As we gather in gratitude and settle into the long Thanksgiving weekend, there’s no better time to escape into stories that warm the heart. These autumn romances—filled with family, fresh starts, and the quiet magic of fall—make perfect reads for this Thanksgiving weekend. Whether you’re relaxing after the feast or enjoying a peaceful moment to yourself, let these cozy, emotional journeys keep you company.
As it is the season of giving, drop a comment below of what you are thankful for this year. One winner will receive three ebook copies of these lovely titles! Giveaway closes Dec. 6th.
Chocolate is better than men, and so are dogs. At least, that’s what Dakota Parker tells herself as she mends her broken heart and finds forever homes for rescue animals. So far, so good. She can indulge her love of chocolate where she works while her foster dogs provide her with the unconditional love she craves. What more does she need?
Seattle architect Bryce Grayson is counting the days until he can return home to the big city with his father in tow. That is if he can convince his dad to leave Montana. Bryce’s escape plan, however, goes astray when he meets Dakota. Her sweet kisses put the chocolate she sells to shame. Maybe he should be the one to move to Marietta, but could he be happy living in such a small town?
He has until Thanksgiving to decide.
Can a fun-filled activity list from the past help to create a new future?
Art teacher Harley Welsh is charmed by her newest student—a little girl whose shyness disappears the second her hands are covered in clay or paint. Moving wasn’t easy for Nadia so to help her, Harley resurrects the countdown to the Great Pumpkin Patch—a must-do fall activity list from her childhood. She’s determined to show Nadia and her family how wonderful life in Crossvine Creek is. But Harley didn’t plan for Nadia’s father to be single, distractingly handsome and everything she’s running from.
New high school football coach Josh McBride is hoping a smaller town will give him more time to focus on his children. While his son is adjusting to the move, his daughter is struggling. Harley’s offer to help via a fun, seasonal-themed activity list is a welcome gift. Her love for the town is infectious, and soon his kids aren’t the only ones falling under her spell.
But Josh can’t help but wonder…what happens when they reach the end of the list?
She’s given up on love, but her matchmaking sisters have a scheme. He’s a single dad needing a fresh start and a touch of magic to help his little girl…
Pediatrician Sarah Maye moved back home to Belmont, North Carolina years after being widowed, but everything’s changed. Her family’s hit by scandal, her sisters are loved up, and her beloved grandmother has passed. Feeling isolated, Sarah searches for a new purpose—a way to honor their grandmother’s legacy of giving. When the man her sisters tried to set her up with enters her clinic holding his sweet daughter’s hand, Sarah grieves for all she’s missed.
Single dad and history professor Luke Raimy is new to town with a short-term contract and a burning determination to create stability for his daughter as he builds a meaningful career. He’s mortified when he arrives at his daughter’s wellness check to see the elegant woman whom he thinks recently hit on him.
The timing and so much more is wrong, but can a little girl and a possibly enchanted cook book make it right?
The girl next door is now the woman he’s falling for.
As her ten year high school reunion approaches, Becca Thompson feels the pinch of not accomplishing enough since graduation. Romance has been an even bigger bust. Longing for more, she decides to organize a fall harvest festival and community fundraiser on her family’s orchard. But Becca gets more than she bargained for when she asks her childhood friend to help. Suddenly her bestie is making her knees weak and her heart flutter.
Jason Fox is dedicated to his veterinarian practice and raising funds to make his dream animal shelter a reality. When he’s sidelined by an injury, he takes a break and returns home to Cupid’s Corner. But from the moment he sees Becca, everything’s different. She’s no longer the young girl he picked apples and pumpkins with—she’s a self-reliant, beautiful woman.
Jason helps Becca with the festival, but the more time they spend together the harder it is to ignore the sparks. Can leaving the friend zone end in love or will it ruin everything?
By: Melissa McClone
He thought he had the perfect plan…
When elite university professor Keaton Andrews walks into a meeting with the dean, he expects to hear that his tenure application is on track. Instead, his beloved department is cut. Regrouping in Silver Falls with family seems like his best option. One morning, he takes a risk and orders a pumpkin spice latte from the beautiful barista at the local coffee shop. Too bad she doesn’t seem to find him nearly as intriguing as he finds her…
Raine Hanover is no longer swayed by a charming smile, especially by a nerdy—and distractingly handsome—academic. She’s taking a break from romance and focusing on running her increasingly busy coffee shop. But when Raine is involuntarily put in charge of organizing the town’s Halloween bash, Keaton jumps in to help, and it’s not long before sparks, and kisses, fly.
As the leaves begin to fall, Raine wonders if she should risk taking another chance on happily ever after, especially with a man who has dreams and goals so far away from Silver Falls and her.
Can one choice alter destiny or is fate set in stone?
After her father’s disappearance, headstrong healer Rhianwyn finds herself in a perilous position. The king’s law forbids unwed women living alone, but she neither needs nor wants the numerous men vying for her hand. The explosive chemistry between her and mysterious Lord Broccan tempts her to bed—but not to wed. So, when Broccan receives royal permission to marry her, Rhianwyn is furious.
Her friends Elspeth, Selena, and Lilliana envy her fate, which seems better than that of servant, harlot or bartered princess. At the mystical sunstones where they meet to bemoan their powerless futures, a crone appears, offering them a magical opportunity to swap souls for a season. With each believing any life is better than the one given her, they agree, beginning a journey that will change them, their friendships, and their destinies forever.
Broccan, however, didn’t bargain on loving a wife who changes with the seasons. As Rhianwyn starts seeing her independence—and Broccan—through new eyes, she realizes that the pact meant to free her may destroy her best chance at happiness.
Sometimes the secret ingredient is right under your nose…
Executive Chef Sloan Leary just received the invitation of a lifetime to create signature holiday dishes for a premier meal delivery service. If she wins the contract, she can finally expand her restaurant to Paris, fulfilling a promise to her late grandmother. But first she’ll need to complete her annual two-week culinary exchange. Sloan is shocked when she’s sent to a small-town diner in Brooks Bend, Connecticut. If that weren’t enough, she learns her audition is to create dog food for pampered pooches—she’s never even had a pet.
Ex-military handyman Alex Edwards knows plenty about dogs—his beloved labradoodle is also his emotional support companion. So he’s happy to help newcomer Sloan create a Thanksgiving meal fit for canine cravings. When Sloan encourages him to go all in with his carpentry business, Alex pulls back. He stopped taking risks a long time ago and is happy with his slower life…right?
As they work to find the right seasonings, can Alex and Sloan rewrite the meal plans for their futures…with each other?
Thanksgiving is a time for family…
As a young widow and mother to a three-year-old boy, Sarah Mills’s life is complicated, becoming more so when her high school sweetheart, Daniel, moves back to Montana. He left her behind after graduation and she married his brother, only needing Daniel’s services as a sperm donor when she and her husband couldn’t conceive. Now Daniel’s offering her a job as resort manager—but he wants to be part of her son’s life.
Recently retired from pro football, Daniel Hunter is tired of holding on to secrets. He badly wants a relationship with his biological son, and a second chance with the woman he never stopped loving. He builds a first-rate eco resort in Sweetheart, Montana, to give him a shot at a new life post football and proposes to Sarah, thinking it’s the most practical choice for all three of them.
Daniel still makes Sarah’s heart skip a beat, but he’s left her behind once already. She’s convinced he won’t stay this time, either, and now it’s not just her heart at risk.
He dreams of saving his ancestral home. She longs to escape hers.
Persephone is the youngest Penryn, and she’s always felt like an afterthought. As her siblings ventured out one by one, she was left behind, learning to rely on herself. Now that they’ve all returned and are on a mission to save their home, she’s reluctantly falling in with their plans and keeping her distance, especially when an Oxford-educated intern arrives wanting to learn how to save one’s ancestral home.
Oliver Belhaven has come to Casterglass to prove to his uncle that he can make Pembury a financial success, so the only home Oliver has ever had isn’t sold. He is intrigued by the beautiful and mercurial Seph and senses a kindred spirit—alone even around family.
Oliver may be charming, but under her surly facade Seph is afraid to get close to anyone. Yet the longer Oliver works at Casterglass, the more invested he becomes—in Seph and in saving his home. But will achieving one dream mean that he has to let go of another? And can Seph finally learn to let go—and love?
Follow her dream…
After making a deathbed promise to her father, Joelle Winslow is ready to seize the NYC business opportunity to take her jewelry designs global. All she needs to do is cash out her inherited half of the family ranch in Montana—which means convincing her childhood rival, and now co-heir, to sell or buy her out. Sparks fly when Matt, no longer a gangly, solemn teenager, but a tall, handsome cowboy with work-hewn muscles, is unwilling to give up on the legacy he’s worked so hard to keep without a fight. And part of his bargain includes Joelle staying at the ranch with him through Homecoming Weekend.
The son her father never had…
The Winslow ranch rescued Matt Locke from a life in the foster-care system. As an orphan boy adopted by Clark Winslow and groomed to take over the ranch, he wants nothing more than to marry, raise a family, and continue the legacy of the man who became a father to him after his parents’ tragic deaths. Matt can’t imagine a life anywhere else, and he definitely can’t afford to buy Joelle out. Can he convince the dark haired beauty to not walk out on him and her home a second time?
When widower Truett Mahan finds a trespasser hiding in one of his building renovation projects, he thinks he has a runaway teen on his hands. He’s right about the runaway, but Hope Larson is all woman, and in desperate need of help. True never turns away a person in trouble, but helping Hope wakes up feelings and dreams he thought buried with his wife years ago.
Hope was forced to run to protect the people she loves, paring her life down to what fits in her backpack. True tempts her to stop running and set down some roots in Whiskey River, a town she’s come to love.
Can this strong, honorable man help her retake her life, or will the danger she’d left behind strike out at them both?
He’s used to stories with no happy ending…
Aiden Hughes never expected to return to Birdsong, but after a scandal rocked his professional world the former hard-hitting reporter needs a plan B. Covering local events for the small town newspaper after chasing down national news is a huge step backwards. But when he interviews the founder of a dog rescue whose heart is bigger than New York City, he wonders if there’s more to life than his byline in a prestigious paper.
Emily McLane has always had a sweet spot for animals. She plans an ambitious adoption festival to fund the expansion of her beloved dog rescue, but she needs publicity. When a former local boy offers to help her design a promotion, she finds herself falling in love for the first time.
They both have big dreams, but Aiden’s will take him far from Birdsong. Will they follow their hearts or are they only falling in puppy love?
I was brought up to believe that most Southern gatherings should include deviled eggs, and they must be served on a special deviled egg dish. I have five different ones! Suffice it to say, I heard the assignment. With Easter season cooking on the horizon, I’ve got my favorite one washed and ready, a treasured gift from my mama.
USA Today bestselling and RITA Award winning author Catherine Mann has written over fifty romance novels and her work has been released in more than 20 countries. Catherine has a Master’s Degree in Theater, having written her thesis about powerful Shakespearean women. Born and raised in the South, Catherine and her flyboy husband have four children and reside in Florida where she is the President and a founding member of the Sunshine State Animal Rescue.
I’m Southern. That’s the first reason I love writing stories set in the South. I grew up on a farm. We lived in a true farmhouse with a big yard and lots of cracks in the walls! I learned to drive tractors, plant and harvest crops, haul produce to the market, and drive fast over terraces (hills in the field to keep erosion away). That was fun until my daddy stopped it real quick.
I hope you get a chance to read it. My favorite place to read in the summer is in my front yard on our red Adirondack chairs while our dog Chai runs free in the front yard.
GIVEAWAY: Because who doesn’t love FREE books?
I’m thrilled to announce that I’ve become a grandmother for the first time!! My sweet granddaughter, Nelly Tate Sands was born March 6
