting her ideas. Her tales may all come with a side of angst and naughtiness, but end deliciously.








Blaufeld, also an entrepreneur/blogger, is fearless about sharing her opinion. Before turning her pen to fiction, she captured the ear of stay-at-home and working moms on her blog, BacknGrooveMom, chronicling her adventures in parenting tweens and inventing a product, often at the same time. She has also blogged for the Huffington Post and Modern Mom.





Most recently, she shares conversations from being “In Bed with a Romance Author” and reading recommendations over at “Happy Ever After” on USA TODAY.








Rachel lives around the corner from her childhood home in Pennsylvania with her family and two beagles. Her obsessions include running, coffee, basketball, icing-filled doughnuts, antiheroes, and mighty fine epilogues.








Teach Me, Sir by Julia Sykes








Synopsis








Indulging in her secret fantasies about Professor Parker would destroy Sarah’s Good Girl persona. Luckily for her, she doesn’t have a shot with her sexy teacher, so her reputation is safe.   But when Sarah puts herself in a dangerous situation, Professor Parker’s protective—and possessive—instincts take over. Forbidden lust ignites as his long-denied urges to possess his innocent student consume him.   Can they keep their taboo attraction secret? Or will surrendering to their darkest impulses ruin them both?








Author Bio








Website. Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram Newsletter








Julia Sykes is the USA Today bestselling author of the Impossible Series. She has always kept dark stories tucked away in her mind, so she was thrilled when she discovered that other people actually want to read them. Her books blend romance, suspense, and BDSM.








When not writing, Julia spends her time petting her cat-children, reading, and binge watching TV with her husband. You can usually find her in Starbucks with a venti iced coffee clutched in her hand.








Julia loves connecting with readers! Please feel free to contact her on facebook, through twitter, or email her directly at juliasykes193@gmail.com. You can find out more about Julia’s current and future projects at julia-sykes.com.








Schooled by A Senior by K. Webster








Synopsis








Aut Blanks is brilliant bad boy with a chip on his shoulder. Mrs. Macmillan is a substitute teacher way in over her head. When they’re forced to work together, the sexual tension is off the charts. Will the teacher remain professional or will she be schooled in a lesson on sex by a filthy boy who barely fits in his desk?








Author Bio








Website  Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram  Newsletter








K Webster is the author of dozens of romance books in many different genres including contemporary romance, historical romance, paranormal romance, and erotic romance. When not spending time with her husband of twelve years and two adorable children, she’s active on social media connecting with her readers.








Her other passions besides writing include reading and graphic design. K can always be found in front of her computer chasing her next idea and taking action. She looks forward to the day when she will see one of her titles on the big screen.








Learning His Law by Celia Aaron





Synopsis








Having a crush on her demanding—and sexy—law school professor seemed inevitable for Penny. Professor Elliot was smart, hot, and intense. There was only one problem; Penny noticed that Professor Elliot never looked at her, never so much as glanced her way since he called roll on the very first day. When professor and student are thrown together, Penny will discover just how far her professor will go to make her his.

















Author Bio








Website  Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram  Newsletter








Celia Aaron is a recovering attorney who loves romance and erotic fiction. Dark to light, angsty to funny, real to fantasy—if it’s hot and strikes her fancy, she writes it. Thanks for reading.








Behind The Wall by Jane Harvey-Berrick








Synopsis








Behind the Wall is a story of an illicit love that tries to blossom behind the bars of Nottoway Correctional Center, a level 3 security prison.   Ella Newsome quit her job teaching in public school to work in a prison. Her passion is education, but when she is challenged by felon Dane Garrett in more ways than one, she’s shaken to the core.   Can love bloom in such a harsh environment, or will Ella learn things about Garrett that she’d rather not know?








Author Bio








Website  Facebook  Goodreads  Twitter  Instagram  Newsletter








I get asked where my ideas come from. A lot. That’s a really hard one to answer, because it’s usually a build-up of vague ideas, conversations overheard (I do like to lurk), things I’ve seen or experienced, and sometimes just that weird alchemy that is imagination.








I carry a notebook everywhere in case inspiration strikes, and I’m often jotting down notes while I walk by the ocean with my four-legged best friend.
















Categories : Anthology, Book Blast, Book Blitz, Contemporary Erotic Romance, Contemporary Romance, Release Blitz, Student-Teacher Tagged : A.Zavarelli, Alison G. Bailey, Aria Cole, C. M. Steele, Carina Adams, Celia Aaron, Dani Wyatt, Elle Christensen, Hot for Teacher, Jane Harvey-Berrick, Julia Sykes, K. Webster, L.J. Shen, Mara White, QT Ruby, Rachel Blaufeld, Rochelle Paige, Roya Carmen, Sloane Howell

Next Page »

Categories

  • 2 Stars
  • 2.5 Stars
  • 3 Stars
  • 3.5 Stars
  • 4 Stars
  • 4.5 Stars
  • 5 Stars
  • Action Romance
  • Adult
  • Adult Coloring Book
  • Adult Romance
  • Adult Suspense
  • Alpha male
  • Alpha- hero
  • Angsty
  • Anthology
  • Audiobook
  • Author Interview
  • Author Signing
  • Autobiography
  • BDSM
  • BDSM – Dark and Angsty
  • Biker
  • Billionaire Romance
  • Biographical Fiction
  • Biography
  • Bisexual Romance
  • Blog Hop
  • Blog Tour
  • Book Blast
  • Book Blitz
  • Book Launch
  • Book Tour
  • Charity
  • College
  • College Romance
  • Coming of Age
  • Contemporary
  • Contemporary Erotic Romance
  • Contemporary Fiction
  • Contemporary Gay Romance
  • Contemporary Homoerotic Romance
  • Contemporary M/M Romance
  • Contemporary Queer Romance
  • Contemporary Romance
  • Contemporary Western Romance
  • Courtroom Drama
  • Cover Reveal
  • Cowboy Romance
  • Cozy Mystery
  • Crime
  • Crime Romance
  • Dark
  • Dark and Twisty
  • Dark Contemporary Romance
  • Dark Erotic Romance
  • Dark Erotica
  • Dark Humor
  • Dark Romance
  • Diverse
  • Domestic Fiction
  • Domestic Suspense
  • Domestic Thriller
  • Dominant
  • Dystopian
  • Enemies to Lovers
  • Erotic
  • Erotic Humor
  • Erotic Romance
  • Erotic Romantic Comedy
  • Erotic Suspense
  • Erotic Thriller
  • Erotica
  • Erotica/Sci-Fi
  • Events
  • Family Drama
  • Family Saga
  • Fantasy
  • Fashion
  • Feminism
  • Fiction
  • Fighter
  • Financial Thriller
  • Forbidden
  • Giveaway
  • Gothic
  • Gothic Romance
  • Guest Post
  • Hispanic American Literature
  • Historical Fiction
  • Historical Romance
  • Holiday Fiction
  • Holiday Romance
  • Horror
  • Horror Romance
  • Human Sexuality
  • Humor
  • Legal Thriller
  • Lesbian Romance
  • LGBQT Science Fiction
  • LGBT
  • LGBT Romance
  • LGBTQI
  • Literary Fiction
  • Literary Saga
  • M/m
  • M/M Contemporary Romance
  • Mafia Romance
  • Magical Realism
  • Mature YA/NA
  • MC Romance
  • Memoir
  • Ménage
  • Mental Health
  • Military Romance
  • MM Romance
  • MMA
  • Movie Star Romance
  • Multicultural Romance
  • Mystery
  • Mythology
  • Nature
  • New Adult
  • New Adult Contemporary
  • New Adult Contemporary Romance
  • New Adult Romance
  • New Adult Romantic Comedy
  • New Adult Romantic Suspense
  • New Release
  • Non-con
  • Non-Fiction
  • Novella
  • Office Romance
  • Organized Crime Thrillers
  • Own Voices
  • Paranormal
  • Paranormal Romance
  • Political Romance
  • Post-Apocalyptic
  • Prequel
  • Psychological
  • Psychological Thriller
  • Release Blitz
  • Reviews
  • Rock Star
  • Rock Star Romance
  • Rocker
  • Romance
  • Romantic Comedy
  • Romantic Erotica
  • Romantic Suspence
  • Romantic Suspense
  • Romantic Thriller
  • Romantic Women's Fiction
  • Satire
  • Sci-Fi Romance
  • Science Fiction
  • Second Chance
  • Second Chance Romance
  • Self-Help
  • Serial
  • Series
  • Shifter
  • Short Story
  • Single Dad
  • Slow Burn Romance
  • Small-town Romance
  • Speculative Fiction
  • Sports
  • Sports Romance
  • Sports-Hockey
  • Spotlight
  • Spotlight Tour
  • Standalone
  • Student-Teacher
  • Suspense
  • Taboo
  • Tattooed hero
  • Teaser
  • Teaser Tuesday
  • Thriller
  • Time Travel Romance
  • Trailer Reveal
  • Uncategorized
  • Urban Erotica
  • Waiting on Wednesday
  • Western Romance
  • Women's Fiction
  • Women's Studies
  • Young Adult
  • Young Adult Contemporary Romance
  • Young Adult Fantasy
  • Young Adult Fiction
  • Young Adult Romance
  • Young Adult Thriller
  • Young Adult Time Travel
  • Young Adult-New Adult

Stay Connected

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • RSS
  • Twitter

Recent Favorites:

Search The Book Bellas

New Posts Delivered Straight To Your Inbox

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 37 other subscribers

Recent Posts

  • PINEAPPLE STREET by JENNY JACKSON
  • SOMEONE ELSE’S SHOES by JOJO MOYES
  • MS. DEMEANOR by ELINOR LIPMAN
  • WOMEN ARE THE FIERCEST CREATURES by ANDREA DUNLOP
  • MOTHERED by ZOJE STAGE
Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy

Archives

Find us on GoodReads

Goodreads: Book reviews, recommendations, and discussion

Grab our Button


Tags

4 stars 4.5 stars 5 stars A.L. Jackson Aleatha Romig Alessandra Torre alpha male BDSM Bella Jewel Blog Tour Book Blitz Book Launch Cat Porter Chelle Bliss contemporary romance Cover Reveal Erotica Erotic romance Excerpt Giveaway Jane Harvey-Berrick K. Bromberg Karina Halle Katy Evans Kristen Ashley Laurelin Paige Mara White Nelle L'Amour New Adult New Releases Pam Godwin Penelope Douglas Penelope Ward Pepper Winters R.S. Grey Release Blitz Review Reviews S.L. Scott Skye Warren Tarryn Fisher Tessa Bailey Tia Louise Vi Keeland Young Adult

Copyright © 2023 · Annabelle Reloaded Theme