Did anybody else have those carnation campaigns around
Valentine’s Day in high school? I think they were a student council fundraiser,
maybe to pay for prom. The fact that I don’t really know shows my relationship
to the carnation sales (and also to high school). I didn’t even go to prom, and
I was never the one getting carnations delivered in every single period,
standing up in a for me? dance over and over again. My best friend and I
had each other’s carnation backs, saving the other from being flowerless.

Point being, Valentine’s Day can be tough. As a teenager who
has yet to experience romance. And as an adult in myriad ways. Plus February is
about much more than Hallmark. So I thought I would share some thrilling reads
that each embrace a different kind of love.

Speaking of Summer
by Kalisha Buckhanon

Anybody who has a sister will relate to the love that infuses
this dark literary mystery. Autumn’s twin sister, Summer, disappears one snowy
night from a rooftop in Harlem. There is only one set of footprints in the
snow, and the door from the building is locked. Intriguing setup—but the
strong, beating heart of this story is the lengths to which Autumn will go to
find out what happened to her sister, and the tangled, twisted bonds of
sisterly love.

Don’t Turn Around by
Jessica Barry

I know, there’re two Jessica Barry novels on this list.
She’s, like, [cue tween-y voice] my new #faveauthor This book frightened me to
my very toes, as in, I had to stop reading at one point and go stalk around the
house to put me back in the Now instead of the terrifying world Barry creates
where society is divided, and you can almost (note that I did say almost)
see the other’s point of view. In those shades of gray, which Barry delves into
furiously well, true terror lies.

The Vanishing Half
by Brit Bennett

Another twin sister disappearance novel, dealing with the
topics of identity, race, and the dark legacy men leave on women. Is it
possible to grab hold of another life, even if it means never seeing your family
or going back home again? When Stella Vignes stumbles almost accidentally upon
the chance to live as a white woman married to a wealthy businessman, she takes
it, although it requires abandoning all that she loves. And then one day, her stack
of lies is threatened.

Freefall
by Jessica Barry

The love a mother has for her daughter propels this
wilderness thriller. When a small plane crashes in the Rockies, there are no
survivors. Or are there? Because even though Maggie Carpenter hasn’t spoken to her
daughter in years, knows nothing about her life, job, or her impending
marriage, she can’t believe that Allison perished in that fiery crash. And as
Allison makes her way home, her journey places the mother who won’t give up on
her in grave danger as well.

The Lost Night
by Andrea Bartz

The love friends have for each other can be as deep as any
other. But the flip side is how intense the hatred and rivalries and betrayals
can also run. A group of friends has grown up; it’s been ten years since they
left their drunken, partying days behind, with one key member dead. But when
one of the living starts to wonder why her memory of the last night they spent together
is so cloudy, everything else has to be questioned too. Hipster Brooklyn and
millennial life are put vividly on the page, as well as the reality of what happens
when we leave our youth behind with secrets still buried.

Love for a Child Who Isn’t Your Own

Such a Fun Age
by Kiley Reid

How much must you love kids to be a professional nanny?
Arguably, Emira Tucker behaves more lovingly to her three year old charge,
Briar, than does Briar’s snooty, entitled mom. But when Emira is accused of
kidnapping little Briar in an upscale grocery late one night after her
employers have leaned on her to work extra hours, all you-know-what breaks
loose in the upper crust neighborhood where the Chamberlains live, on the
media, and in mom Alix and nanny Emira’s lives. Especially because Emira is in
no way a kidnapper, and Alix doesn’t know her three year old at all.

Love for an Era

Confessions in B-Flat
by Donna Hill

This is the most traditional love story of my selections.
Will Jason Tanner, a new arrival to New York City at the height of the civil
rights movement, who comes bearing the anti-war message of Dr. Martin Luther
King, woo beat poet, Anita Hopkins, a devotee of Malcom X? But this novel is
also a love letter to an era, one we in many ways need to revisit, rediscover,
and reboot now, as we seek to build new and loving binds with each other.

Love for a
Stranger

Before She Disappeared by Lisa Gardner

Frankie Elkin is Lisa Gardner’s new heroine, a woman who
seeks and finds people who’ve been forgotten to the world, their lives, even
their own families. There are so many people truly alone in the world, or who
feel alone in it, and that’s why everybody needs a Frankie: fierce, dogged, and
brave. Because this is a Lisa Gardner novel, we know the character will come
riddled with flaws that make her relatable and real. But you also know you’ll
find in Frankie a heroine for the times, along with the truest message of love,
which is: Never, ever give up.

What’s on your Valentine’s month reading list? Let us know!