Most Read New Adult Romance Books

When a fake dating scheme to get a Harvard professor to fund her research goes awry, PhD candidate Olive Smith finds herself in an unlikely relationship with the notoriously cold and brilliant Adam Carlsen. What starts as a mutually beneficial arrangement quickly becomes complicated as Olive navigates the cutthroat world of academia and her growing feelings for Adam. This charming romance is perfect for anyone who loves witty banter and a slow-burn connection.

• fake dating
• grumpy sunshine

Lily Bloom moves to Boston to open a flower shop and meets Ryle Kincaid — a successful neurosurgeon opposed to relationships — and Atlas Corrigan, the boy who was her first love and whose return complicates everything. What begins as a love story becomes something more difficult: an unflinching examination of the cycle of domestic violence, how it begins, why it continues, and what breaking it actually requires. Hoover has said the novel was inspired by her own parents' relationship. Originally published in 2016, the book went viral on BookTok in 2022–2023, spending over two years on the New York Times bestseller list and selling more than 20 million copies worldwide. It was adapted into a major film released in August 2024, starring Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni. Continued in the sequel It Starts with Us.

• second chance
• love triangle

Eighteen months of war college have left Violet Sorrengail battle-hardened, but the threats closing in on Navarre are bigger than anything Basgiath prepared her for. With enemies pressing from outside the wards and treachery festering within, Violet realizes the kingdom cannot hold without help—and the only allies who might turn the tide lie across uncharted seas. The search takes Violet and her fellow riders far beyond the map they know, into unfamiliar lands where the rules of power, magic, and loyalty are different, and where every potential ally comes with a price. As she races to secure the army and the magic Navarre desperately needs, the secret she's guarding grows heavier, and the cost of the truth climbs higher. The third book in Rebecca Yarros's Empyrean series widens the world beyond the college walls, trading some of the classroom trials for a perilous quest across new territory. It's a high-stakes middle chapter that deepens the mythology, tests the central romance under fresh pressure, and sets the board for the conflicts still to come.

• academy
• found family
• quest

Hannah Wells has worked hard to leave a painful past behind and build a steady life at Briar University. She has good grades, a plan, and a hopeless crush on a boy who barely notices her. What she does not have is any idea how to get his attention—until she winds up tangled with the last person she would ever choose. Garrett Graham is the star of the college hockey team, a golden boy whose future depends on keeping his grades up. When he fails a midterm badly enough to threaten his spot on the roster, he needs a tutor, and Hannah is the only one who can save him. She refuses, so he proposes a deal: she coaches him through the class, and in return he pretends to date her to make her crush jealous. What starts as a transaction turns into something neither planned. As fake dates blur into real feelings, Hannah has to decide whether to trust Garrett with the parts of herself she has kept hidden. The first book in the Off-Campus series, The Deal is a warm, funny new-adult sports romance about two people who agree not to fall for each other and fail spectacularly.

• fake dating

Ava Chen is a warm, free-spirited photographer haunted by nightmares of a childhood she cannot fully remember. Alex Volkov is her older brother's best friend: ruthless, success-obsessed, and emotionally walled off by a tragic past that fuels his hunger for revenge. When Alex becomes Ava's de facto protector, the cold distance he keeps gives way to a possessive, all-consuming pull that neither is supposed to act on. Their grumpy-sunshine, brother's-best-friend dynamic plays out against the darker currents of Alex's history and the secrets surrounding Ava's own. The first book in the Twisted series, it introduces a tightly connected friend group whose members headline the books that follow, and it establishes the morally grey anti-hero that made Ana Huang a BookTok phenomenon.

• grumpy sunshine

Chosen from birth, Penellaphe — known to the kingdom of Solis only as the Maiden — has spent her life in isolation, forbidden to be touched, to speak unless spoken to, or to look anyone in the eye. She waits, veiled and guarded, for the day of her Ascension, a sacred rite that will supposedly lift her people closer to the gods. But Poppy is restless, curious, and desperate for a taste of the life she has been denied. When Hawke, a charming and lethal guard, is assigned to protect her, the careful walls around Poppy's world begin to crack. Their forbidden attraction pulls her toward everything she is supposed to resist — and as the bloodthirsty Craven threaten Solis and the truth behind the Ascension begins to surface, Poppy must decide how much of what she has been taught is a lie, and how much she is willing to risk to be free. The opening book of Jennifer L. Armentrout's runaway-bestselling Blood and Ash series, this is fast-paced, high-heat fantasy romance built on a forbidden guard-and-charge romance, a richly drawn kingdom, and secrets that reshape everything Poppy thought she knew.

• forbidden love
• slow burn
• forced proximity
• enemies to lovers

When Tate Collins moves in with her brother, she meets Miles Archer — a commercial airline pilot who is closed off to any emotional connection but not to a physical one. Miles offers an arrangement with two rules: no questions about the past, no expectations of a future. Tate agrees, certain she can manage the terms. Told in dual timelines — Tate's present alternating with Miles's past narrated six years earlier — the novel gradually reveals the trauma that made Miles who he is, while Tate discovers that agreeing to rules and living within them are very different things. Ugly Love won the Goodreads Choice Award for Romance in 2014 and reached #1 on the New York Times bestseller list.

• dual timeline

Following the reality-fracturing events at the end of House of Sky and Breath, Bryce Quinlan finds herself stranded in Prythian — the world of the Fae from A Court of Thorns and Roses — with no way home. Everything she loves is back in Midgard: her family, her friends, her mate. Alone in a strange new world and unsure who among its powerful players she can trust, she has to think her way back before the Asteri finish what they started. In Midgard, Hunt Athalar is back in the Asteri's dungeons, stripped of his freedom and without any word of Bryce's fate. Ruhn is held alongside him, and their allies above ground — Ithan, Tharion, Lidia Cervos and the rest — are left to work in the shadows, hunting for a way to reach them while the Asteri tighten their grip on the city. Lidia's double life comes fully into the light, recasting much of what came before. The third book in the Crescent City series, House of Flame and Shadow is its longest and most expansive entry, drawing threads from Sarah J. Maas's connected worlds together as the fight against the Asteri comes to a head.

• portal fantasy
• multiple povs
• secret identity

Lily Bloom is rebuilding her life after leaving Ryle, cautiously beginning something real with Atlas Corrigan — her first love, who has been present at the edges of her life since she returned to Boston. But navigating a new relationship while co-parenting with an ex who is not ready to accept that the marriage is over requires more than love; it requires the kind of clear-eyed courage that It Ends with Us spent an entire novel establishing Lily had. The direct sequel to It Ends with Us, It Starts with Us focuses on what happens after the ending — the legal complexity, the co-parenting negotiations, the small ordinary moments of starting over — and completes the duology. Published in October 2022, it debuted at number one on the New York Times bestseller list.

• second chance
• multiple povs

Bridget von Ascheberg never expected to inherit a throne, but when her brother steps aside she becomes the reluctant heir to a small European kingdom, her every move dictated by duty. Rhys Larsen is the stoic ex-military bodyguard assigned to protect her, a man with an iron rule against getting emotionally involved with the people he guards. Forced into constant proximity, the princess and her protector slide from wary friction into a romance that neither royal protocol nor his professional code permits. The second Twisted book trades the first's darkness for a forbidden royal-bodyguard slow burn, following one of the four friends at the heart of the series as she fights for a sliver of freedom and the one person she is forbidden to want.

• forbidden love
• slow burn

Bree Prescott arrives in the small lakeside town of Pelion, Maine, hoping to outrun the violence that shattered her life the night she watched her father die. She plans only to pass through, but the quiet town — and one of its most solitary residents — gives her reasons to stay. Archer Hale lives on the edge of Pelion, watched over from a distance by a town that pities and avoids him in equal measure. A childhood tragedy left him unable to speak and largely cut off from the world, and he has spent his life in near silence, tending his land and keeping to himself. When Bree wanders onto his property, the two begin an unlikely friendship built on written notes, patient attention, and a slowly dawning trust. As Bree teaches Archer to reach beyond the walls his family built around him, buried secrets about his past — and the people who profited from his isolation — begin to surface. Archer's Voice is a tender, emotionally charged love story about two wounded people who find healing in each other, and about the courage it takes to claim a voice of your own.

• slow burn
• grumpy sunshine
• friends to lovers

Evan Zanders is the NHL's most notorious playboy, known for burning through one-night stands and clashing with authority. Stevie Shay takes a job as flight attendant for his team hoping for a fresh start, and instead finds herself sparring with Zanders on every flight. A team fraternization policy puts her job on the line if anything develops between them, but the friction between the two slowly gives way to something neither expected as the season wears on.

• enemies to lovers
• forbidden love
• slow burn
• multiple povs

Josh Chen is a cocky, charming aspiring doctor who can usually get anything he wants; Jules Ambrose is the fiery best friend of his sister, and the one woman who has always seen straight through him. Their long-running, very public mutual hatred boils over when Jules turns up working at his hospital, and one night together leads to an enemies-with-benefits arrangement built on three rules: no jealousy, no strings, no falling in love. As the line between hate and want blurs, both are forced to face the private wounds they hide behind banter and bravado. The third Twisted book pairs sharp comedic sparring with real emotional stakes, continuing the interconnected friend-group saga and tying back to the cast of Twisted Love.

• enemies to lovers

Fallon and aspiring novelist Ben agree to meet one day a year, every November 9, for five years — but Ben is hiding a secret about Fallon's past that could undo everything.

• slow burn
• betrayal
• unreliable narrator

Misha and Ryen have been pen pals since they were kids, matched by chance and writing each other letters ever since. They have never met, never spoken, never even shared a photo — yet they have told each other everything, and each has become the other's closest confidant. Then, entirely by accident, they finally cross paths in real life, without realizing who the other is. In person, they are nothing like the people they have loved on paper: in person, they are enemies. As attraction and animosity collide and the truth of their identities threatens to surface, both must reckon with the difference between the masks they wear and who they really are. Punk 57 is a provocative, tension-filled Penelope Douglas romance about anonymity, cruelty, and knowing someone completely and not at all.

• enemies to lovers
• secret identity
• epistolary
• redemption arc

John Logan has always been the dependable one—the Briar University hockey player who holds his team together and quietly holds up a family falling apart at home. He is not looking for anything serious the night he meets Grace Ivers, and their first encounter goes about as badly as a one-night stand can. But he cannot stop thinking about her, and when he decides he wants a real chance, he discovers that a first impression this bad is not easy to undo. Grace has spent her freshman year finding her footing and has no interest in being anyone's second choice, least of all a cocky athlete who already blew it. As Logan sets out to prove he has changed, he is also wrestling with pressures he hides from everyone: a struggling father, an uncertain future, and feelings for his best friend's girl that complicate everything. The second book in Elle Kennedy's Off-Campus series, The Mistake is a steamy, emotional new-adult sports romance about second chances, growing up, and earning back the trust you carelessly threw away.

• second chance

Shy, bullied Shannon Lynch transfers to Tommen College hiding bruises from her father — and is noticed by rugby prodigy Johnny Kavanagh. Book one of Chloe Walsh's Boys of Tommen: a 600-page slow-burn Irish sports romance about abuse, safety and found family.

• slow burn
• friends to lovers
• found family
• multiple povs

Cath and her twin sister Wren have always shared everything, including their all-consuming devotion to the Simon Snow book series. Writing fan fiction about Simon got Cath through the hardest years of growing up. But now the twins are starting their freshman year at the University of Nebraska, and Wren has decided she doesn't want to room together anymore. For the first time, Cath is on her own. Painfully shy and happiest inside the worlds she invents, Cath has to navigate an intimidating roommate, a demanding fiction-writing professor, a charming boy who keeps turning up in her doorway, and a father back home she's not sure can cope without his daughters. She would rather retreat into her stories, where she always knows how things end. Learning to write her own life, though, means risking the mess and uncertainty of the real world. Warm, funny, and tender, Fangirl is Rainbow Rowell's love letter to fandom, first love, family, and the courage it takes to grow up on your own terms.

• coming of age
• slow burn

Scarlett Vandermeer is a junior platform diver at Stanford, still working her way back from an injury that nearly ended her career, with a therapist and a strict recovery plan standing between her and her next competition. Romance is the last thing on her list — until a secret arrangement with swim captain Lukas Blomqvist gives her exactly what she didn't know she needed. Lukas has a reputation for being disciplined to the point of unapproachable, but behind closed doors he and Scarlett explore a dynamic built on trust and control that neither of them expected to want. As qualification pressure builds toward the Olympic trials, what starts as a private, no-strings arrangement becomes harder for either of them to keep casual. Ali Hazelwood pairs her usual banter-heavy voice with an explicit, consent-forward BDSM storyline, set against the specific world of competitive collegiate diving and swimming.

• forbidden love
• slow burn

Tisaanah, a former slave with a touch of magic, seeks freedom and justice for her best friend. She journeys to the powerful Orders of magic Wielders, where she must apprentice under Maxantarius Farlione, a reclusive fire wielder who despises the very organizations she hopes to join. As war looms and their fates intertwine, Tisaanah finds herself drawn to Maxantarius, whose dark past may hold the key to her future or their mutual destruction. She will risk everything, even her heart, to save those she left behind.

• mentor figure
• slow burn
• quest
• sacrifice

Twin sisters Tory and Darcy Vega have spent their lives in the foster system, scraping by and looking out for each other, with no idea where they come from. On the eve of their nineteenth birthday, they learn the impossible truth: they are Fae, the lost heirs to the throne of the magical kingdom of Solaria, and their power is only beginning to wake. To claim their birthright, the sisters must enrol at Zodiac Academy, an elite and brutal school where students are sorted by star sign and Order—dragons, sirens, werewolves, and worse—and where magic is currency and cruelty is a lesson plan. Standing in their way are the four Celestial Heirs, impossibly powerful young men who have been raised to rule Solaria and have no intention of letting two clueless outsiders take the crown. What follows is a savage test of survival, as the Vega twins fight to master their gifts, endure relentless hazing, and resist the dangerous pull of the very people determined to break them. The first book in Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti's wildly popular Zodiac Academy series, The Awakening is a dark, addictive, and steamy bully-romance fantasy set in a richly built magical world of star signs, elemental power, and shifting loyalties.

• enemies to lovers
• academy
• chosen one
• multiple povs

A dark new-adult college romance set on Brighton Island, where the children of two feuding crime dynasties attend rival universities. Glyndon King is an art student from a famous, intimidating family, gifted but weighed down by an inferiority complex and self-destructive thoughts. Killian Carson is a charming, brilliant medical student and a founding member of the Heathens, a violent secret society, and beneath the charm is a controlled, predatory nature he keeps carefully leashed. When Killian fixes his attention on Glyndon, she recognizes the danger in him but is drawn into his orbit anyway, and his fascination escalates into obsession. Their bond develops amid society initiations, family rivalries, and long-buried secrets that tie their parents' generation together. Told in dual point of view, the story leans into power, control, and the pull between a girl learning her own strength and a young man who refuses to let her go. It is the opening entry of the Legacy of Gods series and establishes the wider cast of King, Carson, Volkov, and Sokolov heirs who anchor later books.

• dark academia

Ford Grant has just been crowned Forbes’ “World’s Hottest Billionaire,” and he wants nothing to do with the title. He trades the city for the small town of Rose Hill, where he spent his childhood summers, planning to set up a quiet recording studio for his record label. His plans for peace evaporate when Rosie — his best friend’s little sister and the woman he’s secretly wanted for years — lands back in town freshly fired, and he can’t help offering her a job. Then his life tilts again when a twelve-year-old girl shows up claiming to be his daughter. The first Rose Hill novel mixes a best-friend’s-little-sister romance with surprise fatherhood, set in the tight-knit mountain town that anchors the series — now being adapted as a Prime Video drama.

• slow burn
• forbidden love
• grumpy sunshine
• workplace romance

At Zodiac Academy, Hell Week has begun, and the senior students are determined to make the freshmen's lives a nightmare before the final trial: the Reckoning itself. Twins Tory and Darcy Vega must survive a brutal week of elemental trials while the Heirs, furious that the sisters have proven themselves too powerful to sideline, plot to eliminate them for good. With a lunar eclipse approaching and dark magic closing in, surviving Zodiac Academy will take more than raw power.

• enemies to lovers
• academy
• multiple povs
• morally grey

On the night of her nineteenth birthday, Jordan Hadley is evicted from the apartment she shares with her boyfriend, Cole. A chance encounter at a late-night screening leads her to Pike Lawson — kind, steady, and, it turns out, Cole's father. When the young couple has nowhere to go, Pike offers them a place to stay for the summer in exchange for help around the house. What begins as a practical arrangement grows complicated. As Cole drifts and disappoints, Jordan and Pike find in each other an understanding neither expected, and an attraction that neither is supposed to feel. Pike, nearly twice her age, wrestles with what pursuing it would cost them both. Penelope Douglas's Birthday Girl is a steamy, emotionally charged age-gap romance about two people building something real out of an impossible situation — and about wanting a life larger than the one you were handed.

• forbidden love
• forced proximity
• slow burn

Beyah Grim has grown up in near-poverty, raised by a mother whose addiction defined the household. When her mother dies of an overdose weeks before Beyah is due to leave for college, she is left with nowhere else to go and spends the summer with a father she barely knows — at his beach house on a Texas Gulf Coast peninsula, where the houses are large and the expectations are foreign. Samson is her next-door neighbor: at ease in this world, and carrying a grief she recognizes without needing to be told about it. A summer romance that does not flinch from the class divide at its center, Heart Bones examines what it means to love someone when your entire life has taught you not to count on anything lasting — and whether someone from a completely different world can truly understand what you have come from.

• secret identity
• coming of age
• fish out of water

Arianna has always believed first loves last forever, with her whole future built around the boy she's loved for years, until that certainty collapses. Then Noah Riley, the magnetic golden boy of Avix University's football world, refuses to let her hide from what she feels. The steamy first book in Meagan Brandy's Boys of Avix new-adult college romance series.

• friends to lovers

Rune Kristiansen thought he knew love when he left Norway for Georgia as a child, finding a soulmate in Poppy Litchfield. But when he returns years later, the girl who promised to wait has vanished from his life without a word. Rune's quest to understand her silence uncovers a heartbreaking truth that will test their bond and his own resilience. This is a story about first love, enduring connection, and the pain that can come with it.

• coming of age
• friends to lovers
• second chance
• multiple povs

Rugby prodigy Johnny Kavanagh and anxious, traumatized Shannon Lynch fight to hold on to the fragile safety they've found together, as an injury threatens Johnny's future and Shannon's dangerous home life closes in. The emotional, slow-burn second novel in Chloe Walsh's Boys of Tommen series.

Nineteen-year-old Cecelia Horner takes a job at her estranged father's company in small-town North Carolina in exchange for an inheritance — and meets Sean and the guarded Dominic, two men bound by secrets and a matching raven tattoo. Drawn into their intense, unconventional world, she uncovers a hidden brotherhood and dark truths about her father's empire. First in Kate Stewart's Ravenhood trilogy — a morally grey dark romance.

• love triangle
• morally grey
• forbidden love