historical – 20th century

Word Count: Click here to reveal61,000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: Every story has an ending… Connor always had memories of lives not his own. Snippets of conversations and awful yearning have dogged his steps and made him question his sanity. His only anchor is his sister and her belief in his stories of a cosmic black dragon. His obsession leads him to search for answers among the sacred mountains of the world... and what he finds is almost more than he can handle. Asagoroth, the last dragon, has awakened after centuries of slumber, ready to reclaim his angel and their love. Undeterred that his angel is in the body of a human, Asagoroth embraces him as his own. But the world has changed. The children have become violent and destructive. And the former conqueror of realms has run out of patience. For the love he and Asagoroth have shared over eons, Connor must find the courage to take the final step on his quest for immortality… and through their love, he hopes to save humanity from draconic retribution.

Word Count: Click here to reveal33000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealBisexual, Gay (Click here to hide)

Summary: Lee My life changed one hot summer evening in 1935— two young men trying to prove werewolves really could get drunk, a kiss that felt perfect and inevitable, then a painful morning after— but that night's twenty-five years in my rearview mirror. I've been to war in Europe, returned alone, and built a satisfying life among humans. So now, in my forties, the mere scent of Micah Crue in the sheriff's office shouldn't make my heart leap and my breath come short. Except I still can't control how I feel. Micah's here, in my little town of Highcrest, Wyoming. Locked in the single jail cell for vagrancy, or maybe just not being white enough for the local sheriff. I can't walk away, even if Micah regrets that summer night so long ago. Micah It's been decades since I saw Lee… Pierce. He's changed his name, changed a lot since we were both twenty and joined at the hip. After my wedding to Janet, Lee left our pack and vanished into the big world. My life went on, with love and pack runs, divorce and service overseas, wins and losses. But a few days ago, as I worked a photo assignment in Yellowstone, something pulled me south. Like a cord, tugging at my insides. I had no idea the other end of that cord was my oldest friend. Any pack bond with Lee was lost when our Alpha died. But I've missed my best friend for half my life, and I really want to fix whatever went wrong between us, whatever made him mad at me that I don't even remember. All These Years is a second-chances, hurt-comfort, self-discovery, Hidden Wolves prequel novella, set in 1960 before wolves even considered coming out, with two solitary men finding their way back to each other.

Word Count: Click here to reveal33000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealLesbian (Click here to hide)

Summary: Lena is enjoying the freedoms available on the Home Front during the Great War. With the village men gone to France, she is running the post office and offering sexual solace to the lone wives. But a newcomer - suffragist Miss Cawkwell - upsets all Lena's notions of what she wants. And the horrors of war eventually reach even this isolated haven.

Word Count: Click here to reveal28000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: When a devastating tragedy shatters a cherished friendship, it takes forty years for the boys’ paths to cross again. One bears the lifelong scars of a single reckless choice; the other can barely remember his own name. Fate intervenes when mutual connections bring them together once more. Is it too late to make amends? Can forgiveness bloom after so many years? Join number one best-selling authors Daniel Elijah Sanderfer and C.C. Black for a beautiful, heart-wrenching story of love and redemption, proving that time can heal even the deepest wounds.

Word Count: Click here to reveal20586 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: In late spring of 1944, Jack Harris has returned from the Battle for Rome and is back in Cheltenham, struggling with coming to terms with his wartime injury and the pangs of first love for fellow soldier, Tim. Staying with his devoted uncles, Stanley and Walter, above the grocer’s shop on Cheltenham High Street gives Jack some thinking time. He slowly realises that change isn’t necessarily bad and that hope might be on the horizon. But there are still many challenges to cope with. Will his reservations and worries about his burgeoning relationship with Tim be proven correct? Or will these two young men overcome their own doubts and family pressure to be together?  

Word Count: Click here to reveal86200 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: Exiled by his own family for being too visible, too defiant, too himself, Tomás Moreno is abandoned in La Corona—a forgotten jungle town in the far northeastern corner of Colombia. The son of the Minister of the Interior finds himself in a place with no electricity, no running water, and no escape. But in this prison of his family's making, Tomás discovers something unexpected: purpose. As teacher, healer, and advocate for the powerless villagers of La Corona, he navigates the impossible space between guerrillas, the oil company, and the military. When rebels repeatedly sabotage the nearby pipeline, toxic oil floods the river that sustains the town, and Tomás becomes the only voice fighting for people who have none. Then Felix Amaral arrives—a Brazilian engineer working with the cleanup crew—and for the first time in years, Tomás glimpses the possibility of love. Suddenly, he's summoned back to Bogotá to join peace negotiations that could end the war. But returning to the family that rejected him means confronting his past. In a land where survival demands compromise and silence, can Tomás claim both love and purpose—or must he sacrifice one to save the other? A powerful story of love, of identity, of resilience, and of finding family in the most unexpected places.

Word Count: Click here to reveal25,421 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: Patch Burke is the son of a miner. He lives with his mother in the forgotten coal community of St. Charles, Virginia. They are barely making ends meet, but they do what they can to survive. While they may lack material possessions, they find strength in their love for one another. Butch is an orphan who was left behind after his father died from Black Lung Disease. Feeling desperate and lonely, he contemplates leaving the place he once called home. Fortunately, hope arrives when he encounters Patch, a kind neighbor boy. What begins as a friendship soon blossoms into a beautiful love. Patch persuades his mother to welcome Butch into their home, creating a sense of family. However, when bad news threatens to tear them apart, they must unite to overcome the challenge and protect everything they hold dear. Join best-selling authors Daniel Elijah Sanderfer and C.C. Black in this poignant tale about overcoming hardship, having faith, and embracing chosen family amid life's struggles.

Word Count: Click here to reveal52000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealBisexual, Gay (Click here to hide)

Summary: Wade When my little brother was fifteen, he kissed a boy. Someone from our werewolf pack saw him and told Alpha, and that was the end. The end of his life, because wolf packs have ironclad rules and one of them is, Thou shalt not be gay, ever. Shawn died. And the extra gut-punch on top of losing my brother was that the man who obeyed our Alpha’s order to kill Shawn was Dustin, our Fixer, a man I’d thought was my good friend. The man I’d secretly had a crush on. Once Shawn was dead, once Alpha let me loose, I ran fast and far. I wanted to kill Dustin, to smear his guts out on the ground and dance on them, but he had four inches, thirty pounds, and fifteen years of fighting experience on me. He was pack Sixth to my Fifteenth. In a fight, I’d always lose. Still, as I made a new life a long way from the pack, I vowed that one day, I’d find Dustin and end him. Then, one spring night, I woke to a very familiar wolf peering in at me from the fire escape. I had my shot at revenge at last. Dustin Pack Fixer is a title, a job, an avocation. It’s also a prison, bound by vows to your Alpha and one sole commandment: protect the pack. My father, who was Fixer before me, taught me all kinds of ways to cover up evidence that might reveal werewolves. I could pick locks, alter photos, confuse, drug, blackmail, and eliminate threats. I was up on all the new technology that was growing by leaps and bounds here in the 1970s. I understood video, knew what a motion detector could do. And I used my skills to kill an innocent boy. Well, that’s what my Alpha thought I’d done, what he’d commanded of me. What Shawn’s brother Wade believed, when he escaped our pack and vanished. In fact, Shawn was still alive and I was no longer Fixer. But it took me seven years to find Wade, to give him the good news. Question is, will he kill me before I can tell him he still has a brother? Fixer is a hurt-comfort, second chances prequel novella set in the 1970s, thirty-seven years before the events in Unacceptable Risk.

Word Count: Click here to reveal125000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: The action-packed sequel to the best-selling thriller, The Road to Montepulciano On the night of the ninth of June 1944, four days after the Allied liberation of Rome, four nuns are murdered in a railway carriage at the Vatican City railway station. Sixteen years later, returning to Tuscany after a gruelling book signing tour of Australia, Damson O’Reilly finds his partner, Giancarlo (no longer a detective but now a well-known and successful lawyer) engrossed in a slander case between Italy’s screen heartthrob, Mario Celestino, and a high-profile, fascist industrialist, Giovanni Scavola. The case uncovers buried secrets, secrets that bring to light the involvement of both men in the WW2 crime and which lead to kidnapping, torture and murder, culminating in a dramatic, bloody outcome that will rock the Italian nation to its core.

Word Count: Click here to reveal32650 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealBisexual, Gay (Click here to hide)

Summary: After a couple of weeks at the Fire Island cabin, developing their second play together, writer Sam Herman thinks his star’s flirting means he can finally risk a kiss. But maybe not: Tommy Hayes doesn’t make a scene about it, but he leaves fast. Back in the city, Tommy spills the story to a friend who makes an unexpected suggestion: marriage. Much to Tommy’s surprise, the solution works. His wife Roberta is underwriting their play. She and Sam’s wife become friends. And Tommy has their blessing to find out why Sam’s kiss didn’t send him running to confession. Tommy and Sam find ways to fit their love affair into their marriages, careers, and military service. But they live on opposite coasts for decades, and Tommy finally has to ask: can they ever have a real life together?

Word Count: Click here to reveal13700 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay, Lesbian, Straight, Transgender (Click here to hide)

Summary: Seven queer stories about our favourite literary figures. Lord Byron encounters a gorgeous ghost in Verona. An author seeks to share her truths. Feste discusses love and revenge. Oscar Wilde discovers more than he expected in a deep Colorado mine. La Belle Dame sans Merci shares her perspective. An engineer is astonished to find a lost manuscript in an old cellar. While Virginia Woolf contemplates peace during another world war…

Word Count: Click here to reveal91000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: The year is 1968, and Phoenix Rising is on the brink of becoming bigger than the Beatles - but can lead singer Ravynn St. John survive their world tour without exposing his secret love for the band's rhythm guitarist, or will the truth tear apart their shot at stardom? I'm the twenty-year-old lead singer of the hottest band on the planet, leading the charge on our first world tour as we chase the dream of becoming bigger than the Beatles and recording at Abbey Road Studios. You'd think I'd be on top of the world, living the dream, but my life is a carefully constructed lie. Behind the fame, the sold-out shows, and the adoring fans, I'm hiding who I really am. The truth? I'm homosexual - and my family disowned me when I admitted it. The only family I have now is my band and our management team - they're the ones who know the real me. As our tour kicks off, I'm determined to keep my secrets buried. I refuse to be another nobody from Atlanta, Georgia, and I won't let anything - or anyone - stand in the way. But when my guitarist, Benji, pushes for us to be more than bandmates, and my ex's friend - a reporter - shows up to dig into my past, everything begins to unravel. Will I be able to keep my secrets hidden and secure my shot at musical greatness, or will everything I've worked for come crashing down?

Word Count: Click here to reveal71,288 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: The Sebring family has been involved with espionage for centuries, and as the firstborn son, Anthony Sebring II has every intention of fulfilling his parents’ expectations. To that end, when the United States is thrust into the Second World War, Tony enlists in the Navy, eager to enter the war and do his part to defeat the Axis powers that threaten the freedom and safety of his beloved Country. Instead, however, he finds himself assigned to a position in DC, working surreptitiously with his father. Tony is gay and is comfortable with his homosexuality, although he isn’t able to act on it -- his devotion to his country overshadows that. Meanwhile, his father is unaware and arranges a marriage with a local girl. Before Tony can refuse, Allegra reveals she’s already married to a young soldier of whom her parents disapprove, and she begs Tony for help. As a gentleman, he can’t say no, but this causes problems with his siblings, Jefferson, Bryan, and Portia, who are upset he never told them he was involved with a young lady. While Tony is fiercely devoted to his siblings, most especially his youngest brother, he can’t divulge Allegra’s secret to them, since it isn’t his to reveal. Things have a way of coming out, however, especially when they learn Allegra is pregnant. When Tony refuses to marry her, even after their meddling fathers threaten to have her marriage annulled, he’s banished to London to work with an obscure branch of British security. Some months later, the war in Europe ends and he learns he’s to be sent to the Pacific Theater. En route, he stops in New York, where he takes the opportunity to see his siblings, only to be told by the woman he’d thought was his mother that he isn’t a Sebring, and he’s never to contact the only people he loves -- the secret about his birth could ruin everything he holds dear. Tony leaves without revealing this to them. But Sebrings, no matter what their age, have the ability to ferret out secrets. How will they react when they learn the truth of his birth, and how will Tony deal with the loss of the one person who means the world to him?

Word Count: Click here to reveal79000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealBisexual, Gay (Click here to hide)

Summary: The Philippines, 1946 After being discharged from the Marines, John Buchanan is offered a position as overseer for plantation owner Ignacio Saenz. The offer is unexpected, considering he knows nothing about coconut farming, but the presence of Mount Mayon, an active volcano within sight of the property, tips the scales in Ignacio’s favor. Finally, John has a chance to put his lifelong passion for vulcanology into practice. Gregorio Delgado, the current overseer, takes exception to this turn of events. He views John as an interloper and Ignacio’s offer as a thinly disguised excuse to marry off one of his six daughters. What neither of them expects is the powerful physical attraction that simmers between them. Could John be a kindred spirit, or is he just using Gregorio for his knowledge of farming to ingratiate himself with his potential father-in-law? As John and Gregorio begin a tour of the haciendas, John discovers he has far more in common with his new acquaintance than he thought possible. Torn between honor and desire, John struggles to define who he is and what Gregorio could mean to him. Like the unpredictable volcano, equal parts beauty and danger, Gregorio becomes an obsession that could erupt at any minute and destroy them both.      

Word Count: Click here to reveal135000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: “Please donate generously to Mrs. Roosevelt’s charity. Every penny raised from this series of concerts along the eastern coast of the United States will help with the resettlement and care of child refugees from war-torn continental Europe.” Over dinner with J Edgar Hoover in Washington, Tommy Haupner is shocked to learn that his forgotten and empty Swiss bank account has been topped up regularly with staggering sums of money … deposits that originate in Nazi Germany. Could this bank account have something to do with anonymous letters posted to him at home in London, their contents a single blank slip of paper on which are written two words: NAZI GOLD? When he returns to Britain, he soon discovers that not only is his own life in danger but also those of his nearest and dearest who become pawns in a savage game of revenge.

Word Count: Click here to reveal27900 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: Stiles Long and Michael O’Leary were asked to join two agents from the Secret Service to break up a counterfeiting ring. They didn’t usually work with other agents, but since several Secret Service agents had been killed, the president wanted the Pinkertons in on the job. Reginald McCullough did not want to be anywhere near his uncle, but this was a chance for him to move up in the ranks. His new partner, Rochelle Warner, was a stranger, but he’d do whatever it took to do a good job. When he entered his uncle’s office in St. Louis, he was shocked to see his old lover, Michael O’Leary there as well. The assignment would take them on a new Pullman train across several states and cities. Death seemed to be at every turn. Stiles, Michael, Reginald, and Rochelle; all had attempts made on their lives. Every clue seemed to lead to a dead end. Could Reginald pull Michael away from Stiles?  Could they discover who the head of the counterfeit ring was before the end of the line in Santa Barbara, or would they end up just another dead agent riding the Death Train?

Word Count: Click here to reveal85000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: A steamy, queer retelling of The Postman Always Rings Twice After a beef with the mob, Sal Minovich has to get out of New York City pronto. He gets as far as Beacon, New York, otherwise known as Nowheresville, and talks his way into a situation working as a handyman at a fading motor lodge. It’s not a bad place to hide out for a while and sock away some cash until he figures out his next step. Then Sal meets the young manager, Will, and things get a whole lot more interesting. Pushed out by his homophobic father, Will hooked up with a small-time real estate investor, and now, six years later, he’s trapped in an unhappy relationship that might also be abusive. Sal thinks he and Will should run away together and leave their pasts behind. But Will won’t leave without a payout for all the time he’s put in. Do they have to get George out of the way to have their happily-ever-after?

Word Count: Click here to reveal71000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay, Lesbian (Click here to hide)

Summary: The stage is set for murder It's the summer of 1929 and there's a serial killer on the streets of London. Bodies of young women are dumped at the stage doors of London’s theatres. Noël Coward's assistant Florence Miles, known to her close friends as Bill, is dragged into the investigation when the body of her former secret lover is found outside His Majesty’s Theatre. Bill forms an unlikely alliance with the Chronicle newspaper’s senior crime reporter Simon Sampson. Together they discover that the killer has friends in high places… This is the prequel to the LAMBDA finalist A Death in Berlin. It explores the secret world of the 1920s, a time when your sexuality could make you a lawbreaker. When gay men and women were constantly on their guard, careful about how they presented themselves in a hostile society. A Death At His Majesty's is the first of a series that brings together Bill and Simon and follows them as they embark on a series of sleuthing adventures.

Word Count: Click here to reveal134000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: Clyde’s idyllic afternoon in the surf with his mates is interrupted by the news that there’s been a quadruple suicide in an apartment overlooking the beach. Two of the deceased are the parents of Barry Wilkinson, one of Clyde’s childhood friends, a man he hasn’t seen since Clyde donned the khaki and left for war. Wilkinson engages Clyde to discover the identity of a mysterious woman who has been left a huge sum of money in his father’s will. On the surface, what appears to be a straightforward case evolves into a complex story of deception, lies, violence and murder. Relationships are tested, new ones formed and Clyde discovers that those connections that seem unrelated are closely linked behind a veil of secrecy. The early summer of 1957 is a time in which Clyde nearly loses everything he holds dear—his own life included—all because of two couples who died while playing bridge at the beach.

Word Count: Click here to reveal34000 (Click here to hide)

Character Identities: Click here to revealGay (Click here to hide)

Summary: In 1920, a werewolf attack changed Malachi Powers’s life forever. Now, a decade later, Malachi lives near Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, as a lone wolf, avoiding humans and other werewolves alike. Two young men, Roger and Jonathan, arrive on the beach below Malachi’s cottage with a boat full of illegal hooch. Captivated by his unexpected visitors, Malachi wants them to stay. But bringing the men into his life would mean letting them in on his secret—and endangering his heart. Once again, Malachi’s life is changing. Forever. This book includes a scene in which the main character spies, without consent, on two people having sex. It also contains references to past sexual assault and underage male prostitution.