Last Chance to Vote!

Hundreds of you have voted and we are slowly sorting through thousands of write-ins. (Big thanks to our staff!)

Round One will close on Sunday at midnight EST. If you’ve not yet voted, please do. Remember to do the whole poll including the write-in section.

Here again are the rules:

Round 1: Select as many books as you want from the list provided. It is meant to just be a starting point. There are fifty books on it–the list will ultimately have 100 books. Then, in the write-in section, enter up to ten books that are NOT on the current list you think must be. All book choices will be given one vote so a write-in has just as much weight as one on the list.

Round 2: The nominations from you, our faithful community, will be provided to be voted on.

Round 3: The ranking begins…

Round 4: Once the Top 100 is established, we’ll give you a final chance to rank the Top […]

By Dabney Grinnan| 2018-04-20T09:29:49+00:00 April 20th, 2018|Categories: Best of List, Best of Romance, Polls|Tags: AAR Top 100 Romances|0 Comments

AAR’s Top Picks for 2017

Each year we ask our staff to share the romance, the one romance, they read this year they’d pick as their favorite. This year, they’ve picked more contemporary romance than anything else although other sub-genres are represented as well. Where we reviewed a book, we’ve linked to the review and, as usual, clicking on the book cover will take you to Amazon.

What do you think? If there’s a book we missed, please let us know below! Thanks!

Lee

I will choose Something Like Happy by Eva Woods. Even though it was a tearjerker, it was funny and sweet, had great characters and was a real surprise to me. I will definitely be checking out future books by the author.

Buy it at Amazon/iBooks/Barnes and Noble/Kobo

Em:

I pick Deal Maker by […]

By Dabney Grinnan| 2018-02-11T11:14:27+00:00 February 10th, 2018|Categories: Best of 2017, Best of List, Best of Romance|Tags: Best of 2017|30 Comments

The Best of 2017: Dabney’s List

I enjoyed reading in 2017. I read widely and much of what I read was good. So that’s a win.

Of the couple hundred books I read last year, these are the ones, in no particular order, that stood out.

Edge of Power by Megan Crane. (You can read Em’s B+ review here.)

Edge of Obsession, Crane’s first book in this series, was my pick for best book of 2016. The series came to a conclusion with Edge of Power, book four, and Crane ends it well. Wulf, King of the Raiders, is one of the series’ most interesting characters and the woman Crane pairs him with, Princess Kathlyn is his match. Their story would have been rewarding in and of itself. Edge of Power, however, also offers a compelling resolution to the political conflict between the Raiders and the truly […]

By Dabney Grinnan| 2018-02-06T21:45:24+00:00 February 6th, 2018|Categories: Best of 2017, Best of List, Best of Romance, Dabney AAR|Tags: Best of 2017|22 Comments

Scenes that make us swoon…. (Part Two)

I asked the AAR staff to share the scenes from novels they found the most romantic. And, boy, did they come up with some exquisite scenes. Be prepared to swoon….

Caroline:

In Again, by Kathleen Gilles Seidel, the heroine Jenny Cotton, showrunner of a Regency-set soap opera, has been with her boyfriend Brian (an actor on the soap) for over a decade when Brian commits a terrible betrayal. Meanwhile, Alec Cameron, another actor, has fallen in love with Jenny, and his Grand Romantic Gesture is of the most delightfully practical and empathetic type.

Everyone in the production goes into hysterics over Brian’s misdeed, which doesn’t help Jenny in the slightest. An actress doesn’t want to work with Brian, but Jenny’s show will be ruined if the actors don’t act. A producer offers to fire anybody to help Jenny, but Jenny’s professional […]

By Dabney Grinnan| 2017-06-23T08:30:01+00:00 February 14th, 2017|Categories: Best of Romance, Caroline AAR, Dabney AAR|Tags: Joanna Bourne, Kathleen Gilles Seidel, Kimberly Cates|2 Comments

Scenes that make us swoon…. (Part One)

I asked the AAR staff to share the scenes from novels they found the most romantic. And, boy, did they come up with some exquisite scenes. Be prepared to swoon….

Keira:

This scene is from the novella Paris for One from Jojo Moyes’ Paris for One. Nell and Fabien sit on the ledge. A half-drunk bottle of wine sits beside them. He is reading to her, his voice halting as he translates into English. Her head rests on his shoulder.

Because she knew already that this would be the thing that would end them. And that in the deepest part of her, she had known it from the beginning, like someone stubbornly ignoring a weed growing until it blocked out the light.’”

“You can’t stop,” says Nell when he does.

“The other pages are missing. Anyway — like […]

By Dabney Grinnan| 2017-06-23T08:30:01+00:00 February 14th, 2017|Categories: Alexandra AAR, Best of Romance, BJ Jansen, Caz AAR, Janet Boatman, Keira Soleore, Maggie AAR, Maria Rose, Romance reading|Tags: Jojo Moyes, Katharine Ashe, Laura Florand, loretta chase, susan elizabeth phillips, Valentine's Day|17 Comments

The Best of 2016: LinnieGayl’s List

When 2016 started I was in the midst of a nearly three-year long reading slump, and close to quitting as a reviewer here. For the first time this lifelong reader struggled to start any books, let alone finish them. Instead of eagerly looking forward to squeezing in reading whenever possible, I could go days on end without reading anything. Fortunately, I’ve broken out of the slump and have so far read 114 books this year, including a number of DIKs. I primarily broke out of the slump by reading a variety of genres in both fiction and non-fiction, always simultaneously working on at least three books. But while some of the non-fiction proved interesting, none broke into my Top Ten of the year. My best reads of 2016 are primarily contemporary romances, and are dominated by Sarah Morgan; and also includes a couple of historical mysteries, and a steampunk. My favorites, in no particular order, are:

By Dabney Grinnan| 2017-05-24T17:33:33+00:00 January 4th, 2017|Categories: Best of 2016, Best of Romance, LinnieGayl AAR|12 Comments

The Weekend DIK: The Glittering Court

Fans of Kiera Cass’ Selection series won’t want to miss The Glittering Court, book one in Richelle Mead’s trilogy of the same title. It’s a captivating story of forbidden love set against the backdrop of a world not so different from Great Britain and America. […]

By Dabney Grinnan| 2017-06-23T08:30:10+00:00 April 23rd, 2016|Categories: AAR Shannon, Best of Romance, DIK|Tags: fantasy, NA fantasy, Richelle Mead, The Glittering Court, YA fantasy|Comments Off

A Roundtable Discussion on Lost Among the Living

Today, AAR Reviewers Maggie, Caz, Mary, Linniegayl and Melanie have AAR’s first ever Round Table Discussion. The book chosen is Simone St. James Lost Among the Living. Ms. St. James is a popular author with AAR staff having made several Top Ten lists in 2015 as well as having two DIK reviews on our site. Lost Among the Living is her most recent release and one that has been eagerly anticipated by many. […]

By Dabney Grinnan| 2017-06-23T08:30:11+00:00 April 1st, 2016|Categories: Best of 2015, Best of List, Best of Romance, Caz AAR, LinnieGayl AAR, Maggie AAR, Mary AAR, Melanie AAR, Roundtable|Tags: Gothic, Gothic mystery, Gothic romance, Lost Among the Living, Simone St. James|8 Comments

And the winners of the AAR Annual Reader Poll 2016 are….

This year’s Annual Poll results are finally here. We thank the many many readers who responded to our survey. The format of taking nominees and then creating a ballot with the top vote getters was a success. Our hard working pollsters–thanks LinneGayl and Lee–tabulated thousands of votes. We plan to run our poll similarly next year.

We will make a few changes, however. It’s clear that allowing books to nominated in multiple categories can create a situation where one author and/or book wins big time. Which is what happened this year. (This will make you happy if you love Nalini Singh which, clearly, many many of our readers do.)

Here, then, are the winners of the 2016 Annual Reader Poll.

NOTE: Honorable mentions have traditionally been given when a book receives at least 80% of the votes of the winner.

Best Romance

Winner:

By Dabney Grinnan| 2017-06-23T08:30:11+00:00 March 27th, 2016|Categories: All About Romance, Annual Reader Poll, Best of 2015, Best of List, Best of Romance, Polls|22 Comments

A Lambda Awards Roundup

The 28th Annual Lambda Literary Awards–or the “Lammys,” as they are affectionately known–kick off another record-breaking year with this week’s announcement of the finalists. They were chosen from a record 933 submissions (up from 818 last year) from 321 publishers. Submissions came from major mainstream publishers and from independent presses, from both long-established and new LGBTQ publishers, as well as from emerging publish-on-demand technologies.

Nearly 100 literary professionals, including booksellers, book reviewers, librarians, authors, academics and previous Lammy winners and finalists volunteered countless hours of reading, critical thinking, and invigorating discussion to select the finalists in 25 categories, including the inaugural year for Transgender Poetry.

“Being nominated for a Lammy is an outstanding achievement among such a crowded field of submissions and within an LGBTQ writing community rich with talent,” said Lambda Literary Executive Director, Tony Valenzuela.

Here are all the nominations in the 25 categories: Lambda Nominations

A few of the romances that have been nominated –

Romance