The Devil I Know (Heaven Vs. Hell Saga Book 1)
Carmen Hayes has everything—beauty, success, and a thriving career in the city that never sleeps. The only thing missing? A love that lasts.
On her thirtieth birthday, she meets Samuel.
Magnetic. Mysterious. Irresistible.
One night turns into something neither of them can walk away from. For the first time, Carmen believes she’s found her fairytale—until she discovers the truth.
Samuel isn’t just a powerful man.
He’s the Devil.
For a thousand years, Samuel has ruled Hell with ruthless precision. Love was never part of the plan. But Carmen makes him question everything—his kingdom, his past, even his immortality.
When Carmen chooses to love him anyway, she doesn’t just risk her heart.
She declares war.
Because Hell has a Queen.
And Lilith does not forgive betrayal.
As Heaven watches and Hell prepares for battle, Carmen must decide:
Can she love a monster who was born to destroy… or will their forbidden romance ignite an apocalypse?
Mya
Mya is a gothic historical novel with a real feel for texture: wet cobbles, gaslight, apothecary glass, winter hedgerows, lecture halls, churchyards, and drawing rooms that seem to breathe on the page. It opens in 1883 Liverpool and London, but it keeps one foot in older, deeper folklore, so the book reads like a meeting point between Victorian medicine, old-world myth, and a love story that knows from the start that tenderness can be dangerous. What struck me first was how confidently the novel understands its own atmosphere. It isn’t just dark for the sake of being dark. It builds a whole emotional climate around secrecy, restraint, ritual, and longing.
At the center is Mya herself, and the book works because she isn’t treated as a puzzle to be solved so much as a person who has spent centuries managing survival with discipline, intelligence, and grief. Her connection with William Ashbury gives the novel its emotional shape. He’s a doctor drawn to botanical medicine and careful observation, and their conversations let the book become a romance of ideas as much as a romance of feeling. One of the smartest lines in the novel is, “Forward does not always mean away.” That sentence isn’t just about medicine. It’s the book’s whole philosophy. Mya keeps asking whether modernity actually means wisdom, whether buried knowledge still matters, and whether care can exist without control.
What I liked most is that the supernatural material is woven into the novel’s deeper concerns instead of sitting on top of them. The wolf mythology, Mya’s tincture, and William’s medical curiosity all feed the same question: what does it mean to live with a force inside you that can’t be cured, only understood imperfectly? That gives the story a surprising amount of emotional seriousness. Even when the book moves into danger, pursuit, and revelation, it stays grounded in questions of mercy, containment, loneliness, and bodily cost. There’s also a really appealing thread about lost knowledge and dismissed healers, crystallized in William’s beautiful line, “And that space… is where medicine lives.”
The prose is often lush, but it usually earns that lushness because the novel is so committed to sensation: scent, sound, weather, fabric, breath, animal unease, the pressure of silence in a room. Music matters here too, not as decoration, but as part of the novel’s emotional architecture. The result is a book that feels composed rather than merely plotted. Scene by scene, it keeps returning to the same tonal register of ache, beauty, and suspended threat, and that consistency gives the later chapters real weight. By the time the story reaches its final movement, the tragedy feels not imposed but grown from everything the novel has been quietly building all along.
Mya is a romantic gothic novel about survival, intimacy, and the cost of carrying an old violence through a modern world. It’s rich in setting, unusually tender toward its heroine, and genuinely interested in the overlap between science, folklore, and moral choice. More than anything, it’s a book about a woman who has mastered endurance and then dares, briefly and painfully, to imagine a future larger than endurance. That gives the ending its sting, but also its grace. I finished it feeling that the novel had delivered exactly what it promised from its opening pages: fog, firelight, danger, music, and a love story haunted by history yet fully alive in the present of its telling.
Pages: 282 | ASIN: B0GTB1JZ5F
Seeking Sasha
Seeking Sasha opens with a woman running from danger and from her own name, then widens into the story of Sasha Cooper, who has spent years surviving by splintering herself into aliases while trying to stay one step ahead of a violent past. When she is unexpectedly recognized in Lashburn by Cole, the boy who once loved her, the novel turns into both a suspense story and a study of psychic fracture: Sasha isn’t merely hiding from someone else, but from the self she no longer trusts to keep her alive. Laura Frost builds the book around reinvention, fear, memory, and the exhausting labor of endurance, and the result is a novel with a thriller engine and a bruised emotional core.
I was pulled in by the book’s understanding of survival as something messy rather than noble. I admired the way the author lets Sasha’s shifting personas feel tactical, humiliating, ingenious, and unsustainable all at once. The novel does not prettify trauma; it shows how a mind under siege becomes improvisational, how ordinary logistics, cashing a check, renting a room, taking a bus, answering to a name, can become almost unbearably charged. I also found the repetition of Sasha’s inner commands and evasions effective rather than overdetermined; they create a pressure-cooker rhythm that makes even mundane scenes feel electrically unsafe. There were moments when I wanted secondary characters to sharpen a bit faster on the page, but Sasha herself is drawn with such raw, flinching conviction that she keeps pulling the whole book forward.
I was especially taken by the tension between the novel’s romantic thread and its suspense architecture. Cole could have been written as a simple refuge, but Frost makes his presence more complicated than that: comforting, invasive, hopeful, and dangerous to the fragile ecosystem Sasha has built to survive. That ambivalence gives the book its sting. I kept reading not just to find out what would happen, but to see whether a person who has become a patchwork of aliases could bear the weight of stability, tenderness, and recognition. The later movement toward a new life doesn’t feel neat to me, it feels provisional, earned in increments, still haunted by the habits of flight, which is exactly why it works. The ending carries a wary brightness instead of a false halo.
I’d recommend Seeking Sasha to readers of psychological suspense, women’s fiction, trauma fiction, romantic suspense, and identity-driven thrillers, especially those who like character-first stories where danger is both external and interior. It will likely appeal to people who read Lisa Jewell or who were drawn to the emotional volatility and hidden-life mechanics of The Last Thing He Told Me. This novel is less glossy than many mainstream thrillers and more tender in its wreckage. Seeking Sasha is a fugitive-heart thriller that understands survival is not a clean escape, but a long, trembling argument with your own name.
Sugar Sand Land
Sugar Sand Land is a contemporary celebrity romance, but it also feels like a story about performance, reputation, and the cost of being watched all the time. It follows Emerson, the most famous influencer in the world, and Renn, a country music star whose career collapsed under scandal, as they fall for each other under an ugly, noisy public spotlight. What begins as a glamorous, high-heat romance opens into something heavier and more tender, especially once the book moves beyond fame and into grief, family pain, and the question of whether love can survive both public myth and private hurt.
I liked how much the book leans into contrast. Emerson is all curation, sparkle, flash, and instinctive media fluency, while Renn feels weathered, withdrawn, and almost allergic to the modern machine of attention. That setup could have turned cartoonish in less careful hands, but author Patricia Leavy gives it enough emotional weight to keep it grounded. I liked that the novel does not treat celebrity as pure fantasy. It keeps reminding us that image is labor, and that being adored can still leave a person lonely. Emerson’s belief that social media is an artful illusion and Renn’s fear of public life give the romance a real push-pull. Their chemistry is immediate, but what held my attention was the way they slowly become mirrors for each other. She helps him step back toward art. He helps her step away from performance.
I also liked the author’s choices around tone and structure. The dialogue is doing a lot of work here. Sometimes it is playful and knowingly glamorous, and sometimes it turns raw very fast. That shift mostly works. In fact, I think it is part of the book’s point. Beneath the glossy surface, there is a bruise. The novel is most convincing when it lets the glitz crack open and shows the fear, damage, and longing underneath. The later sections, especially the material around the meaning of Sugar Sand Land itself, gave the book a deeper emotional center than I expected at the start. It gives the title a softness and ache that the early Hollywood scenes only hint at. The book isn’t trying to be cynical, and I appreciated that. It believes in love, but it doesn’t pretend love arrives untouched by history.
I came away thinking this is a romance for readers who want both swoon and reflection. I would recommend it most to people who enjoy contemporary romance with celebrity culture, emotional healing, and a slightly more thoughtful edge than a pure beach read. Fans of stories about fame, reinvention, and complicated public women will probably find a lot to like here, and readers who want a love story that stays hopeful without feeling completely weightless should feel at home in it.
Pages: 256 | ASIN: B0GPDKB31P
Richard: Distant Son
Michael W. Hickman’s Richard: Distant Son opens with a wonderfully outsized premise: an ordinary fifteen-year-old from Ohio discovers that he is the lost heir to a galactic throne and is swept from suburban life into a sprawling interstellar kingdom of court ritual, prophecy, old betrayals, and species drawn from both science fiction and myth. What follows is a chosen-one story with a deliberately maximal appetite, part space opera, part royal fantasy, part coming-of-age tale, as Richard is tutored by the enigmatic AAL and forced to grow into a destiny much larger than his own imagination ever allowed.
What I liked most was the book’s refusal to behave modestly. Hickman doesn’t nibble at worldbuilding; he heaps it on. The novel moves from cosmic prologue to Ohio basement to a kingdom populated by aliens, winged horses, political operators, and ceremonial grandeur, and I found that sheer amplitude genuinely fun. Richard himself is appealing because he does not arrive pre-polished. He’s gawky, impulsive, occasionally funny without trying to be, and still recognizably adolescent even when everyone around him wants to turn him into a symbol. That contrast of teenage bewilderment set against imperial expectation gives the novel much of its momentum and charm.
I also found the book interesting in the ways it exceeds the boundaries some readers might expect from its premise. Beneath the wish-fulfillment engine, there’s a streak of earnest strangeness here: sexuality is more explicit than a typical younger-YA adventure, the mythology of Richard’s bloodline is treated with near-feudal seriousness, and AAL’s guidance carries a persistent undertow of secrecy and control. The novel can feel overfull, even unruly, but for me that unruliness is part of its character. It reads like a story written by someone who genuinely loves the idea of throwing star empires, prophecy, palace intrigue, romance, and adolescent dislocation into the same crucible and seeing what burns hottest. The result is not sleek; it’s exuberant.
I’d recommend Richard: Distant Son to readers who enjoy science fantasy, space opera, royal-intrigue fiction, chosen-one narratives, and coming-of-age adventure with a romantic thread. Readers who like the dynastic scale of Dune but want something more accessible and emotionally direct, or fans of Christopher Paolini-style earnest mythmaking pushed into a galactic register, will probably find a lot to savor here. This is a book for people who don’t mind a little grandeur in their storytelling and maybe prefer it a touch unbuttoned.
Pages: 493 | ASIN : B0B627767G
Everything We Try to Hold
Everything We Try to Hold is a work of domestic literary fiction, or family saga, told through Caroline Graham’s long memory as she looks back on the lives braided around her own: her fierce friendship with Cathy, her mother June’s unhappy marriage, the damage caused by pride and infidelity, the loss of her brother Stephen, and the way grief and love keep resurfacing across decades. The book opens with Caroline in late middle age, successful on the surface, then pulls us backward through childhood, marriage, motherhood, ambition, and old family secrets, using one discovery tied to Uncle Frank as the thread that brings the past rushing forward again.
What stayed with me most was how openly the book wants to sit with emotional history. Sometimes it feels almost as if Caroline is talking to readers directly, sorting through memory piece by piece, and that intimacy gives the novel much of its strength. I liked the way the manuscript returns to certain pressures over and over: the father’s cruelty, the mother’s quiet suffering, the steadiness of Cathy, the comfort of Uncle Frank. That repetition mirrors how family wounds actually work. They do not pass cleanly. They echo. I found myself wishing the prose were tightened in places, because the strongest scenes already have real weight and don’t need quite so much explanation. When the writing trusts the moment, especially in scenes of childhood wonder or private grief, it really works.
I also found the author’s choices interesting in how firmly the book centers women’s interior lives inside what could have been a more conventional generational drama. June’s pain, Caroline’s watchfulness, Cathy’s lifelong presence, and even Caroline’s later professional growth as a designer give the story a pulse that feels more intimate than plot-driven. There is loss here, but also endurance, self-making, and the strange way tenderness can grow in damaged ground. The late reveal involving the hidden safety deposit box and the photograph of June doesn’t explode the book so much as deepen its sadness. It asks whether the private things people hold onto are shameful, necessary, or simply human. I appreciated that the novel seems more interested in emotional residue than in neat judgment. That felt honest to me.
I would recommend Everything We Try to Hold to readers who enjoy character-centered family dramas, reflective women’s fiction, and multigenerational stories that care more about relationships than speed. This is a book for someone willing to settle in and listen. Someone who doesn’t mind a novel lingering over memory, pain, and the slow shaping of a life. Readers who value sincerity, emotional accessibility, and the sweep of a family saga will likely find a lot to connect with here.
Pages: 110
The Extra Ordinary Life of Henrey Dragon
Henrey Dragon is, in every sense, an ordinary dragon. He is average, unremarkable, and thoroughly middle-of-the-road. He does not shine at football, tennis, music, art, or much of anything else. While other young dragons discover their gifts and begin to stand apart, as Henrey’s brothers do, Henrey moves through life without any obvious talent to call his own. For his family, that absence feels disappointing. For Henrey, it is simply his reality. Then everything changes.
A near-tragic accident at sea suddenly thrusts Henrey into the spotlight. When a ship is in danger, he acts without hesitation and rescues those on board. Yet his heroic deed brings an unexpected twist. Rather than receiving recognition, Henrey is mistaken for the Loch Ness Monster. From that moment on, his future feels uncertain. Could this strange incident become the defining event of his life? And will it ultimately prove to be a blessing or a burden?
The Extra Ordinary Life of Henrey Dragon, written and illustrated by T. Thomas Seelig, is a children’s book filled with elaborate, colorful artwork. It is aimed at younger readers, especially children who are beginning to read independently.
Seelig’s illustrations are every bit as captivating as the story itself, and in many ways they steal the show. Bright, energetic, and richly detailed, they bring Henrey and his world vividly to life. The story is narrated by Benjamin Bixby, Henrey’s best friend, whose voice guides readers through Henrey’s life and introduces the circumstances leading up to the dragon’s unforgettable rescue.
Henrey’s struggle to find where he fits in will feel familiar to many young readers. The fear of not standing out, of not excelling, of not yet knowing what makes you special is a deeply relatable theme. Henrey’s rescue of the ship’s passengers gives that theme a fresh turn. Instead of immediate celebration, he faces a case of mistaken identity, which offers a memorable reminder that even good actions can lead to unexpected consequences.
In the end, this is a children’s book, and the story resolves in a reassuring way. Young readers are likely to enjoy returning to it, both for the adventure and for the lively illustrations. The book also offers an added learning element, with new vocabulary words highlighted in extra-large print, making the reading experience both entertaining and accessible.
Pages: 36 | ISBN : 1964012945
Exit Signs
Exit Signs opens with an eighteen-year-old girl, Stella Hart, being thrown out by her mother after a lie at work detonates her already precarious life. From there, the novel follows her through car-sleeping, couch-hopping, cheap rooms, fragile friendships, predatory arrangements, and the long, humiliating mathematics of survival in the Bay Area, all while she tries to hold onto the future she imagined for herself, Stanford, stability, self-definition, even as pregnancy, coercion, and family damage keep redrawing the map. It is, in plain terms, a novel about homelessness and control, but it is also about the subtler violence of being treated as temporary in every room you enter.
Author Dawnette Brenner understands that catastrophe is not only dramatic; it’s logistical, sensory, and repetitive. The novel keeps returning to money, soap, gas, laundry, parking lots, hunger, paperwork, doors, and the freighted atmosphere of other people’s houses. That accumulation gives the book its tensile strength. I felt Stella’s vigilance in my own body. I also admired the way the prose often moves in clipped, pressure-built units, then suddenly opens into a more lyrical sentence when Stella’s mind slips from survival into grief or recognition. The result is a voice that feels both young and sharply weathered. At its best, the writing has a granular honesty that refuses uplift on credit.
What I liked even more was the book’s understanding of control: how it masquerades as help, how gratitude can be weaponized, how a girl trained to be “good” can be made legible to everyone except herself. This is where the novel has real bite. Stella’s progress is not a clean ascent but a series of grim recognitions, and I appreciated that the ending leans toward clarity rather than false closure. At times the interior monologue reiterates a point the scene has already made, and a little pruning would sharpen the writing. But I never lost faith in the emotional intelligence behind it. Brenner is writing from a place of close observation, and that gives the story moral weight without turning it into a sermon.
I would hand Exit Signs to readers of contemporary coming-of-age fiction, domestic drama, survival fiction, trauma fiction, literary women’s fiction, and character-driven social realism, especially readers who want emotionally immediate prose and a heroine whose resilience is hard-won rather than ornamental. It feels closer to a more intimate, female-centered cousin of Demon Copperhead than to conventional “issue fiction,” and readers who admire authors who can braid precarity with psychological precision will find plenty here. This is a bruised, clear-eyed novel about how survival can become a way of seeing.
Pages: 600 | ASIN : B0GPPH2WKJ
