Peyton’s mom and my mom were best friends. You’d think that should cover the gist of it. But, no... Oh, no. Not even close. You see, Mom and Aunt Donna (as I’d always called Peyton’s mother) were not simply just best friends; I'm saying they were the-same-person-inhabiting-two-different-bodies kind of best friends. And thus, Peyton Royce had been forced on me since the moment she was born. We were treated like twins, yet always expected to fall in love one day and get married. The only problem with that was I didn’t love Peyton. And I'm positive she didn’t even like me in return. Don’t get me wrong. I adored our moms—swear to God—but they had to let this stupid notion go because one thing had become abundantly clear to me over the years. I would never marry Peyton Royce. I think it was my one goal in life, actually. So... Sorry, Mom and Aunt Donna, but you two just weren’t going to get your way on this. Peyton and I? It was never gonna happen.

Dori Baquet never thought her life was all that remarkable. A single waitress living in New Orleans, she was just trying to make it through the pandemic in one piece until one little brick to the head unexpectedly sucked her into an alternate dimension. Now, she’s navigating an unfamiliar, medieval-type world called the Outer Realms, where there’s no chocolate…or books, and everyone lives in castles and rides horses while carrying around their own personal sword. If that weren’t strange enough, she learns she’s actually a descendant of the oldest, most cursed family here. Plus, she has magical abilities. But the craziness doesn’t end there. She only got one of their love mark tattoo thingies to fit in with the locals and avoid being burned at the stake or some such atrocity. Except the very day she realizes how to get back home, her freaking love mark alerts her to the presence of her soul mate nearby. And Dori can’t seem to resist her insatiable need to see what this dude’s like. Meeting the King of Lowden, however, changes everything, and Dori soon learns her adventures in this oddball world are just beginning.

Camille had only been heading to her grandma’s house because Gran couldn’t figure out her cable again, but along the way, she stumbled across the city’s notorious graffiti artist. And now that she knows who the face behind the spray paint can is, she can’t seem to listen to her friends’ sage advice and follow the safe path, leaving well enough alone. She’s determined to coax Black Crimson into agreeing to an exclusive interview so she can become the famous newspaper journalist she’s always wanted to be. But in this contemporary twist to the “Little Red Riding Hood” fable, our redheaded heroine learns just how dangerous talking to strangers can be...to her heart.