S08.12: Fantastic Romance Series
Fated Mates - Romance Books for Novel People
Fated Mates
4.9 • 964 Ratings
🗓️ 3 December 2025
⏱️ 90 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
It's winter, which means that it's time to get cozy, build a blanket nest on the couch, and read a million books one right after the other in the great tradition of our ancient forbears. Today, we're talking about series that deliver one banger after another and, yes, that also bang. We'll talk historicals, contemporaries, and of course, the paranormal series that started it all for us.
Don't forget--you can buy the Fated Mates Best of 2025 Book Pack from our friends at Pocket Books Shop in Lancaster, PA, and get eight of the books on the list! Scoundrel Take Me Away and Lazarus, Home from War (independently published) are not in the box. As always, you can add additional romances, or one of Sarah's books to your box.
If you want other people to discuss great romance series, maybe you want to join our Patreon? You get an extra monthly episode from us and access to the incredible readers and brilliant people on the Fated Mates Discord! Support us and learn more at fatedmates.net/patreon. You can also ask for it as a gift, or give it as one at fatedmates.net/gift.
Our next read along will be KJ Charles's The Magpie Lord. Get it at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple Books or wherever you get your books.
Notes
- Go to Sarah’s site to sign up for her newsletter. Apparently, it’s going to be a snowy winter because of squirrels, the Farmer’s Almanac is over, and social media is ruining your life and your brain, or maybe it’s just your whole damn phone.
- Heated Rivalry, baby. Also this fall, the CW has unveiled a bunch of movies based on Harlequin books, including Savvy Sheldon Feels Good as Hell, Mason Deaver’s YA romance I Wish You All the Best and in January we get Season 4 of Bridgerton, and Netflix's adaptation of Emily Henry's People We Meet on Vacation.
- Graphic Audio has adapted a bunch of your favorite books, not just Kate Daniels.
- A graphic of the Beverly Jenkins universe.
- Here’s a cool way to look at the connections from Lorraine Heath’s Scoundrels of St. James series.
- Sarah misses Romantic Times magazine.
Books
- Immortals After Dark by Kresley Cole
- The Game Maker Series by Kresley Cole
- Kate Daniels by Ilona Andrews
- The Cynster Family by Stephanie Laurens
- Pennyroyal Green by Julie Anne Long
- The Beverly Jenkins Universe
- The Game Changer Series by Rachel Reid
- The Irish Shifters by Theodora Taylor
- Temperance Falls by London Hale
- His Duchess’s Lovers by Elizabeth Roubaix
- Scoundrels of St. James by Lorraine Heath
- The Toronto Series by Farrah Heron
- Ice Planet Barbarians by Ruby Dixon
- The Undone series by Payton Corinne
- Fast Track Billionaires by Amanda Cinelli
- Bourbon Brothers by Reese Ryan
- The Shieldmaiden Sisters by Lucy Morris
Sponsors
- Zara Doyle, author of Tanya and Her Wolf, available in print, ebook, audio or with your monthly subscription to Kindle Unlimited.
- Jenny Alexandra, authors of Santa Cutie, available in print, ebook or with your monthly subscription to Kindle Unlimited.
- Bailey Seaborn, author of Peppermint Bark, No Bite, available in ebook or with your monthly subscription to Kindle Unlimited.
- Blue Box Press, publishers of JR Ward's Black Dagger Brotherhood: 20th Anniversary Insider's Guide, available in hardcover, ebook and audiobook at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple Books or wherever you get your books.
The Rest
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I read this article the other day and I said something to Eric about it on the street and he laughed at me. But like according to the squirrels, it's going to be a snowy winter. Well, and he went. I'm sorry, what? |
| 0:12.6 | Are they collecting more acorns? And now listen. Okay. Wait, I have a bones pig with my husband. Wait, should we introduce ourselves before we start picking him before? Okay. |
| 0:22.1 | My husband, who is also, sometimes everybody, he is also the producer of this podcast, |
| 0:26.5 | and sometimes I just leave him notes this way. |
| 0:29.8 | I air my grievances here. |
| 0:31.8 | He's like, oh boy. |
| 0:33.9 | Okay. |
| 0:34.7 | Welcome everyone to Fadamates. |
| 0:36.3 | I'm Sarah McLean. |
| 0:37.3 | I read romance novels and I write them. |
| 0:39.6 | And I'm Jennifer Prokopper romance reader and editor. |
| 0:43.5 | And here's the thing. |
| 0:45.2 | So we, what was I talking about? |
| 0:46.7 | Squirrels. |
| 0:47.6 | The squirrels, the winter. |
| 0:49.0 | Okay, here's the thing. |
| 0:50.7 | So, I think it feels like I've talked on the podcast about this whole, I did |
| 0:57.7 | write a very long newsletter last week and I talked about it in there too, but like, oh, I enjoyed |
| 1:02.2 | reading that. I actually was very long, longer than, see, that's, I should have put all |
| 1:06.8 | those words into a book, but instead, I got a got a newsletter. Anyway, I really feel like social |
| 1:13.5 | media is ruining my life. Like, I feel like it's everybody's life, Sarah, it's ruining |
| 1:17.3 | everything. I feel like when I am doom scrolling on Instagram, which I am, like, I fully understand, |
... |
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