A bankrupt bakery. A batch of kittens. A body on the doorstep. Welcome to Pineville—where murder is always on the menu.

I’m Sunny Shaw, and regardless of what my name might suggest, my world has become rather dim as of late. The irony isn’t lost on anyone—least of all me. Sunny by name, decidedly not sunny by circumstance 🧁

With a bankrupt business to save, homeless kittens that need rescuing, and a new business partner distracting me with every glance, there seems to be a disaster waiting at every turn. The bakery that was supposed to be my dream has become a financial nightmare. The kittens are adorable but demanding. And the business partner? Dangerously attractive and entirely too helpful 🐱

Just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, a murder literally lands on my doorstep—or at least the corpse does. Now I’m struggling to figure out which problem to solve first! Because apparently running a failing bakery while fostering kittens wasn’t complicated enough—now I need to solve a murder too 🔍

My business partner seems to want to share more than our lease, but I have to take that step very slowly. Of course, I can’t in good conscience leave the kittens to wander the streets. Then again no business means no money. And a dead body on my doorstep means the police are asking questions I don’t have answers to 💕

Decisions. Decisions. Do I focus on saving the bakery? Finding homes for the kittens? Figuring out who killed someone right outside my door? Or dealing with the inconvenient attraction to my business partner who seems determined to be involved in everything? Emmie Lyn serves up cozy mystery with humor, heart, and plenty of feline assistance 😺

Why this delights: Emmie Lyn delivers cozy mystery comfort food—a bankrupt baker, adorable kittens, a murder mystery, and slow-burn romance all wrapped up in small-town charm. Perfect for readers who want their mysteries light, funny, and filled with cats who probably know more than they’re letting on.

Job Advert – Wanted: unattractive woman with lots of patience and a sense of humour. What lunatic replies to an ad like this? Probably someone having the worst day of her young life 📰

It’s the perfect job for heart-broken Millie who just lost everything including her confidence. She desperately needs a new start, and a job posting this bizarre has to be better than staying in the wreckage of her old life. When you’ve hit rock bottom, even insult-laced employment opportunities start looking appealing 💔

With nothing but a little courage, she sails to La Canette, a tiny rustic island in the English Channel. Her new boss is impossibly grumpy and doesn’t allow cars or street lights on his island and he keeps trying to fire her. It’s like working for a curmudgeon who’s determined to make medieval living conditions seem aspirational 🏝️

Despite all this, the beautiful little island full of unique wild flowers soon awakens Millie’s long-lost dreams of a wild-herb café by the sea. She also finds supportive loving friends and laughter. Gradually she blossoms into the beautiful confident woman she is meant to be, discovering that sometimes you have to lose everything to find yourself 🌸

The only problem is her boss’ son. George might be handsome, rich and eligible but a painful memory from his past makes it impossible to trust. He’s built walls that make his father’s grumpiness look like warm hospitality, and Millie can sense the hurt beneath his defensive exterior 💕

He might be well out of her league, but winning his heart might turn out to be the easy part. The real challenge is helping him trust again—and believing she deserves the happiness that’s finally within reach. Rose Amberly delivers sweet romance with self-discovery and island charm 🌹

Why this captivates: Rose Amberly creates a Cinderella story with a twist—the job posting literally asks for an unattractive woman, and Millie’s journey to confidence happens on a car-free English Channel island run by a grump. Perfect for readers who love transformation stories, quirky settings, and heroes who need healing as much as the heroine.

In May 2000, Joel Smith is a cocky, adventurous young man who sees the world as his playground. But when the college senior, days from graduation, enters an abandoned Montana mine, he discovers the price of reckless curiosity 🎓

He emerges in May 1941 with a cell phone he can’t use, money he can’t spend, and little but his wits to guide his way. Stuck in the age of swing dancing and a peacetime draft, Joel begins a new life as the nation drifts toward war. Everything he took for granted—instant communication, modern conveniences, the knowledge of what’s coming—becomes either useless or dangerously prescient ⏰

With the help of his 21-year-old trailblazing grandmother and her friends, he finds his place in a world he knew only from movies and books. But when an opportunity comes to return to the present, Joel must decide whether to leave his new love in the past or choose a course that will alter their lives forever 💕

The grandmother angle is particularly brilliant—Joel knows her as an elderly woman in 2000, but now she’s young, vibrant, and his contemporary. The relationship dynamics shift in fascinating ways as he sees her as she was before life and time changed her. He can’t reveal who he is without sounding insane, so he navigates this surreal situation with care 🌟

John A. Heldt writes time travel that focuses on character over paradox, exploring how a modern man adapts to 1941 while carrying knowledge of Pearl Harbor, World War II, and everything that follows. Joel’s choices become increasingly weighted as he falls in love and realizes that returning home means abandoning everyone he’s grown to care about ⚡

What makes this compelling: John A. Heldt delivers time travel romance with emotional stakes—Joel must choose between returning to his own time or staying in 1941 with the woman he loves and the grandmother he’s gotten to know as a young woman. The historical setting is rich, the romance genuine, and the time-travel dilemma heartbreaking.

Civilization is gone… Entire cities reduced to ruins… People are missing. All of them.

Leaving the vault their father locked them in six months prior, Jack, Samantha, and Will emerge into a terrifying world they do not recognize. Their father told them to stay inside for six months, to trust him, to wait. They did. And now they understand why—but understanding doesn’t make the horror any less overwhelming 🌍

Sick and starving, they must fight to survive while seeking the answers to all that has happened. But they aren’t alone in the ruins. Six months in a sealed vault means six months of malnutrition, six months of muscle atrophy, six months of not knowing whether their father survived whatever destroyed the world. They’re weak, vulnerable, and unprepared for what’s waiting outside 💀

Hunted at every turn, they must find the answers before they are too sick, too weak, or caught by those that seek them. Something—or someone—is tracking them through the ruins. Every shadow could hide a threat. Every sound could signal danger. The world didn’t just end; it became actively hostile ⚡

Jeremy Laszlo writes post-apocalyptic survival with relentless tension. The siblings aren’t hardened survivors or trained warriors—they’re ordinary young people thrust into a nightmare scenario with only each other to rely on. The mystery of what happened, where everyone went, and why they were locked in a vault drives the story forward 🔍

The “Children of the After” framing is particularly ominous—they’re not just survivors, they’re inheritors of whatever came after civilization collapsed. And as they uncover the truth, they realize their father knew more than he told them. The vault wasn’t just protection—it was preparation 🌟

Why this grips from page one: Jeremy Laszlo delivers post-apocalyptic mystery where three siblings emerge from a vault to find everyone gone and something hunting them through the ruins. The combination of survival horror, family bonds, and the desperate search for answers creates dystopian fiction that’s both terrifying and impossible to put down.

When twelve-year-old Frankie steps onto his boat Max has no idea that the cute, skateboarding girl is a time bomb that will lead him into a mystery with a tangled web of secrets and lies involving small time hoods, corrupt politicians, paranoid hippies, and, most dangerously, his long time nemesis, a twisted casino operator at the heart of the city’s criminal trade 🛥️

As Max races to solve the convoluted case and find Frankie’s big sister, the mayhem and dead bodies pile up. What started as helping a kid find her missing sibling spirals into something far darker—a conspiracy that reaches into city hall, organized crime, and places Max thought he’d left behind 🔍

Finally, he realizes that the only way to get the whole truth involves risking his own life. But for Max Plank this is just the cost of doing business in the game he’s decided to play. He’s a private investigator who lives on his boat, operates outside conventional rules, and has made enough enemies to fill a prison block ⚡

The title references the Rolling Stones song, and there’s definitely a noir, bluesy quality to Max’s world—grimy, morally ambiguous, and populated by characters who’ve all compromised something to survive. Frankie’s innocence contrasts sharply with the corruption Max uncovers, raising the stakes beyond just solving a case 💔

Robert Bucchianeri creates a detective who’s equal parts tough and vulnerable, cynical and principled. The boat setting gives Max mobility and isolation—he can literally untether and disappear when needed, but he’s also alone with his choices and their consequences 🌊

What makes this gripping: Robert Bucchianeri launches a detective series with a protagonist who lives on his boat and gets pulled into conspiracy when a skateboarding twelve-year-old needs help. The tangled mystery involves everyone from small-time crooks to casino operators, and Max must risk everything for answers—noir with heart and genuine danger.

A genius, hairless, seven-foot-tall psychopath, Leonard Land is many people wired into the cyber-subculture of Satanism and Death Metal. He is smart and cunning. He is quick, brutal and deadly. And he is everywhere 💀

This isn’t your typical serial killer—Leonard exists simultaneously in multiple identities across the early internet’s darkest corners, using primitive chat rooms and message boards to orchestrate terror before social media even existed. Stephen J. Cannell, legendary creator of *The Rockford Files* and *The A-Team*, brings his storytelling genius to a prescient thriller about digital anonymity and the monsters it can hide 🖥️

A renegade US Customs agent, a brilliant and beautiful forensic psychologist, and a streetwise convict master hacker are on the trail of the maniac who is methodically slaughtering innocent women—a hunt that is leading a trio of unlikely heroes across an imperiled nation and deep into the darkest corridors of cyberspace. Each brings specialized skills: the agent has instincts honed by years of tracking criminals, the psychologist can get inside Leonard’s twisted mind, and the hacker can navigate the digital underworld where Leonard hides 🔍

But there is no system the maniac cannot infiltrate, no secrets he cannot access. He knows he is being hunted and by whom. Leonard’s digital omnipresence means every email, every phone call, every database search potentially alerts him to their movements. The hunters have become the hunted, their every step monitored by the very predator they’re pursuing ⚡

And he’s determined to strike first—in ways too terrible to anticipate. Leonard doesn’t just kill—he psychologically tortures, he studies his victims’ lives through their digital footprints, and he strikes where they feel safest. The race to stop him becomes increasingly desperate as the body count rises and Leonard proves that in the emerging digital age, privacy is an illusion and safety is a lie 🌐

What makes this gripping: Stephen J. Cannell anticipated our digital nightmare decades ago, creating a techno-thriller that feels eerily relevant today. The seven-foot hairless killer is unforgettable, the cyberspace elements prescient, and the three-person team dynamic crackles with tension—perfect for readers who want psychological horror merged with early internet paranoia.

In a few short years, Lauren Ko made all hell bake loose, going from novice pie baker to Internet star and creator of today’s most surprising and delightful pie and tart designs. Her Instagram account @lokokitchen became a phenomenon—each post revealing pies so geometrically stunning, so impossibly intricate, that they seemed more like stained glass windows than desserts 🥧

Her unique geometric style uses fruit and dough cut and woven into stunning shapes to highlight color and texture. With an elegant symmetry that matches their knockout flavor, her dazzlingly intricate and inventive designs look difficult to produce, but can be achieved with little more than a knife, ruler, and some patience. Think mandalas made of blueberries, herringbone patterns in peach, and kaleidoscopic arrangements that make you question whether you’re looking at food or art 🎨

In Pieometry, Lauren reveals her secrets, sharing stories about her designs and the inspiration behind them. Warm and funny, she recounts the spectacular piesasters that led to some of her best creations, and breaks down her most beautiful designs, describing how to make naturally-colored dough, intricate weaves, and striking cut-out patterns. Her voice is refreshingly honest—she admits when designs failed spectacularly before succeeding, when she had to scrape dough off the floor, when perfectionism nearly derailed her joy in baking 😄

Pieometry provides clear, step-by-step instructions, accompanied by helpful photographs, which any patient baker can follow to build these pies from bottom crust to top in their own kitchens. Lauren makes it easy to mix and match doughs, fruits, fillings, and designs, and each recipe includes suggestions for alternative ingredients. You don’t need special equipment or professional training—just time, attention to detail, and a willingness to embrace the meditative process of arranging fruit in patterns 🌈

Best of all, the beautiful finished pie and tart photos are just as much of a treat to look at as the pies are to eat. But even if you make a mistake here and there, her flavors save the day! Ko’s designs may be Instagram-perfect, but her recipes prioritize taste—these aren’t just pretty pies that disappoint when you bite in. They’re legitimately delicious desserts that happen to be breathtakingly gorgeous 🍓

Here’s what you’re getting: Lauren Ko transforms pie-making into geometric art without sacrificing flavor or accessibility. Her Instagram-famous designs come with honest, achievable instructions and stories that make you feel like you’re baking alongside a friend—perfect for anyone who wants their desserts to be conversation pieces as well as crowd-pleasers.

On a hot summer night, a watchful neighbor locks eyes with an intruder and unwittingly alerts the police to a vicious crime scene next door: a lavish master bedroom where a man lies dead. Next to him, his wife is bleeding out onto the hardwood floor, clinging to life 🔪

The victim, Adam Grant, was a well-known San Francisco prosecutor—a man whose connection to homicide detective Valerie Hart brings her face-to-face with a life she’s long since left behind. Adam’s career made him an easy target, and forensic evidence points towards an ex-con he put behind bars years ago. It’s the obvious answer, the clean narrative that would let everyone move on quickly 🔍

But while Adam’s wife and daughter grapple with their tragic loss, Valerie uncovers devastating clues that point in a more ominous direction. Lurking in the shadows of the Grants’ pristine life is a mysterious blonde who holds the key to a very different—and much darker—story. The perfect marriage, the respected career, the loving family—all of it conceals secrets that someone was willing to kill to protect 💔

As Valerie struggles to forge a new path for herself, the investigation forces her to confront the question: can we ever really leave our pasts behind? Her own history with Adam complicates everything, blurring professional boundaries and personal demons. Every revelation about Adam’s hidden life mirrors questions Valerie has avoided about her own choices, her own compromises, her own buried truths ⚠️

Saul Black writes psychological suspense that cuts deep, examining not just the mechanics of murder but the ways trauma and secrets shape who we become. Valerie Hart is a complex, damaged protagonist whose personal stakes in the case create constant tension between seeking justice and protecting herself from painful truths 🌊

What makes this compelling: Saul Black delivers a detective novel where solving the murder is only half the story—Valerie’s reckoning with her own past drives emotional stakes as high as the body count. The mysterious blonde, the perfect family’s hidden rot, and a detective who can’t escape her history combine for psychological suspense that lingers.

In the early 1800’s, on a Hebridean beach in Scotland, the sea exposed an ancient treasure cache: 93 chessmen carved from walrus ivory. The Lewis Chessmen are probably the most famous chess pieces in the world. Harry played Wizard’s Chess with them in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. Housed at the British Museum, they are among its most visited and beloved objects ♟️

Questions abounded: Who carved them? Where? When? And how did they end up buried on a remote Scottish beach? Nancy Marie Brown’s Ivory Vikings explores these mysteries by connecting medieval Icelandic sagas with modern archaeology, art history, forensics, and the history of board games. In the process, she reveals a world far more connected and sophisticated than most people imagine medieval Europe to have been 🌊

In the process, Ivory Vikings presents a vivid history of the 400 years when the Vikings ruled the North Atlantic, and the sea-road connected countries and islands we think of as far apart and culturally distinct: Norway and Scotland, Ireland and Iceland, and Greenland and North America. This wasn’t the Dark Ages as we’ve been taught—this was a vibrant network of trade, culture, and artistic exchange spanning an ocean 🛶

The story of the Lewis chessmen brings from the shadows an extraordinarily talented woman artist of the twelfth century: Margret the Adroit of Iceland. Brown makes a compelling case that these masterpieces—with their expressive faces, intricate details, and sophisticated artistry—were carved by a woman whose skill was renowned even in the sagas. In an era when most female artists remain anonymous, Margret emerges as a named, celebrated craftsperson whose work survives centuries later ✨

Brown weaves together archaeological evidence, literary sources, and art historical analysis to build her argument. She examines walrus ivory trade routes, workshop practices, and the specific stylistic choices that suggest Margret’s hand. The result is part detective story, part medieval history, part feminist reclamation of forgotten genius 📚

Why I’m including this: Nancy Marie Brown solves a centuries-old mystery while resurrecting a forgotten female artist and revealing the sophisticated Viking world that connected continents. The Lewis Chessmen become a window into medieval trade, artistry, and the women whose contributions history tried to erase—essential reading for anyone fascinated by archaeology or medieval culture.

The only lie told more often than “No, that looks totally cute on you” and “I got AIDS through oral” is “It gets better.” Well, a lotta times it don’t. Sometimes it just sucks less. But I promise you: where there’s a Willam, there’s a way 💋

Willam Belli—RuPaul’s Drag Race legend, actor, musician, and professional shit-stirrer—delivers a self-help book that’s equal parts hilarious, profane, and surprisingly practical. This isn’t your typical “love yourself” pablum. This is survival advice from someone who’s navigated Hollywood, drag culture, and life as a proudly messy queer person with humor and zero apologies 👠

But this isn’t all about me (for once). It’s about you and how you can Suck Less at a variety of things drag queens are so much better at than the average person. I’ve got clap backs and life hacks and tips on classing up a simple grab-and-run lifting spree to the much more dignified act of larceny. Super-important life stuff with my own special, secret fag-swag sauce 💅

So welcome to Willam’s School of Bitchcraft and Wiggotry. Class is in session. The chapters cover everything from makeup application to dealing with haters, from navigating relationships to maximizing your assets (whatever those may be). Willam’s advice is gleefully inappropriate, devastatingly honest, and actually useful—assuming you can handle truth delivered without a filter 🎭

What makes this book work is Willam’s refusal to sugarcoat anything. The drag world rewarded them for being outrageous and authentic, and that same energy infuses every page. This is self-help for people who are tired of being told to manifest their dreams and just want practical advice delivered with humor and a healthy dose of cynicism 🌈

What makes this essential: Willam Belli delivers self-help that’s actually helpful, hilariously honest, and unapologetically queer. If you’re tired of inspirational books that promise everything gets better and want real talk about surviving and thriving while being your authentic messy self, Willam’s your teacher—and class is never boring.