5 Twisty Romance Novels I Loved This Year
My Goodreads goal this year was to read 100 books. I am not quite there, but I expect I will be by New Year’s Day. We’ll see. Meanwhile, reading furiously!
But here are a five twisty romantic novels that don’t quite fit the pattern of genre romance, selected from those I read this year. See my entire read list here. Zara West Goodreads
The Deception by Kim Taylor Blakemore
If you love twisty-turny books with a bit of ghoulishness and ghostliness, this is the book for you. Set at the height of the nineteenth century spiritualism fad, this historical romance has some clever tricks up its sleeve, and a romantic ending you’d never predict.
Beauty and the Clockwork Beast by Nancy Campbell Allen
Steampunk is not a genre I read often, but I found this book to be intriguing. With a hero hiding a clockwork heart and a cast of suspicious family members planning something dire, you can’t but fall in love with the intrepid heroine who sticks her nose into everything and saves the man she comes to love, mechanical heart and all.
Sold on Monday by Kristina McMorris
There is a romance hidden in this tear-jerky historical novel about a newsman who makes up a story and then lives to regret it and a would-be-female journalist hiding a secret. If you love novels with intrepid women fighting against male dominance, this is the book for you.
Magic’s Divide by Serena Lindahl
Imagine being born into a world where some people have magic and some people have tech, but you have neither. Having lost her arm in a childhood accident, Eden struggles to find her place unaware that she is a heroine with love in her future. If you like scifi fantasy, you will enjoy this glimpse of life in a sharply divided society.
The Last Rose of Shanghai by Weina Dai Randel
Set during the occupation of Shanghai by the Japanese during WW 2, this heart-breaking romance between a wealthy Chinese woman who runs a night club and a Blues piano-playing Jewish refugee from Germany twists and turns with the fortunes of war and societal pressures. High tension. Daring escapades. Loss, starvation, and death all take their toll. But in the end, the reader is rewarded with a happy ending.
