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The Love of My Afterlife
The Love of My Afterlife by Kirsty Greenwood is $2.99! I hope this sale lasts! Sarah had the author on the podcast and she picked it as her favorite read of 2024.
A recently deceased woman meets “the one” in the afterlife waiting room, scoring a second chance at life (and love!) if she can find him on earth before ten days are up…
If she wasn’t dead already, Delphie would be dying of embarrassment. Not only did she just die by choking on a microwaveable burger, but now she’s standing in her ‘shine like a star’ nightie in front of the hottest man she’s ever seen. And he’s smiling at her.
As they start to chat, everything else becomes background noise. That is until someone comes running out of a door, yelling something about a huge mistake, and sends the dreamy stranger back down to earth. And here Delphie was thinking her luck might be different in the afterlife.
When Delphie is offered a deal in which she can return to earth and reconnect with the mysterious man, she jumps at the opportunity to find her possible soulmate and a fresh start. But in a city of millions, Delphie is going to have to listen to her heart, learn to ask for help, and perhaps even see the magic in the life she’s leaving behind…
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Well Matched
Well Matched by Jen DeLuca is $1.99! This is DeLuca’s latest release in her contemporary ren faire romances. I believe there’s another on the way? The series has been reviewed well here and seems great for some low angsty reads, but correct me if I’m wrong.
An accidentally in-love rom-com filled with Renaissance Faire flower crowns, kilts, corsets, and sword fights.
Single mother April Parker has lived in Willow Creek for twelve years with a wall around her heart. On the verge of being an empty nester, she’s decided to move on from her quaint little town, and asks her friend Mitch for his help with some home improvement projects to get her house ready to sell.
Mitch Malone is known for being the life of every party, but mostly for the attire he wears to the local Renaissance Faire–a kilt (and not much else) that shows off his muscled form to perfection. While he agrees to help April, he needs a favor too: she’ll pretend to be his girlfriend at an upcoming family dinner, so that he can avoid the lectures about settling down and having a more “serious” career than high school coach and gym teacher. April reluctantly agrees, but when dinner turns into a weekend trip, it becomes hard to tell what’s real and what’s been just for show. But when the weekend ends, so must their fake relationship.
As summer begins, Faire returns to Willow Creek, and April volunteers for the first time. When Mitch’s family shows up unexpectedly, April pretends to be Mitch’s girlfriend again…something that doesn’t feel so fake anymore. Despite their obvious connection, April insists they’ve just been putting on an act. But when there’s the chance for something real, she has to decide whether to change her plans–and open her heart–for the kilt-wearing hunk who might just be the love of her life.
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Everyone I Kissed Since You Got Famous
Everyone I Kissed Since You Got Famous by Mae Marvel is $2.99! Marvel is the writing duo of Ruthie Knox and her wife, Annie Mare. This book was mentioned in Hide Your Wallet and Dahlia’s queer romance round-up over last summer.
An actress home for the holidays makes a bet with her former best friend-turned-online sensation.
Katie Price is known in every living room in America. A small-town Wisconsin girl who became an A-list star, she rarely makes it home, but this year is different… Little does she know it will lead her straight into the piercing blue-eyed gaze of Wil Greene.
A lot has happened in the decade since those cold Wisconsin nights when Wil and Katie drove around in Wil’s Bronco senior year. Since then, Wil’s law career hasn’t taken off. Her father passed away. And what started as a personal challenge―kissing a new person twice a week, every week―has made her a growing sensation, but her life is still stuck in phase one. Through the years, the two have never left each other’s thoughts and desires, but now suddenly, they are back in each others’ lives. Their reconnection is instantaneous and the passion is palpable… but can it stand the test of time?
Witty, emotional, and steamy, Everyone I Kissed Since You Got Famous is an unforgettable romantic read for everyone who almost kissed their best friend. And then finally did.
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When Grumpy Met Sunshine
When Grumpy Met Sunshine by Charlotte Stein is $2.99! I know Stein has a lot of fans, especially if you like steamy romances. However, I feel like this one didn’t do as well as I thought it would with readers. Have you read it?
A steamy, opposites-attract romance with undeniable chemistry between a grumpy retired footballer and his fabulous and very sunshine-y ghostwriter.
When grumpy ex-footballer Alfie Harding gets badgered into selling his memoirs, he knows he’s never going to be able to write them. He hates revealing a single thing about himself, is allergic to most emotions, and can’t imagine doing a good job of putting pen to paper.
And so in walks curvy, cheery, cute as heck ghostwriter Mabel Willicker, who knows just how to sunshine and sass her way into getting every little detail out of Alfie. They banter and bicker their way to writing his life story, both of them sure they’ll never be anything other than at odds.
But after their business arrangement is mistaken for a budding romance, the pair have to pretend to be an item for a public who’s ravenous for more of this Cinderella story. Or at least, it feels like it’s pretend—until each slow burn step in their fake relationship sparks a heat neither can control. Now they just have to decide: is this sizzling chemistry just for show? Or something so real it might just give them their fairytale ending?
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Currently free for US Kindle readers ~ Black Moon (Wolf Moon Rising Book 1) by Sam Burns and W.M. Fawkes
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B091HYR74F/ref=ya_aw_dod_pi?ie=UTF8&psc=1
WELL MATCHED is the 3rd of DeLuca’s 4 RenFaire books (not the most recent); I enjoyed all 4 and would be happy if another entry is on the way!
Is The Love of My Afterlife going to cause damp eyes as did (a mystery, but still) The Lovely Bones? Reality is challenging enough, not sure if I need fiction + tears.
@LML: I would say most likely yes. The characters are dealing with different kinds of grief and loss, and I definitely got teary at some of the later scenes. If you’d like more specifics:
I don’t want to spoil too much but grief is a major theme and the book hit me square in the squishy feels.
A little off topic, but I read an interview with Ali Hazelwood today and she has the best answer to the perennial question romance novelists are asked about the value of romance as a genre:
“I think we should turn this question around: Why should romance, a genre that clearly resonates with millions of readers, have to explicitly fight for its right to exist?”
https://pen.org/ali-hazelwood-shelf-love/
Loved THE LOVE OF MY AFTERLIFE. Just bought a bunch of kindle copies as Galentine’s Day gifts for my friends!
@JenC: What a great Galentine’s Day idea!
Re: When Grumpy Met Sunshine by Charlotte Stein. I am SO MAD at the second-rate editing St. Martin’s Press provided for this book and How to Help a Hungry Werewolf. Stein’s authorial voice is weird and original. Her characters’ interior monologues are trippy, funny, awkward and horny. St. Martins’ blew it. In some places Stein’s style is corralled into more conventional prose, while in others dialogue is hard to follow. I’m still buying her books, but they’re nowhere near as good as the gothic weirdness of Sweet Agony https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/reviews/sweet-agony-by-charlotte-stein/.
@SBSarah, thank you. I’ll buy it and let it sift towards the bottom of Mt. TBR until the next time I need a good cry. (I didn’t read the spoiler.)
I wanted to like Everyone I Kissed Since You Got Famous more than I actually did. It was a solid B, but something about the writing style made it hard for me to connect with the characters. The writing also reminded me a bit of Jennifer Crusie (whom I used to love), in that the main characters are Very. Certain. about how the world works, but their understanding doesn’t always fit with my lived experience. I was mostly able to suspend disbelief but I kept got pulled out of the story more often than I like, wondering if such and such thing would really happen.
Read the sample.
Remember when we were all worried about saving the contemporary genre? I never thought I would miss that, but there are so many contemporaries now and I almost never like them anymore!
I was super excited for Everyone I Kissed Since You Got Famous but it really didn’t work for me. Neither did When Grumpy Met Sunshine, which I also expected to like. I am often disappointed by having too high expectations of authors I have previously enjoyed so that might be all it is, although @AI R-B has an excellent point about the editing. I have never really liked a Jen DeLuca book but it’s always close, and I think a better editor would make all the difference in the world.
@Lisa ~ thanks for sharing the link to the Ali Hazelwood piece!
$.99:
– Ruby Red Herring: An Avery Ayers Antique Mystery (Avery Ayers Antique Mysteries Book 1) by Tracy Gardner
– The Make-Believe Marriage (The Farthingale Series 10) by Meara Platt
– Ransomed by Kashatok: A Steamy Sci-Fi Romance (Galactic Pirate Brides Book 2) by Tamsin Ley
– My Estranged Lover (Middlemarch Shifters Book 5) by Shelley Munro
– Sweet as Pie: a MM Grumpy/Sunshine Romance (Indigo Bay) by Beth Bolden
– Joy Danvers’ backlist
$1.99:
– These Violent Delights (These Violent Delights Duet Book 1)
by Chloe Gong
– Butterfly Swords (The Tang Dynasty Book 1) by Jeannie Lin
– A Winter’s Earl by Annabelle Greene
– Rumors, Ruin and the Duke (The Lost Lords Book 1) by Karla Kratovil
– Crazy Love You: A Novel by Lisa Unger
– Butcher & Blackbird: The Ruinous Love Trilogy by Brynne Weaver
– Miss Wonderful (Carsington Family Series Book 1) by Loretta Chase
– To Sir Phillip, With Love: Bridgerton: Eloise’s Story (Bridgertons Book 5) by Julia Quinn
Free:
– Beyond the Tides (Prince Edward Island Shores Book #1) by Liz Johnson
– Sweetheart in High Heels (High Heels Mysteries short story #5.75): a Funny Romantic Mystery short story by Gemma Halliday
– Enraged (Iron Vex MC Book 1) by Elizabeth Knox
– Daddy Sees Snakes: A Dark Christmas Romance by Elizabeth Knox, Isabella Starling
– Bet On Me: A Royal Bastards MC Novel / Knights of Retribution Prequel (Knights of Retribution MC Book 1) by Elizabeth Knox
– Never Mine to Hold: An Enemies-to-Lovers Secret Identity New Adult Sports Romance (Western Wildcats Hockey Book 3) by Jennifer Sucevic
Some free small-town romances: https://findabookboyfriend.com/
I don’t think Kirsty Greenwood’s THE LOVE OF MY AFTERLIFE should be compared to Alice Sebold’s THE LOVELY BONES. Each book deals with loss and grief and tissues may be required for both, but to me the Greenwood is less traumatic than the Sebold. BONES is about the nightmare of a raped and murdered child, while AFTERLIFE has a lighter touch as its protagonists deal with mourning, yes, but also looking for and finding love and connection.
i loved when Grumpy met Sunshine, and the sequel just came out? will be out soon? and it was even better.
also, every time i see the title of the Marvel book i read it as a brag, not a list–“every person i kissed since you has become famous”
Barely made it 4% into “When Grumpy Met Sunshine”—just felt too tedious, characters felt a bit silly. Way too much internal monologue imo, at least for the opening two or three scenes. But I’d never read Charlotte Stein before, so based on @Al R-B’s comment I’m thinking I should give one of her previous books a try.
I did like “Everyone I Kissed Since You Got Famous,” although it’s been on pause since I got distracted by another book 1/4 of the way in. (That’s 100% a reflection of my squirrelbrain and not the writing, lol.) The story felt relatively original and characters seemed well-drawn—found both MCs interesting and Katie pretty relatable. I love acting, and Mae Marvel writes about it so insightfully that I think either she does, too, or she’s extremely empathetic/good at interviewing people.
Thanks for sharing, @Lisa! Some of those questions, though *rolls eyes*
Also, “The Townsend Family Recipe for Disaster” is $1.99 across platforms!
@Susan/DC, I was thinking about how, to me, The Lovely Bones felt so elegiac, and wondering if not meeting your true love until after death could feel different.
@Al R-B you are spot-on about the editing of When Grumpy Met Sunshine. It was so sloppy that it turned the book into a DNF for me, and I LIKE Stein’s work. WGMS had so many single-sentence paragraphs, and sentences that started with ‘And’, that I could never get into the flow of the book.