Summer Reads 2023 Novels & Stories

I brought home eighty dollars’ worth of durian. When my sister-in-law, Lily Ward, saw me, she clutched her stomach and screamed from the couch. “Ugh, my stomach! Summer, you know I can’t stand that smell. Are you trying to suffocate my baby?” Before I could even steady myself, my mother, Rosemary Ward, slapped me across the face. It made me see how much my mother favored my younger brother, Jasper Ward. When we were children, she always reminded me that he was younger and told me to give him a pass. I thought things might change after he grew up and got married. Instead, her favoritism only got worse. “Summer, you jinx! Hurry up and sign over your apartment to Jas to make up for this!” Watching Jasper pull out a property transfer agreement, I covered my swollen cheek and smiled. So, this whole act was just to get the apartment I had bought. “Sure.” They were delighted to see me agree readily. However, they failed to consider one thing. I might have willingly given it away, but I wondered if any of them had the nerve to take it.

In the summer of 1990, Rachel Weber spent a week down on the Florida coast, soaking up the sun's rays while she waited for her life to begin. It was there that she met Dean Sherman, a handsome, muscular soldier with crystal blue eyes. The two spent a week together full of champagne kisses that only ended when Operation Desert Storm forced Dean to choose between his duty and his love. He chose duty. Twenty years later, Rachel figured it was just summer love, but she never forgot those eyes. As personal assistant to powerful billionaire Jack Saunders, she never expected Dean to walk into her office after being hired as Jack's personal bodyguard. Even though she had spent the last two decades trying to forget Dean, she found herself falling for him once again. When fate forced both Rachel and Dean to choose yet again between love and duty, Rachel had to decide between the man she had always loved and the family that had become her life. She knew she couldn't have both, but she knew she wouldn't be happy with just one. Would she choose love, or be forever haunted by the memory of those Champagne Kisses?

A night i will never forget... Becca Summer was prepared for a bright future, until a night party and an unknown man ruined everything. As the notorious Alpha of the Moon Shine Pack, Christos Fernandez has everything he wanted. Except the mysterious girl of seven years ago. He is determined to keep searching for her no matter the cost, but his new Head of Design and the mother of two is a distraction from his goal. Will he get to know they are one and the same person?

My mom, Susan, had a habit of sending me to get her shopping. However, she would always leave out a zero when paying me back what was owed, blaming on her poor eyesight. I never minded. In fact, I would just cover the cost without another word. Then, Summer, my sister, had to throw shade. “Mom sends you money whenever she wants something. You never show us the actual costs, though. I bet you’re making a nice little profit off Mom behind our backs.” Susan smiled and didn’t even bother to defend me, as if confirming Summer’s accusations. My heart sank. Over the years, I had bought her things from major appliances to the smallest groceries, and each time, the payment she sent was short. Susan would just brush the whole thing off by saying, “Oh, my eyes aren’t what they used to be. My bad.” I had poured hundreds of thousands into her expenses, only to end up with a reputation as a thief who cheated her own family. When Susan sent me money for the New Year’s Eve catering, I simply booked food that fit the budget she paid for.

"He is no hero, but he is willing to fight for her..." Abigail fucking Howard! Typical sweet girl, a nerdy girl who always has that cute button nose of hers buried inside a book. She wants to be an author and she's got what it takes. She has also got her whole life planned out. Study, get her degree, then get an internship in some publishing company and work her way to becoming the best selling author. I could also see her getting married to some preppy rich guy who is going to be a lawyer and then they'd have two kids and live happily ever after, cool story right? Wrong! I was wrong because Abigail wants me and the crazy thing is I want her too! I have for a long time but the problem is I am not good enough for her and I am mixed up in too many fucked up shits to be the man she wants me to be. I am not the hero she reads in those romance books of hers, I am no hero and I'll never be!

The two childhood sweethearts swear that they'll marry no one but me, but they stand by as my dog of ten years gets killed in a car accident. I cradle the dog's mangled body, but no tears fall. Dante Battaglia stares at me in disgust and asks, "Why did you bring it home? Don't you know Anna's allergic to it?" Dario Battaglia immediately rushes over to snatch away the body in my arms. "This is a damned jinx. Get rid of it!" The Battaglia siblings and I are childhood friends. Dante became the Don, and Dario the Consigliere. I'm the precious princess in the two brothers' eyes, but everything changes with Anna's arrival. After burying the dog myself, I reply to the email inviting me to join an international classified project. The email reads, "Ms. Julia Costanza, we'd like to know if you're willing to participate in this institute's ten-year-long classified project. Upon joining, your personal information will be sealed for a decade, and you will be prohibited from contacting the outside world." I replied, "Yes, I agree."

River Davis was a confident girl with shy tendencies, who wanted to enjoy her last summer before going to college at Princeton in the fall. Jace Durand a young artist on the rise from London, at the age of 19, didn’t know what hit him when he saw the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. Love and happiness is all they knew for three long months, until a plane crash and 4 years apart changed everything.

Ivan is a lost soul. He longs for each month's fight to the death in the Cage to be his last day on earth. Except when Cherish's terrified clear blue eyes meet his in a post-fight haze, he feels compelled to get involved. If he doesn't claim her body as his victory prize one of the other embittered fighters will. While Cherish despises Ivan for his notorious brutality in the Cage, she soon realises she cannot afford for him to lose the next fight. Not just for her own safety, but for her softening heart as he defies her expectations about shifters. Both have secrets, but when trapped together under the watchful eye of the Axelon gang, fellow fighters and desperate gamblers, is their love enough to achieve the impossible, and escape? Fate has kept Ivan alive this long, is Cherish the reason? Or is there to be a final cruel twist from the Moon Goddess… White Forest Pack Series (Can all be read as standalone) *Book 1 - A Banished Alpha *Book 2 - The Luna's Rejected Assassin *Book 3 - The Beta's Prize Shadowlands Series (Can all be read standalone) *Book 1 - A Damaged Alpha *Book 2 - The Luna Who Wants Everything (2023)

Waverly Alaia Knight is known for her best chemical experiments, she makes the perfect antidotes and poisons that the FBI and RVS has been using since she started working for them. Summer came and one of the bosses instructed her to make a love potion, to easily manipulate and conquer some of their enemies. But while making the potion, an unexpected accident happened that turned her life upside down. Will she able to bring back things in their rightful places? Or she'll be trapped in her mistake and be punished severely?

Fate tends to give you things that you don’t wish for. She has her cruel way of testing your tolerance, your faith and your strength. Summer Laurent wished to lead a normal life, as normal as a person with past trauma could lead, but bumping into Dorian King changes all that. Her past chases her and haunts her everywhere and soon she finds herself entangled in the world of the supernatural which was more horrifying than the human world.