thriller

Neighborly Chemistry

by Mary DCosta

Tropes: slowburn, firstperson, characterdriven

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She’s an overworked scientist. He’s a celebrity wellness guru. They share a wall—and an enemy. Victoria Darling has no patience for her infuriatingly serene neighbor. Determined to escape her parents' Beverly Hills dental empire, she's grinding through an MD-PhD program, working eighty-hour weeks in the lab of a Nobel Laureate. The last thing she needs is Stephen Souza. Stephen is Hollywood's favorite wellness guru, selling adaptogens, mindfulness, and immaculate vibes to A-listers who swear by him. Victoria sees him as everything wrong with modern health culture—until academic betrayal destroys the career she's spent her life building. Suddenly, the man she dismissed as a celebrity quack is the only person who can help—and the one person she never expected to fall for. Because Stephen Souza isn't who she thinks he is. And the man who ruined Victoria's future has a history with Stephen—one that could help her reclaim credit for a groundbreaking discovery and protect its future. A STEM romance for readers who want the STEM to actually matter. Expect real scientific detail, highly competent characters, enemies-to-lovers chemistry, humor, and a plot that depends on the science. [Read More]

Fatal Revelation

by Sarah Shadow

Tropes: darkromance, dualpov, suspense

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She falls for the charming man who makes her feel safe. She fears the killer hiding beneath his restraint. The terrible truth is that they are the same man. Alexander Vale kills the monsters the law cannot stop. Anna works beside the next one on his list. Anna has survived by trusting no one. Then Alexander walks into her office and gives her a reason to lower her defences. She does not know their meeting was planned. Anna was supposed to be a shortcut to his target. Instead, one meeting becomes coffee, coffee becomes dates, and the woman he intended to use becomes the only person capable of making him question the violent life he has chosen. But while Alex struggles to conceal what he is, the predator working beside Anna begins to watch her. Soon, she must decide whether to fear the killer behind Alexander’s charm… Or accept that the velvet glove and the iron knuckles belong to the same hand she fell in love with. What to Expect • Vigilante serial-killer hero • Morally grey and fiercely protective MMC • “Touch her and die” energy • Guarded, sarcastic FMC • He approaches her with an ulterior motive • He falls first • Hidden identities and dangerous secrets • Love built on lies • Psychological suspense • Dual POV • Graphic violence and mature themes His Dark Secret is Book One in the Anna and Alexander dark-romance series. Their story continues in Book Two. [Read More]

Poison Apple: Snow White and the MC Beast

by Katlyn S. Coen

Tropes: slowburn, forcedproximity, firstperson

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White as snow, red as blood, black as ebony. Fairy-tale beauty made flesh had one rule: Nobody gets close to her son. Fate—or the Norse Gods—had other plans: Shove me on a pitch-black parking lot. Drop a six-foot-six Sons of Ragnarök patch-wearer—inked, ruthless, and fourteen years my senior. I’m frozen in terror. My fearless two-year-old with zero sense of danger? Both arms. Open wide. And the Beast takes my boy like he’s always belonged to him. — Annika’s already buried one man she loved. She’s still haunted by the ghosts of her past. Drugs. Whores. Viking brutality. Ronny “Leif” Reinhardt rules the Sons of Ragnarök with absolute power. Innocence has never been his weakness. Until a tiny redhead barrels into his life and the beast finally meets his match. The feeling is foreign, dangerous, and fuckin’ addictive. Suddenly he’s everywhere. Watching. Guarding. Smirking. He calls it coincidence. Her head? Calls it obsession. Screams: run! Her body? Starts sending SOS. But the most terrifying part? He doesn’t rip Annika’s clothes off. He looks her in the eyes and asks, “May I?” There’s no going back. The poison apple is already bitten. ONE BITE, and you’ll be stuck in Germany’s industrial wasteland where the darkness hits harder—not for lack of light, but because hope, love, and beauty only increase the level of destruction. A dark, twisted Snow White retelling × outlaw biker romance. ONE BITE, Snow White… and the Beast never lets you go. Five books. One arc. This is where the saga begins. One warning before you bite: It is not for soft Disney princesses. But it’s not for those expecting blood, grief, and questionable consent on every single page either. The full dark romance × twisted Brothers Grimm fairy tale retelling potential isn’t delivered like instant soup. Think of a five-course menu. It doesn’t start with the heavy tastes. It starts with an amuse-bouche. [Read More]

Pantheon

by Lacunae

Tropes: slowburn, characterdriven, multipov

For five years the woman running Praya Capital has been Vivienne Ho. Five years of filings and no press. Two photographs on the fund's own site, both of the other founder. A face fixed by hand before seven each morning, and a life built so completely that it became real to the woman wearing it. Damien Tang loses a container terminal to her on a Thursday and wants her by the weekend. His family opens a file. The file goes considerably further than courtship requires, and he lets it run, and tells himself it was the only way to begin. Six years before that, Circe walked out of an authorised job carrying something she had never been meant to see. She has been moving it ever since, one bonded shed and one cold store at a time, and it is the reason she has been able to leave at a few days' notice for five years and has never once been able to go. By the end of the season the name is registered dead. A house in Geneva publishes half a billion dollars for a body and engages five specialists who are not being paid for one. An American unit opens a file of its own. The man who loves her has money, no training, and no idea what he is buying. She has carried one thing for six years that she has never been able to spend. It cannot be posted, or wired, or left with a lawyer. To use it at all she has to be standing in the room when it is read. Circe can wear any face in the world. What her craft cannot survive is being looked at properly, at close range, by somebody who is not going to stop. He is not going to stop. Before you claim: 166,000 words over 63 chapters, so please only take a copy if you can give it the time. HFN, not HEA. Book one of three, stands alone, no cliffhanger. Drafting is AI-assisted; the story and initial prose are mine and I edit extensively every chapter. Honest reviews are greatly appreciated on Goodreads and Storygraph, and Amazon if you can. Thank you very much for reading! [Read More]

Episteme

by Suzy Bernard

Tropes: characterdriven, darkromance, multipov

Fox sees all. That’s the warning Aegis has been whispering across Washington and the threat to Episteme, the company that put a computer inside the minds of half the nation. It’s also a promise Edward Gareau intends to keep, especially when it comes to Dior Barnes, his co-founder, his undoing, and the only mind in the city sharp enough to challenge him. Edward will change every law, conceal every secret, and bury every version of himself to keep her. But somewhere beneath the politics of the DC elite, a woman called Tabby wakes up with no memory of who she is or where she came from—and only she can destroy everything Episteme has built. As Edward grasps for the one thing money and power can’t buy back, Tabby searches for a name, a past, and a truth someone doesn’t want her to remember. Some secrets aren’t meant to be found. Some find you first. A dark political romantic suspense where privacy is currency, love is suffocating, and surveillance is the law. FOR FANS OF: A true villain x villain love story High spice Morally black characters He falls first Soft only for her Fake engagement Amnesia The romance and political intrigue in H.M Wolfe's Daggermouth and ABC's Scandal The dark suspense of S.T. Abby's The Mindf*ck Series and Netflix's Black Mirror Content Warnings: EPISTEME contains dark and potentially disturbing themes, including but not limited to: child abuse (past/referenced), murder, human experimentation, explicit sexual content, non-consensual third-party present during sexual act, attempted non-consensual surgical procedures, invasion of privacy, hacking, car accident, alcoholism, opioid epidemic (past/referenced), opioid addiction and overdose, substance abuse, depictions of homelessness, mistreatment of vulnerable individuals struggling with substance abuse (related to human experimentation), use of Rohypnol (roofie), death of a parent, description of corpse, medical content, blackmail. In short, the FMC and MMC are VILLAINS. [Read More]