Our 18 Most-Anticipated Romance Books of 2020

Lisa Kleypas is one of the few undisputed legends of historical romance, someone whose work can be recommended to anyone and everyone, regardless of their taste in books. The latest book in the Ravenels series comes with very high expectations. 

Railway magnate Tom Severin is powerful enough to sate whatever whim he has at any given time. He's used to getting his way and is willing to pay the price, no matter how high, so obviously he'll be able to have Lady Cassandra Ravenel. He greatly underestimates her and insists she will only marry for love. 

However, when a newfound enemy nearly destroys Cassandra’s reputation, Severin seizes the opportunity, but gets far more than his cold heart bargained for. 

Release date: February 18th, 2020

With a name like The Bareknuckle Bastards, how could anyone resist Sarah MacLean's latest series? The action concludes with the third and final book, Daring and the Duke, focusing on the third brother, Ewan, Duke of Marwick. 

He's spent the best part of a decade looking for his lost love who he has never gotten over. That woman, Grace Condry, has spent her life running away from the demons of her past after being betrayed by her only love. 

Ewan is determined to win her back but she's not interested in reconciling. Instead, she vows revenge, and they do say that one should keep their friends close but their enemies closer.

Release date: June 30th, 2020

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Another beloved legend of romance, Beverly Jenkins has been breaking hearts and boundaries in publishing for many years and should be on every romance lover's must-read list with each new release. 

Wild Rain, the second title in her Women Who Dare series, follows a reporter who heads to post-Civil War era Wyoming to do a story on doctors. His interest, however, turns towards his subject's sister. 

Spring Lee runs her own ranch, wears denim pants, and takes zero crap. In short, she's the most fascinating woman in Wyoming. How could anyone resist?

Release date: July 28, 2020

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Historical romance favorite Caroline Linden has a new series coming out next year, Desperately Seeking Duke, which kicks off with About a Rogue. 

Bianca Tate is horrified when her sister Cathy is obliged to accept an offer of marriage from society's most notorious rake, Maximillian St. James. 

To save her from inevitable ruin, she helps Cathy elope with her real love and takes her place as the future Mrs. St. James. Max is then offered a chance at a dukedom, so he's not exactly picky about which Tate sister will be his wife, even as he later discovers how passionate and determined she is to do good for herself and her family, and how little time she has for rogues in her life.

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Release date: June 30, 2020

Lucy Parker’s juicy, sparky London-set contemporaries dive into the world of theater, arts, and entertainment, worlds full of sexy warring creatives who seldom seem able to keep their hands off one another. 

Headliners dives into the world of morning television, following feuding TV presenters who have spent years sniping at one another from their respective shows until things blow up in an especially unpleasant manner. 

To save their floundering reputations, the pair are matched up to host a failure morning talk show whose ratings have hit an all-time low. If they can win back the nation's love by Christmas Eve, they won't be out of a job. All they need to do is stop despising one another for a few hours a day.

Release date: January 20,2020

Remember #PlaneBae? In 2018, a woman live-tweeted a friendly conversation happening between two strangers on a flight, spinning a romantic yarn that quickly went viral, all while the people involved had no idea what was going on. It was the ultimate cautionary tale of the digital age and our collective penchant for oversharing. 

Now, Alisha Rai has turned this modern phenomenon into a layered, and irresistible romance. Girl Gone Viral follows a former model turned reclusive investor whose mundane chat with a stranger in a café becomes the romantic story of the year on social media, forcing her to go into hiding for a while under the care of the man who really holds her heart, her bodyguard. 

RELATED: 17 Funny Romance Books That Will Melt Your Heart While Making You Laugh 

Release date: April 21, 2020

Sajni Patel makes her author debut with The Trouble With Hating You, a rom-com that promises big laughs and plenty of love. Liya Thakkar is a successful biochemical engineer who is happy to be single, thank you very much. 

Her parents, however, have very different ideas and, at their latest dinner part, try to set her up with a man they consider to be perfect marriage material. 

It doesn't go well, but things get even more awkward when said not-future-husband, lawyer Jay Shah, turns up at her office as the person brought on board to save her struggling company!

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Release date: May 12, 2020

Alyssa Cole's Reluctant Royals series was a must-read for all romance lovers, helping to inject new life and a detailed vibrancy to the oft-trite subgenre of royal romance. Now, she's kickstarting a spin-off from that series, the Runaway Royals. 

The first entry, How to Catch a Queen, follows Shanti Mohapi as she weds the king of Njaza. As King Sanyu's consort, she hopes to be able to contribute to Njaza's wellbeing and participate in more substantial royal duties being looking pretty and standing behind her husband. Sanyu agreed to take a wife but expected their relationship to be wholly impersonal, but now she's captured his heart and proven herself to be perfect for the crown. 

When scandal breaks out in their kingdom, Shanti goes on the run and Sanyu is left to see if he has what it takes to find her and rule his land.

Release date: May 26, 2020

Sonali Dev's latest series puts modern romantic twists on Jane Austen's iconic novels. Recipe for Persuasion takes its inspiration from ... well, the title kind of gives it away! 

Chef Ashna Raje needs to figure out a way to save her failing restaurant and prove her scornful mother wrong, so when an opportunity comes up for her to join the cast of the new reality TV show Cooking With the Stars, she jumps at the chance. 

She'll be one of the chefs paired up with a celebrity contestant to create delicious dishes and win over the voting public. It all seems to be the perfect strategy until she discovers she's being paired up with Rico Silva, a soccer player from her past and their simmering chemistry proves enthralling to the media. Can they hold it together long enough to win the show and not fall once more into disaster?

Release date: May 26, 2020

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The name Milla Vane may not be familiar to you, but if you’re a lover of paranormal and steampunk romance, her pseudonym Meljean Brook certainly will be! Her Guardians and Iron Seas series comprise of some of the strongest and most unique storytelling in speculative romance. It's been a minute since we've seen something new from Brook/Vane, but in 2020 she's coming back in a big way! 

A Heart of Blood and Ashes kicks off the A Gathering of Dragon series, which promises plenty of political intrigue, barbarian monarchs, and a LOT of bloodshed. The alliance between the barbarian riders of Parsathe and the walled kingdoms of the south is tenuous at best, bound together in a shared desire to keep an ancient evil at bay. 

After the barbarian king and queen are slain, their son Maddek vows to avenge them at all costs. When he learns it was the king’s daughter who lured his parents to their deaths, he finds himself oddly entranced by Yvenne, the last of the legendary warrior queens. 

We’ve missed Brook/Vane, so suffice to say we are hyped up for her glorious return, especially with this suitably epic sounding series that promises to make good use of her wonderful world-building talents and keen eye for character. 

Release date: February 4th, 2020

Grace Draven has slowly built up a reputation as one of the leading voices in modern high fantasy romance, a subgenre that is often overlooked. Dragon Unleashed will be the second title in her Fallen Empire series, which features a dragon shapeshifter, magical healers, and grave-robbing witches. 

Magic is outlawed in the Krael Empire and punishable by death, forcing the free trader Halani to guard her darkest secret from the world. Malachus is a draga living on earth disguised as a human who is quickly running out of time before his facade fails him. 

He soon becomes the target of the Empire's twisted ruler who wishes to capture and kill a draga as a trophy of honor, forcing Malachus to turn to Halani for help.

Release date: June 9, 2020

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In just a few short years, Sarah J. Mass has become one of the most popular fantasy YA writers working today, topping the New York Times bestseller list on multiple occasions. Those who loved her Throne of Glass series will be eager to get their hands on House of Earth and Blood, the first book in the Crescent City saga. 

Half-Fae and half-human Bryce Quinlan had the perfect life until a demon murdered her closest friends and forced her on the road to vengeance. Fallen angel Hunt Athalar, enslaved to the Archangels he once tried to overthrow, offers his assistance to Bryce. He'll help to capture the murderer and hopefully secure his own freedom. 

As Bryce and Hunt descend into Crescent City's muddy underbelly, they discover dark secrets, unfathomable power, and a new spark of passion.

Release date: March 3, 2020

The fifth book in their Clean Slate Ranch series, A.M. Arthur's Hard Ride comes with the ever-enticing sub-header of "Five Weddings and a Fake Boyfriend." 

City slicker Derrick Massey has always had a thing for cowboys, so of course a quick liaison with Kendall "Slater" Stamos during a weekend wedding getaway was in order. It's a fun fling until Slater offers a unique proposition: Be his fake boyfriend and help him get his nagging family off his back about finding a full-time partner. 

Derrick likes the idea of having a gorgeous plus-one for all the weddings he has to deal with while Slater gets some fun of his own. Of course, the countdown to their "breakup" is just on the horizon.

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Release date: February 17, 2020

Cord Hollister, the rugged cowboy hero of Country Strong, has devoted his life to training horses on a ranch in Montana and thrives on the quiet stability this situation offers, free of fuss. 

That all changes when a new girl arrives in Painted Pony Creek, a woman who is the spitting image of his first love and first heartbreak. Shallie Fletcher has reinvented herself and seeks Cord's help to partner with a therapeutic riding program for kids. Once upon a time, she only had eyes for him but surely he will just remain the one that got away?

Release date: January 21, 2020

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Rebekah Weatherspoon can seemingly write everything: Erotica, contemporary, paranormal—she does it all! Now she's getting into the Western world with A Cowboy To Remember, the first in the Cowboys of California series. 

Chef Evie Buchanan has a headline spot on a popular morning show and is poised for stardom when she takes a fall at an industry party and wakes up with no memory of who she is. Her assistant scrambles to contact her "family", her close friends who run a luxury ranch in California where she grew up. 

Enter former rodeo champion Zach Pleasant, a childhood friend and lost love who broke Evie's heart, not that she remembers that now. Zach is terrified to repeat past mistakes but wants to help Evie remember who she was.

Release date: February 25, 2020

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Set in the world of her New York Times bestselling Winner's Trilogy, Marie Rutkoski's The Midnight Lie is an epic LGBTQ romantic fantasy that we can't wait to get our hands on in 2020. 

Nirrim lives in a bleak world with rampant crime and strictly enforced rules, one where society's most decadent pleasures are reserved only for the High Kith. People of her low status are forbidden from sampling sweets or wearing colors so Nirrim keeps her head down until she meets Sid, a charming traveler who claims that the High Kith possess magic and that Nirrim should seek it out for herself.

Release date: March 3, 2020

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Jeremiah Stewart is happy to keep his sexuality private. It's his business and nobody else's and he's sure that if he ever meets the right guy then he'll definitely introduce him to his mother. 

Collin Galloway is dealing with an early on-set mid-life crisis as he tries to figure out what he wants from his life. Jeremiah enters his life and despite their desire to keep things professional, personal feelings can't help but interject, but Collin won't deal with a closeted boyfriend and Jeremiah has some tough calls to make.

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Release date: January 6, 2020

Olivia Waite made a splash with her historical f/f romance The Lady's Guide to Celestial Mechanics, and she's following that up with an enticing story and an equally delightful title. 

The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows includes a grumpy widowed engraver working to keep her family's print shop going, a lady beekeeper with a love of poetry and trousers, with promises of "luxuriant English gardens with extremely naughty statues" and "satirical ballads about tight pants." We're sold!

Release date: June 9th, 2020