To explain a little about what this post will be about, every Trope Tuesday post starts with the same introduction. In every romance book you read there are tropes or archetypes you find inside its pages. You can also see them in shows, movies, plays, etc. Every type of entertainment and media. Romantic tropes are everywhere, and they are fabulous. I adore them and I always tend to find my favorite ones in romance books so I can enjoy them even more. Trope Tuesday is a weekly column where I share books that I know people will enjoy with a specific central trope.
What is a trope? Urban Dictionary explains it best: “​Despite the erroneous definitions already published here, ​trope on ​the interwebs really refers to an often overused ​plot device​. It can also be described as another variation on the same theme. TV shows, movies, comics, games, anime’, & books are full of tropes & many rabid fan-sites now name & track said tropes with a self-explanatory title for each one.” We can name a few: accidental pregnancy, best friends to lovers, sibling’s best friend, marriage of convenience, and so many more. Your favorite couples? They probably got a trope too! It’s always so nice to realize or find out your favorite romance trope and keep searching for books with the same theme. So really? I’m just helping you find that new favorite book of yours. If ever you want a post on a trope I haven’t done yet, do drop me a tweet at @thebookvoyagers and let me know!
Me being a super huge fan of mystery and suspense movies, I am surprised that I don’t usually read this category. Just the most recent movie I watched in this genre was Knives Out, which was amazing and one of my new all time favorite movies to watch if I’m feeling blue. I know Daniel Craig and Ana will lift me up with the mysteries surrounding the whole movie. (I totally need a franchise of these movies and Daniel Craig just solving them all).Â
But when it comes to books, I gravitate more towards contemporary or historical, without any suspense and murders. But today we’re going to change that. I have known about these books and I want to share them with you. If you love romantic suspense and staying on the edge of your seats while also enjoying and falling in love with the main characters’ relationship, I have four books that will completely make you swoon and scared at the same time.
Chocolate Covered Murder by Necole Ryse
Necole Ryse started a holiday romance novellas series with Chocolate Covered Murder as the first title.This one is a Valentine’s Day story while she also has an Independence Day novella and a Christmas novella. All surrounding love and murders. Interesting, right?Â
In this title, murder finds these two Valentine’s Day haters. True-crime lover Brianna agrees to go to a Valentine’s Day weekend getaway instead of her friend who just got the flu. There she meets Nate, another person who doesn’t really care about the holiday, but is there because his grandmother’s nurse switched the name of the ticket. Things get even worse when a blizzards blows in, trapping both of them inside this luxurious hotel. But then a body appears.Â
Private Eye by Katrina Jackson
If you know me, you know I’m a huge Kat Jackson fan so of course I have to mention Private Eye, the second book in The Spies Who Loved Her series. We have to love spies and all the mystery that surrounds them! So I bring you this book and this series if you didn’t know it yet.Â
These two don’t know more than what they are shown. Maya is a sex worker who has steamy, private sessions online with Kenny. She doesn’t know a thing about Kenny unless you count how he makes her feel through the screen. She doesn’t know he’s a spy and she was once his surveillance subject. But when his team needs her help to catch a mobster, he has to tell her everything that he has been hiding from her. How are they going to go back to normal after that?Â
Whiteout by Adriana Anders
I was intrigued by this book as soon as I saw it. Antarctica and suspense? Sign me up. It really checks off all my boxes while also adding more things that I just adore, like two people who are opposites but their partnership is vital to survive, the sunshine/grumpy dynamic we love to see, surviving in the wild and trying their best to not get murdered. Whiteout is the newest Adriana Anders book that introduces us to the Survival Instincts series, which by the name we can pretty much say that the next ones are also going to have high stakes and a love story that we won’t be able to forget.
Hidden Impact by Piper J. Drake
And if you are so into bodyguard romances you dream about them, I’m not forgetting you! We know that when a bodyguard appears, things are going to start to happen. The characters need protection from someone they might not know but they’re trusting their lives with them. Definitely high stakes! But also the close quarters, maybe one bed trope, trying not to scream when the other one is hurt, these tropes can be found too.Â
Hidden Impact is a romantic suspense novel that puts together someone who needs help finding her sister and the stoic bodyguard who is going to help her. He doesn’t want anything to mess up his missions and falling for Maylin might not be the best choice.Â
