Tally Adam’s first book in the Immortal Romance series has a lot going on. It wears its influences on its sleeve - Underworld, Supernatural, and many other vampire and werewolf movies and shows of the 90s and 00s. Shadow Pact follows William, a half werewolf half vampire who is the official executioner of the Coven, a shadowy organization that rules the immortals of the world. He and his surrogate father figure and friend, Paoli, act as the Coven’s hand to kill any who disobey their laws. When they go to a werewolf pack to exterminate a new target, they meet Emily, a human who is trying to save her estranged sister from the pack. Surprise, surprise, William and Paoli’s target is Emily’s sister. William attraction to Emily is immediate, and together he and Paoli discover that Emily must be his mate. But a werewolf has never had a mate that’s been human before!

If Virginia is for lovers, then Romancelandia is for dreamers. We live in a world that’s uncertain and often unfair and while a lot of us are putting in the work the change the things we can no longer accept, sometimes we need to rest and reset. And in those times we dream of escaping to a place where we know, in the end, love really will conquer all. Romancelandia is that place. It’s a place where good always (eventually) triumphs over evil, everyone finds their soulmate(s), and “they lived happily ever after” isn’t an ending— it’s a promise.

Dakota Gray (AKA Melissa Blue) writes some truly excellent filth. In fact, that's the name of the series in which her latest release (out TODAY!) exists. The Filth series started with Perv, which is about a man who lives to go down. The heroes are also pretty darn anti-hero-y, so Dakota Gray wrote a thread about the genesis of this latest book, Adonis Line, and how she wrote it while reading all the #metoo news. We also interviewed her a while back, if you want to read more about her other books!

New week, new news! (That was a lot. We won't do that again.)

The first series of Anne Bishop’s The Others ended two years ago with Etched in Bone. Since then Bishop has written two additional books in that world for her World of the Others series. In this spin off series Bishop revisits familiar themes, while expanding the world, by introducing new types of characters and introducing new perspectives. The first book in that series was Lake Silence. It took place in an Others controlled human settlement, and it takes place a little bit after Etched in Bone. That book followed new but familiar characters and could be read as a standalone, as it only lightly references prior books.

Wild Country, however, takes things a completely different direction. As a long-time fan of the Others series, I couldn’t put it down, but it suffers from and magnifies a lot of the problematic issues from the original series - chiefly, sexualized violence against women - this time, extending beyond the exploitation of the cassandra sangue. A large of percentage of the women in this book experience some sort of violence or sexual harassment at some point in the novel and one character suffers a gratuitously explicitly violent death.

Crazy Cupid Love is a goofy contemporary fantasy rom-com with some Greek Mythology thrown in. The Erosians (descendents of Cupid/Eros) told the world about themselves back in the 1960's, and joined the ranks of other highly taxed and regulated service industries. Eliza, a failed Cupid, has a gift so strong that she can enchant people without trying. It's caused her all sorts of trouble before the book starts, and doesn't stop.

This book ruined me. Even if the title was not The Earl I Ruined, I would have written that sentence, but now it’s there for posterity as some sort of dad joke. The truth is that this book hit the right chord and I couldn’t stop reading it. I whined about how I had to go to work when all I wanted to do was call in sick and finish this gorgeous story. Also, this book has one of my favorite complicated heroines too.

More mini-reviews! This time we've got a queer YA with romantic elements, an m/f contemporary, and an m/m new adult (college-set) romance.

Romance fans rejoice - a romance-only bookstore may be coming to the Midwest! Marissa and Roseann Backlin are a mother/daughter team who currently have a Kickstarter for Love’s Sweet Arrow. Their goal is to open up a romance focused bookstore in the south suburbs of Chicago with the funds raised. We spoke to Marissa and Roseann about their Kickstarter, their goals for the store, and some of their favorite romance reads.