Happy Valentine’s Day! With this love-centered day falling within Black History Month, here are a few adult romance novels by Black authors you might want to check out. (Important: I haven’t read all of these, and others I haven’t read in a while, so please look up any possible trigger warnings. Does The Dog Die is a really good resource that lists a lot of potential triggers within a novel.)
Get a Life, Chloe Brown. Take a Hint, Dani Brown. Act Your Age, Eve Brown.
Written by Talia Hibbert, these novels center around three sisters and their romantic journeys. The first novel is about the eldest sister Chloe, who makes a bucket list to make her life more interesting. She enlists the help of a man named Red to help her complete her tasks and the two fall for each other over the course of the novel.
The second novel is about Dani, a Ph.D. student who falls into a fake-dating situation with her coworker Zafir after a viral Instagram post brings new attention to Zafir’s charity business. The only problem is that Dani doesn’t believe in romance and has no idea how to be someone’s girlfriend, but she’s determined to help out her friend (and just maybe has a crush she isn’t willing to admit to yet). This novel features bisexual representation as well as a really great depiction of what it’s like to live with anxiety.
The last novel is about the youngest sister Eve, who gets cut off by her parents until she proves that she can hold a real job. Eve becomes the chef at an inn run by Adam, and the two constantly butt heads while simultaneously hiding their attraction to one another. The novel features an autistic love interest and a (self-diagnosed) autistic protagonist (I can’t personally speak on how good the autistic representation is in this novel, or how the conversation around autism in the U.K. differs from the U.S. and how that may affect how the story is written. The author Talia Hibbert is autistic, if that helps).
While the novels are written in order from oldest to youngest sister, they can be read in any order.
D’Vaughn and Kris Plan a Wedding by Chencia C. Higgins
Stars of a reality show competition, D’Vaughn and Kris have six weeks to plan a wedding. They’re not actually in a relationship, but a $100,000 prize means they’ll have to convince everyone that they’re actually in love. The two have natural chemistry on-and-off camera, but chemistry only gets them so far as the show forces them to dig deeper and deeper into their relationship.
Honey Girl by Morgan Rogers
TRIGGER WARNING FOR MENTIONS OF SELF-HARM
Recent Ph.D. graduate Grace wakes up in Vegas to find she drunkenly married a woman she barely remembers. After a job opportunity falls through, Grace realizes that she hasn’t taken a break since she started school and decides to travel across the country to meet her mystery wife, Yuki Yamamoto. This summer in New York forces Grace to question what she really wants and what she’s been working towards for so long.
How to Find a Princess by Alyssa Cole
Makeda travels to the fictional land of Ibarania after an investigator named Bez shows up claiming Makeda is its missing heir. It is the classic “lost princess” plotline, only Black and queer with some really fun characters. While this is the only Alyssa Cole novel I own, Cole has written a lot of Black romance novels, from historical stories to things more modern.
The Love Con by Seressia Glass
Kenya enters a cosplay competition and panics when she realizes that the final round is a couples contest. When Kenya’s best friend Cameron steps in, the two of them realize that pretending to date is forcing them to address feelings they didn’t realize they had. (For anyone paying attention, this is in fact the third fake-dating relationship on the list and in my opinion, it’s the best romantic trope).
Disclaimer: The links provided are not affiliated nor sponsored by Her Campus nor Her Campus at Agnes Scott College. They are provided solely by the author.