Ready for Springtime Love?

Reading sweet romance novels is what has got me through the past year and really rekindled my love of romance novels as I’ve only focused on books with diverse leads. There is a ton of good YA and adult swoon worthy novels out there. And since you all know I’m a huge proponent of Black Love, I thought I’d do a post with the upcoming romances from Black authors coming this spring.

Excuse Me While I Ugly Cry by Joya Goffney

HarperTeen

Quinn keeps lists of everything—from the days she’s ugly cried, to “Things That I Would Never Admit Out Loud,” to all the boys she’d like to kiss. Her lists keep her sane. By writing her fears on paper, she never has to face them in real life. That is, until her journal goes missing…

An anonymous account posts one of her lists on Instagram for the whole school to see and blackmails her into facing seven of her greatest fears, or else her entire journal will go public. Quinn doesn’t know who to trust. Desperate, she teams up with Carter Bennett—the last known person to have her journal—in a race against time to track down the blackmailer.

Together, they journey through everything Quinn’s been too afraid to face, and along the way, Quinn finds the courage to be honest, to live in the moment, and to fall in love.

Meet Cute Diary by Emery Lee

QuillTree Books

Noah Ramirez thinks he’s an expert on romance. He has to be for his popular blog, the Meet Cute Diary, a collection of trans happily ever afters. There’s just one problem—all the stories are fake. What started as the fantasies of a trans boy afraid to step out of the closet has grown into a beacon of hope for trans readers across the globe.

When a troll exposes the blog as fiction, Noah’s world unravels. The only way to save the Diary is to convince everyone that the stories are true, but he doesn’t have any proof. Then Drew walks into Noah’s life, and the pieces fall into place: Drew is willing to fake-date Noah to save the Diary. But when Noah’s feelings grow beyond their staged romance, he realizes that dating in real life isn’t quite the same as finding love on the page.

In this charming novel by Emery Lee, Noah will have to choose between following his own rules for love or discovering that the most romantic endings are the ones that go off script.

Simone Breaks All the Rules by Debbie Rigaud

Scholastic Press

It’s senior year, and Simone Thibodeaux is ready to shake things up.Until now, her life has been sealed in a boy-proof container, thanks to her strict Haitian immigrant parents, who enforce no-dating rules and send Simone to an all-girls high school. As for prom? Simone is allowed to go on one condition: Her parents will select her date (a boy from a nice Haitian immigrant family, obviously).Simone is desperate to avoid the humiliation of the setup — especially since she’s crushing on a boy she knows her parents wouldn’t approve of. It’s time to take action. So Simone and her fellow late-bloomer friends make a Senior Year Bucket List of all the things they haven’t had a chance to do. Like: sneaking out of the house, skipping class (gasp!), and oh yeah — choosing their own prom dates.But as the list takes on a life of its own, things get much more complicated than Simone expected. She’ll have to discover which rules are worth breaking, and which might save her from heartbreak.

Instructions for Dancing by Nicola Yoon

Penguin

Evie Thomas doesn’t believe in love anymore. Especially after the strangest thing occurs one otherwise ordinary afternoon: She witnesses a couple kiss and is overcome with a vision of how their romance began . . . and how it will end. After all, even the greatest love stories end with a broken heart, eventually.

As Evie tries to understand why this is happening, she finds herself at La Brea Dance Studio, learning to waltz, fox-trot, and tango with a boy named X. X is everything that Evie is not: adventurous, passionate, daring. His philosophy is to say yes to everything–including entering a ballroom dance competition with a girl he’s only just met.

Falling for X is definitely not what Evie had in mind. If her visions of heartbreak have taught her anything, it’s that no one escapes love unscathed. But as she and X dance around and toward each other, Evie is forced to question all she thought she knew about life and love. In the end, is love worth the risk?

Blackout by Dhonielle Clayton, Tiffany D. Jackson, Nic Stone, Angie Thomas, Ashley Woodfolk, Nicola Yoon

QuillTree Books

Six critically acclaimed, bestselling, and award-winning authors bring the glowing warmth and electricity of Black teen love to this interlinked novel of charming, hilarious, and heartwarming stories that shine a bright light through the dark.

A summer heatwave blankets New York City in darkness. But as the city is thrown into confusion, a different kind of electricity sparks…

A first meeting.

Long-time friends.

Bitter exes.

And maybe the beginning of something new.

When the lights go out, people reveal hidden truths. Love blossoms, friendship transforms, and new possibilities take flight.