It’s possible I say this every year, but I love October. To me, this is the month that signals the start of a season of hot apple cider, evenings by the fire, and curling up on the sofa with a good book, dressed warmly in sweatpants and a comfy shirt and snuggled under my favorite fuzzy blanket. We at Carina Press can’t provide most of those things, but we can provide the good books, and this month we have more than a few good books!

In Running Back, the highly anticipated sequel to Allison Parr’s new-adult contemporary romance Rush Me, Natalie Sullivan is on the verge of a breakthrough most archaeology grad students only dream of: discovering a lost city. Her research points to a farm in Ireland, but to excavate she needs permission from the new owner: the Michael O’Connor, popular NFL running back.

If you’re like me, there are certain tropes in romance that you fall for every time. One of mine is the main theme of Christi Barth’s newest book, Friends to Lovers. (Gee, can you guess what it is?) Daphne struggles with revealing her longtime lust for Gib, sparking it all off with a midnight kiss on New Year’s Eve—only Gib doesn’t know it’s Daphne he’s kissed! Also in the contemporary romance category is First and Again by Jana Richards, which has a special place in my heart because this emotional story takes place in my home state of North Dakota.

For months, this Red Cross head nurse has been aiding Allied soldiers caught behind enemy lines, helping them flee into the neutral Netherlands. It’s only a matter of time until she’s caught in Aiding the Enemy, a historical romance by Julie Rowe. If you’re a fan of Downton Abbey, be sure to check out the rest of Julie’s historical romances.

We have two mysteries for readers to solve this month. British crime author Shirley Wells returns to the sleepy northern town of Dawson’s Clough with her popular Dylan Scott Mystery series in the next book, Deadly Shadows. And in Julie Anne Lindsey’s Murder by the Seaside, counseling is murder, but it’s never been this much fun.

Erotic romance author Christine d’Abo brings us the story of Alice’s obsession with a brooding lawyer at her firm, which takes Alice on a journey of self-discovery through the rabbit hole and into the world of BDSM in Club Wonderland. Also this month, the Love Letters ladies, Ginny Glass, Christina Thacher, Emily Cale and Maggie Wells, round up five sizzling-hot stories to finish off their sexy stampede through the alphabet with Love Letters Volume 6: Cowboy’s Command.

Edgar Mason is losing Agamemnon Frost despite everything they’ve been through—the passion, the torture, the heat. Frost’s fiancée Theodora is back, and Mason can feel his lover gravitating toward her. Every day he sees them together, it tears at his heart. Don’t miss Agamemnon Frost and the Crown of Towers, the conclusion to Kim Knox’s male/male historical science fiction trilogy.

Because October is the perfect month for the paranormal, we have a wide selection of fantasy, urban fantasy and paranormal to share with you. In Jeffe Kennedy’s fantasy romance, Rogue’s Possession, neuroscientist Gwynn’s adventures in Faerie continue in the long-awaited sequel to Rogue’s Pawn. And in the sequel to Soul Sucker, a powerful magic user is stealing people’s faces in San Francisco, and empath Ella Walsh and shifter Vadim Morosov have been called in to investigate in Death Bringer by Kate Pearce. Also returning with another book in her Blood of the Pride series is Sheryl Nantus, with her paranormal romance Battle Scars.

Combining futuristic fiction, fantasy and urban fantasy, Trancehack by Sonya Clark is a compelling cross-genre romance. In a dystopian future where magic is out in the open and witches are segregated, a high-profile murder case brings together a police detective and a witch with unusual powers that combine magic and technology. But dangerous secrets, a political cover-up, and the law itself stand between them. Don’t miss this exciting new world of witchpunk!

Carina Press is pleased to introduce three debut authors this October. Science fiction erotic romance author Renae Jones gives us a Taste of Passion when lust strikes hard for Fedni, an empath who can taste emotion, but her off-worlder neighbor is horrified by the caste system that the former courtesan holds dear.

Two urban fantasy authors debut with us this month. In Kathleen Collins’s Realm Walker, a realm walker hunts a demon intent on destroying both her and the mate who left her seven years ago. Also debuting in urban fantasy is Joshua Roots with his book Undead Chaos. When warlock Marcus Shifter performs a simple zombie beheading, he soon finds that the accidental framing of an innocent necromancer, falling in lust, and burning down a bar are just the beginning of his troubles.

Regardless of whether you’re discovering these books in October or in the middle of summer, any time is the perfect time for reading, and I hope you enjoy all these titles as much as we’ve enjoyed working on them.

We love to hear from readers, and you can email us your thoughts, comments and questions to generalinquiries@carinapress.com. You can also interact with Carina Press staff and authors on our blog, Twitter stream and Facebook fan page.

Happy reading!

~Angela James

Three archaeology professors sat before me, frowns on their faces as they decided whether or not to give me the most important grant of my life. Hidden behind my back, my forefinger beat steadily against my hand.

The woman on the left looked up, eyes sharp behind wire-rimmed glasses. “Why Ireland? I see you’ve done your most recent fieldwork in Latin America.”

The male professor beat me to the punch. He leaned closer to his colleague, but not so close that I couldn’t overhear him. “She studied under Jeremy Anderson.”

All three professors eyed me with interest, and I struggled to keep my smile in place. Fake smiles usually came easily to me; I’d been doing them ever since my mother first toddled me out to charm her friends. But with the stakes so high, everything about me shook. I tried to minimize the damage as I spoke. “While I did study with Professor Anderson, this proposal is based off my own research about the most likely site for an Iron Age harbor.”

She nodded, and then looked at the others.

If they granted me this money, I would be the best behaved grad student in the world. I wouldn’t write snarky comments in my field diary and I would map units correctly and I would be a better daughter and I would, I don’t know, contribute to charity and recycle more.

The woman turned back to me. Her smile looked genuine, but she could be the kind of person who thought happy faces softened bad news. “We’ve decided to fund your proposal.”

The clenched fingers around my chest unfurled, releasing my heart so it could beat wildly. My lungs flailed with the increased oxygen. I took a startled gasp, and giddiness rushed through me, starting in my heart but quickly pumping through my arms and legs until every extremity tingled with relief and delight. It swirled in my stomach, brushed the back of my neck, and settled behind my eyes, bright and heavy and gleaming. “Thank you. Thank you so much.”

This time when I smiled, it was real.

Ireland.

I danced all the way down Broadway. New York in May was always beautiful, if heavily perfumed by sewers and smoke, but now the warm stone buildings near Columbia University were extra lovely, and my green-tinted vision turned it into the Emerald City. In Ireland, it would be past 10:00 p.m., so I shot off an email from my phone instead of calling Jeremy.