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Samhain's featured titles for May.

Receive 30% off this month's featured titles with coupon code "MAYDAY" (Exp. 5/31/13 Midnight EST). Stacks with the pre-order/new release discount.

The Bookseller's Daughter by Pam Rosenthal

The worst of times, the most passionate of loves.

In her family’s bookshop, Marie-Laure Vernet had adventure, romance and mystery at her fingertips. And intrigue, in the form of an enigmatic stranger as unsettlingly attractive as the scandalous books he smuggled. But he disappeared, and so did the bookshop’s meager fortunes.

Forced to work as a scullery maid, Marie-Laure struggles to keep the china in one piece—and herself away from the aristocrats’ wandering hands. Until unexpectedly, the Duc’s estranged son comes home, and Marie-Laure once again finds herself face-to-face with the fascinating stranger.

Joseph has braved every conceivable danger during his secret adventures outside France, but he knows no one is in greater peril than a pretty servant in the employ of his lecherous father. And the only way to protect her is to pretend to be her lover.

Behind his bedroom door, their chaste friendship blooms into a connection more erotic than the stories in any forbidden book. But desire, even love, may not be enough to overcome the forces society has arrayed against them…

This title has been previously published.
Product Warnings
Contains a relationship between a couple who love books almost as much as they love each other.

An Indiscreet Debutante by Lorelei Brown

Love is madness.

When Miss Charlotte Vale isn’t running a school for impoverished factory women, she takes tea with an insane painter—the mother she adores. Determined to avoid her mother’s legacy of madness, Lottie refuses to marry and nurtures the ton’s bemused disregard for her reputation.

Through her door strides a man who threatens all she holds dear. Her cherished school, her careful control and her guarded heart.

Sir Ian Heald has tracked his sister’s blackmailer to her last-known location—Lottie’s school. Although he would burn the place to the ground if it would save his sister’s reputation, Ian is drawn to Lottie’s bold candor and indifference toward polite society.

To find his sister’s blackmailer, Ian follows Lottie into a twisted world of illegal gambling clubs and eccentric parties. Even when their mutual passion ignites, Ian knows their affair cannot last. Lottie was never meant to be tucked away on his quiet pastoral estate, and she staunchly refuses his desire to wed. Yet fiery kisses and scandalous showdowns tempt this proper country gentleman to win the woman he loves and never let her go.
Product Warnings
This book contains gambling in low-class clubs, deliciously deadpan dialogue, an unplanned swim to rescue doused women, and a fast, furious spanking. She wants it though, so that hardly counts.

Ashes of the Day by P.G. Forte

Only blood can break your heart.

Children of Night, Book 4

New Year’s Eve, 1999. The world is braced for Y2K, but that’s not the only ticking time bomb in Conrad’s life. Damian wouldn’t be the first vampire to find a way to die, but Conrad is determined he will not be one of them.

Present day. Damian struggles to trust that fate could possibly be kind enough to give him a love as perfect as Conrad’s. Conrad balances on the keen edge of his own fear that one more slip of his formidable control could drive his lover away—permanently.

Julie learns the hard way it’s not just interspecies relationships that seldom work out. Even between vampires, love is not a smooth course.

Meanwhile, intrigue and conflict within the nest continue to grow, fueled in no small part by Georgia’s slipping hold on a deadly secret. Marc works to consolidate his position as leader of the ferals—and discovers that being a walking anomaly has certain advantages. Including some that are totally unexpected.
Product Warnings
Contains more love triangles, more power struggles, more tears and teeth gnashing, and even more graphic scenes of manlove between moody, domestically inclined vampires than in previous editions. Definitely not recommended for anyone suffering from ALSSD (Auld Lang Syne Sensitivity Disorder) or with aversions to ballrooms, evening clothes, sarcasm, or close-quarter stiletto combat.

Ruby's Ghost by Shona Husk

Breaking up is hard to survive.

One moment, Tate Cooper is giving his ex-girlfriend a lift home on his motorcycle. The next, his soul is suspended between life and death, wandering in confusion between the accident scene and the house he grew up in.

Except it’s not his home anymore. In his old bedroom sleeps a beautiful young woman, the only person who can see him. And the only person who can keep him from succumbing to the temptation to escape the horrific pain awaiting him in his mortal body.

Eloise Jones should be studying for her college exams, but it’s tough to stay focused when a lost soul keeps appearing in her room. She figures it must have something to do with sirens she heard screaming in the night, but she’s helpless to assist—and helpless to resist.

As Eloise tries to help Tate unravel the tangled facts surrounding the accident, longing and desire grow into an almost tangible bond between them. But then a second spirit appears, one with a darker intent that could separate them before love draws its first breath…
Product Warnings
Contains a vengeful ex and a romance that crosses the boundary between life and death.

Tangible by Jody Wallace

Dreams don’t come true, but nightmares do.

DreamWalkers, Book 1

When Zeke Garrett is reactivated to mentor the next dreamer that pops up on the Somnium’s radar, he’s sure it’s a mistake. The covert organization is still struggling to conceal the fallout from his last assignment, a fatal catastrophe.

From the first blast of her pepper spray, he realizes this neonati, whose nightmares manifest vampires straight from the pages of pop-culture, is more than he bargained for—a potential dreamwalker. But before her training can begin, he has to convince the stubborn, mouthy woman she’s not dreaming.

Maggie Mackey hasn’t slept well in a month, but that doesn’t explain how the monsters from her nightmares suddenly seem so real. Or why, when a team of intimidating, sword-wielding toughs rescue her, their leader captures her mouth in a swift, knee-weakening kiss.

Once he tears himself away, Zeke’s mental forehead smacking begins. Their embrace has confirmed they have a rare tangible bond, a phenomenon which fooled him once before. Somehow he must tutor the woman of his dreams without getting attached. Otherwise her nightmares could become his own.
Product Warnings
Contains lots of cussing, pop-culture references and monsters with nasty, big, pointy teeth.

Rocky Mountain Rebel by Vivian Arend

The best type of growing up involves getting down and dirty.

Six Pack Ranch, Book 5

Vicki Hansol made different choices than her less-than-reputable mom and sister, yet her fiery temper has left her branded with the same town-bad-girl label. When she desperately needs a change of scenery, her get-out-of-town-free ticket arrives—and requires she face down one of her deepest fears.

Easygoing Joel Coleman has nothing to complain about, but he’s never really done anything to brag about either. The youngest member of the Six Pack Ranch is looking to make some changes in his life that include stepping out from under his twin brother’s shadow.

So when the bold beauty with the smart mouth approaches him with a proposition, Joel is intrigued. Her request for him to teach her to ride soon takes on a whole new meaning. All that passion in his arms, his bed, in the barn…hell, anywhere he can get it? Bring it on.

But tangling the sheets leads to unanticipated complications, and by the time the dust settles, everything family means is going to be challenged.
Product Warnings
Saddle up for some youthful vigor applied with great enthusiasm. Ropes, rails and raunchy sex—there’s more places to get dirty around the ranch than first meets the eye.

A Deeper Dimaension by Thea Harrison (writing as Amanda Carpenter)

Ole description from Harlequin...

Diana was a woman who needed no one

She had fed, clothed and sheltered herself, put herself through college and grad school, and now, at twenty-six, she was a highly successful businesswoman.

She had no intention of becoming more than professionally involved with her new employer, the dynamic Alex Mason.

But when Alex's unscrupulous rivals in the steel industry threatened to destroy him, Diana found herself drawing closer and closer to him ... and farther and farther from her hard-won independence.

There is also one horror title on the list The Influence by Ramsey Campbell