If you love reading romance novels and want to turn up the heat a little, why don’t you check out some of the best spicy romance books? These novels feature passionate storylines and sensual scenes that keep you turning pages late into the night.
Whether you prefer historical settings, paranormal twists, or contemporary tales, there’s a spicy romance book to suit every taste. And the popular subgenres include enemies-to-lovers, forced proximity, and forbidden romance!
The best spicy romance books feature well-developed characters, compelling plots, and intimate scenes that range from mildly suggestive to explicit. Most of these books have gained huge followings on social media platforms like TikTok and are more popularly known as “BookTok books.”
If you are new to the genre, you’ll want to have some recommendations on which books are the best. And if you have already read several spicy books, you will still need this list because you definitely want to read more books and feel the heat rising through erotic storytelling!
So, let’s not waste any more time and dive right into the article where I’ve featured some of the best spicy romance novels you should read this year!
Best Spicy Romance Books to Read in 2025
1. Twisted Love by Ana Huang
Alex Volkov is a devil blessed with the face of an angel and cursed with a past he can’t escape. Driven by a tragedy that has haunted him for most of his life, his ruthless pursuits for success and vengeance leave little room for matters of the heart.
But when he’s forced to look after his best friend’s sister, he starts to feel something in his chest!
Ava Chen is a free spirit trapped by nightmares of a childhood she can’t remember. But despite her broken past, she’s never stopped seeing the beauty in the world… including the heart beneath the icy exterior of a man she shouldn’t want.
Theirs is a love that was never supposed to happen, but when it does, it unleashes secrets that could destroy them both and everything they hold dear.
2. From Blood and Ash by Jennifer L. Armentrout
Chosen from birth to usher in a new era, Poppy’s life has never been her own. The life of the Maiden is solitary. Never to be touched. Never to be looked upon. Never to be spoken to. Never to experience pleasure.
Waiting for the day of her Ascension, she would rather be with the guards, fighting back the evil that took her family, than preparing to be found worthy by the gods. But the choice has never been hers as the entire kingdom’s future rests on Poppy’s shoulders, something she’s not quite sure she wants.
When Hawke, a golden-eyed guard honor bound to ensure her Ascension, enters her life, destiny and duty become tangled with desire and need. He incites her anger, makes her question everything she believes in, and tempts her with the forbidden.
Meanwhile, a fallen kingdom, forsaken by the gods and feared by mortals, is rising once more, determined to take back what they believe is theirs through violence and vengeance. As the shadow of those cursed draws closer, the line between what is forbidden and what is right becomes blurred!
Related: Best Forbidden Love Romance Books
3. Neon Gods by Katee Robert
Society darling Persephone Dimitriou plans to flee the ultra-modern city of Olympus and start over far from the backstabbing politics of the Thirteen Houses. But all that’s ripped away when her mother ambushes her with an engagement to Zeus, the dangerous power behind their glittering city’s dark facade.
With no options left, Persephone flees to the forbidden undercity and makes a devil’s bargain with a man she once believed a myth… a man who awakens her to a world she never knew existed.
Hades has spent his life in the shadows and has no intention of stepping into the light. But when he finds that Persephone can offer a little slice of the revenge he’s spent years craving, it’s all the excuse he needs to help her—for a price.
Yet every breathless night spent tangled together has given Hades a taste for Persephone, and he’ll go to war with Olympus itself to keep her close…
4. It Happened One Summer by Tessa Bailey
Piper Bellinger is fashionable and influential, and her reputation as a wild child means the paparazzi are constantly on her heels. When too much champagne and an out-of-control rooftop party lands Piper in the slammer, her stepfather decides enough is enough.
So he cuts her off and sends Piper and her sister to learn some responsibility by running their late father’s dive bar in Washington.
Piper hasn’t even been in Westport for five minutes when she meets big, bearded sea captain Brendan, who thinks she won’t last a week outside Beverly Hills. So what if Piper can’t do math, and the idea of sleeping in a shabby apartment with bunk beds gives her hives? How bad could it be?
She’s determined to show her stepfather—and the hot, grumpy local—that she’s more than a pretty face.
The fun-loving socialite and the gruff fisherman are polar opposites, but there’s an undeniable attraction between them. Piper doesn’t want any distractions, especially feelings for a man who sails off into the sunset for weeks at a time!
5. The Deal by Elle Kennedy
Hannah Wells has finally found someone who turns her on. But while she might be confident in every other area of her life, she’s carting around a full set of baggage when it comes to sex and seduction.
If she wants to get her crush’s attention, she’ll have to step out of her comfort zone and make him take notice… even if it means tutoring the annoying, childish, cocky captain of the hockey team in exchange for a pretend date.
All Garrett Graham has ever wanted is to play professional hockey after graduation, but his plummeting GPA threatens everything he’s worked so hard for. If helping a sarcastic brunette make another guy jealous will help him secure his position on the team, he’s all for it.
But when one unexpected kiss leads to the wildest sex of both their lives, it doesn’t take long for Garrett to realize that pretending isn’t going to cut it. Now he must convince Hannah that the man she wants looks a lot like him!
6. Hooked by Emily McIntire
James has always had one agenda: destroy his enemy, Peter Michaels. When Peter’s twenty-year-old daughter Wendy shows up in James’s bar, he sees his way in―seduce the girl and use her for his revenge.
It’s the perfect plan until things in James’s organization begin to crumble. Suddenly, he has to find the traitor in his midst, and his plan for revenge gets murkier as James starts to see Wendy as more than just a pawn in his game.
Wendy has been cloistered away most of her life by her wealthy, cold father, but a spontaneous night out with friends turns into an intense and addictive love affair with the dark and brooding James. As much as she knows James is dangerous, Wendy can’t shake her desire for him.
But as their relationship grows more heated and she learns more about the world he moves in, she finds herself unsure if she’s falling for the man known as James or the monster known as Hook.
7. Vicious by L.J. Shen
The man who comes to Emilia LeBlanc in her dreams also haunts her in her nightmares. Baron “Vicious” Spencer is a brilliant lawyer. A skilled criminal. A beautiful liar. A bully and a savior, a monster and a liar. And since her mom was the live-in caretaker for his family’s estate in high school, there was no escaping his wrath―until she had no other choice.
To Vicious, Emilia is completely off-limits. A starving artist. His best friend’s ex-girlfriend. Pretty and evasive as a cherry blossom.
When they were younger, she barged into his life and turned everything upside down. She discovered his darkest secret, and he made her pay the price.
It should deter him from chasing her to New York a decade later, but it doesn’t. So she still hates him―big deal. She’ll have to get used to him. Because this time, he isn’t going anywhere unless he’s taking her with him!
8. A Touch of Darkness by Scarlett St. Clair
Persephone is the Goddess of Spring by title only. The truth is, since she was a little girl, flowers have shriveled at her touch. After moving to New Athens, she hopes to lead an unassuming life disguised as a mortal journalist.
Hades, God of the Dead, has built a gambling empire in the mortal world, and his favorite bets are rumored to be impossible.
After a chance encounter with Hades, Persephone finds herself in a contract with the God of the Dead, and the terms are impossible: Persephone must create life in the Underworld or lose her freedom forever.
However, the bet does more than expose Persephone’s failure as a Goddess. As she struggles to sow the seeds of her freedom, love for the God of the Dead grows—and it’s forbidden.
9. Icebreaker by Hannah Grace
Anastasia Allen has worked her entire life for a shot at Team USA. It looks like everything is going according to plan when she gets a full scholarship to the University of California, Maple Hills, and lands a place on their competitive figure skating team.
Nothing will stand in her way, not even the hockey team’s captain, Nate Hawkins.
Nate’s focus as team captain is on keeping his team on the ice, which is tricky when a facilities mishap forces them to share a rink with the figure skating team—including Anastasia, who clearly can’t stand him.
But when Anastasia’s skating partner faces an uncertain future, she may have to look to Nate to take her shot. Sparks fly, but Anastasia isn’t worried… because she could never like a hockey player, right?
Related: Best Forced Proximity Romance Books
10. Bared to You by Sylvia Day
Gideon Cross came into my life like lightning in the darkness. He was beautiful and brilliant, jagged and white-hot. I was drawn to him as I’d never been to anything or anyone in my life.
I craved his touch like a drug, even knowing it would weaken me. I was flawed and damaged, and he easily opened those cracks in me.
Gideon knew. He had demons of his own. And we would become the mirrors that reflected each other’s most private worlds… and desires.
The bonds of his love transformed me, even as I prayed that the torment of our pasts would not tear us apart.
11. The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood
As a third-year Ph.D. candidate, Olive Smith doesn’t believe in lasting romantic relationships―but her best friend does, which got her into this situation.
Convincing Anh that Olive is dating was always going to take more than hand-wavy Jedi mind tricks: Scientists require proof. So, like any self-respecting biologist, Olive panics and kisses the first man she sees.
That man is none other than Adam Carlsen, a young hotshot professor―and well-known ass, which is why Olive is positively floored when he agrees to keep her charade a secret and be her fake boyfriend. But when a big science conference goes haywire, putting Olive’s career on the Bunsen burner, Adam surprises her again with his unyielding support and even more unyielding… six-pack abs.
Suddenly, their little experiment feels dangerously close to combustion. And Olive discovers that the only thing more complicated than a hypothesis on love is putting her own heart under the microscope.
Related: All Ali Hazelwood Books in Order
12. Flawless by Elsie Silver
I’m the face of professional bull riding―the golden boy―or at least I was until it all blew up. Now my agent says I must clean up my image, so I’m stuck with his ball-busting daughter for the rest of the season as my “full-time supervision.”
But I don’t need a babysitter, especially one with skin-tight jeans, a sexy smirk, and a mouth she can’t stop running. A mouth I just can’t stop thinking about…
Because Summer isn’t just another conquest, she sees the man behind the mask, and she doesn’t run―she pulls me closer, even when she shouldn’t.
She says this means nothing―but I say this means everything. She says there are boundaries we shouldn’t cross.
That my reputation can’t take any more hits―and neither can her damaged heart!
13. Ice Planet Barbarians by Ruby Dixon
You’d think being abducted by aliens would be the worst thing that could happen to me. And you’d be wrong. Because now the aliens are having ship trouble, and they’ve left their cargo of human women—including me—on an ice planet.
We’re not equipped for life in this desolate winter wasteland. Since I’m the unofficial leader, I head out into the snow to look for help.
I find help all right. A big blue-horned alien introduces himself in a rather startling way. Vektal says that I’m his mate, his chosen female—and that his chest is purring because of my presence. He’ll help me and my people survive, but this poses a new problem.
If Vektal helps us survive, I’m not sure he’s going to want to let me go!
14. A Not So Meet Cute by Meghan Quinn
Lottie Gardner’s meet-cute was a little different. She was trolling a wealthy neighborhood in Beverly Hills, searching for someone to take her as his bride―you know, to make the arch nemesis who just fired her jealous. And billionaire Huxley Cane was conveniently stomping around the block like some sort of gorgeous ogre, mumbling about a business deal gone wrong.
That’s when they bump into each other. The next thing Lottie knows, she’s scarfing down chips and guac, listening to Huxley lay out his problems, and then he tells her he needs a huge favor―a fake fiancée.
He’s talking about living in his mansion together, going on intimate double dates, and pretending they’re head-over-heels in love… and engaged.
It’s ridiculous, but people do ridiculous things when they’re desperate. And Lottie and Huxley both reek of desperation. So, she strikes up the deal. Except her one mistake might be accidentally falling for the incomparable, insufferable Huxley Cane!
15. Haunting Adeline by H.D. Carlton
For Adeline Reilly, moving back to Seattle was supposed to be the perfect fresh start. With her flourishing career as an author and the inheritance of her late grandmother’s gothic mansion, there is nothing to stand in her way.
But Adeline isn’t alone in Parson’s Manor! It isn’t the angry souls haunting the hallways of her childhood home that Adeline fears―it’s the mysterious break-ins, roses appearing, and threatening messages that somehow sound more like eerie promises.
Adeline has a stalker. Yet, she quickly discovers she’s not the first person in her family to fall victim to a shadow in pursuit.
Left behind are her great-grandmother’s haunting journals detailing the story of her own phantom and, subsequently, her brutal murder.
Parson’s Manor now holds more than just Adeline’s memories—it houses a grim future that could lead to history repeating itself.
If she doesn’t fall in love with her stalker first.
16. The Fake Mate by Lana Ferguson
Mackenzie hasn’t had a successful date in months. She’s only a year out of residency, and her grandmother’s obsession with finding the perfect mate threatens to drive her mad, so she lies about meeting someone… until she blurts out the name of the last man she would ever date: Noah Taylor!
Noah, an interventional cardiologist and all-around grump, has spent his entire life hiding what he is―an unmated alpha. But when an anonymous tip brings everything to light, he’s left with two choices: come clean to the board and risk his career, or find himself a mate.
So, when the chatty, overly friendly ER doctor asks him to be her fake boyfriend the same day he’s called to meet the board, it must be kismet, right?
Mackenzie gets her grandmother off her back, and Noah gets the chance to prove he can continue to work without a real mate―it’s a mutually beneficial business transaction. But when the fake-mate act turns into a very real friends-with-benefits arrangement, lines start to blur, and they quickly realize love is a whole different kind of animal.
17. The Fine Print by Lauren Asher
Rowan is in the business of creating fairy tales―theme parks, production companies, five-star hotels―everything could be his if he renovated Dreamland.
The idea of hiring Zahra was good in theory, but then he kissed her, and things spiraled out of control. By the time he realized where he had gone wrong, it was too late.
After submitting a drunk proposal criticizing Dreamland’s most expensive ride, Zahra should have been fired. Instead, Rowan Kane offered her a job.
The catch? She had to work for the most difficult boss ever, and Rowan was rude and completely off-limits. She didn’t care, at least not until she discovered his secret!
Related: Best Billionaire Romance Books
18. The Sweetest Oblivion by Danielle Lori
Elena’s a romantic, living in the most unromantic of worlds. She’s the favored daughter, the perfect mafia principessa… or was. Now, all she can see in the mirror’s reflection is blood staining her hands like crimson paint.
In the murky waters of New York’s underworld, Elena’s sister is arranged to marry Nicolas Russo. A Made Man, a boss, a cheat—even measured against mafia standards. His reputation stretches far and wide and is darker than his black suits and ties.
After his and Elena’s first encounter ends with an accidental glare on her part, she realizes he’s just as rude as he is handsome. She doesn’t like the man or anything he stands for, though that doesn’t stop her heart from pattering like rain against glass when he’s near.
And he’s always near. Telling her what to do. Making her feel hotter than any future brother-in-law should!
19. Mile High by Liz Tomforde
Chicago hockey isn’t complete without me―Zanders―everyone’s favorite player to hate. I know my role, and I play it well. I thoroughly enjoy spending most of my game time in the penalty box before leaving the arena with a new girl on my arm each night.
What I don’t like is the new flight attendant on our team’s private plane. She works for me, not the other way around. But I’ll be sure to remind her of that, and I can guarantee that by the end of the season, she’ll be begging to quit her job.
I’m Stevie, and I’ve been a flight attendant for years. I thought I’d seen it all, but when my new job lands me onboard working for the most egotistical and self-righteous diva in the NHL, I start to second guess everything. Including my promise never to hook up with an athlete again, no matter how annoyingly tempting he may be.
Evan Zanders is unfiltered, unapologetic, and too attractive for his own good. He loves his image, but I hate everything about it. Everything but him!
20. King of Wrath by Ana Huang
Dante Russo thrives on control, both personally and professionally. The billionaire CEO never planned to marry—until the threat of blackmail forces him into an engagement with a woman he barely knows.
Vivian Lau is the jewelry heiress and daughter of his newest enemy. It doesn’t matter how beautiful or charming she is. He’ll do everything in his power to destroy the evidence and their betrothal.
There’s only one problem: Now that he has her… he can’t bring himself to let her go.
Vivian Lau is the perfect daughter and her family’s ticket into the highest echelons of high society. Marrying a blue-blooded Russo means opening doors that would otherwise remain closed to her new-money family.
While the rude, elusive Dante isn’t her idea of a dream partner, she agrees to their arranged marriage out of duty.
But craving his touch was never part of the plan. Neither was the worst thing she could possibly do: fall in love with her future husband!
21. A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas
When nineteen-year-old huntress Feyre kills a wolf in the woods, a terrifying creature arrives to demand retribution. Dragged to a treacherous magical land she knows about only from legends, Feyre discovers that her captor is not truly a beast but one of the lethal, immortal faeries who once ruled her world.
As she adapts to her new home, her feelings for the faerie, Tamlin, transform from icy hostility into a fiery passion that burns through every lie she’s been told about the beautiful, dangerous world of the Fae.
But something is not right in the faerie lands. An ancient, wicked shadow is growing, and Feyre must find a way to stop it or doom Tamlin—and his world—forever.
Related: All Sarah J. Maas Books in Order
22. The Spanish Love Deception by Elena Armas
Catalina Martín desperately needs a date for her sister’s wedding, especially since her little white lie about her American boyfriend has spiraled out of control. Now, everyone she knows—including her ex and his fiancée—will be there and eager to meet him.
She only has four weeks to find someone willing to cross the Atlantic and aid in her deception. New York to Spain is no short flight, and her raucous family won’t be easy to fool.
Enter Aaron Blackford—her tall, handsome, condescending colleague—who surprisingly offers to step in. She’d rather refuse; never has there been a more aggravating, blood-boiling, and insufferable man.
But Catalina is desperate, and as the wedding draws nearer, Aaron seems like her best option. She begins to realize that he might not be as terrible in the real world as he is at the office.
Related: Best Enemies to Lovers Books
23. Not in Love by Ali Hazelwood
Rue Siebert might not have it all, but she has enough: a few friends she can always count on, the financial stability she yearned for as a kid, and a successful career as a biotech engineer at Kline, one of the most promising start-ups in the field of food science.
Her world is stable, pleasant, and hard-fought—until a hostile takeover and its offensively attractive frontman threaten to bring it all down.
Eli Killgore and his business partners want Kline, period. Eli has reasons for pushing this deal through – and he’s a man who gets what he wants. With one burning exception: Rue. The woman he can’t stop thinking about—the woman who’s off-limits to him.
Torn between loyalty and an undeniable attraction, Rue and Eli throw caution out of the lab and the boardroom windows. Their affair is secret, no strings attached, and has a built-in deadline: the day one of their companies will prevail. But the heart is a risky business—one that plays for keeps.
24. Birthday Girl by Penelope Douglas
Jordan has nowhere else to go when her boyfriend offers to let her move in with him and his dad. Working a dead-end job, with her relationship sputtering, she jumps at the opportunity, expecting to help out around the house in exchange.
What she doesn’t anticipate is her heart racing every time Pike pulls into the driveway or burning when their eyes meet over the breakfast table.
He’s kind, listens to her, and protects her in a way no man has ever done before. Her sister once told her there are no good men, and if you find one, he’s probably unavailable. Only Pike isn’t the unavailable one… she is.
As the days go by, Pike finds it anything but simple to have his son’s girlfriend living in his house. He can’t stop thinking about her and holding his breath whenever they cross paths. It feels like she’s becoming a part of him. Except he knows they’re not free to give in to this. How could they when he’s her boyfriend’s father?
25. Butcher & Blackbird by Brynne Weaver
When a chance encounter sparks an unlikely bond between rival murderers Sloane and Rowan, the two find something elusive—the friendship of a like-minded, pitch-black soul.
From small town West Virginia to upscale California, from downtown Boston to rural Texas, the two hunters collide in an annual game of blood and suffering, one that pits them against the most dangerous monsters in the country.
But as their friendship develops into something more, the restless ghosts left in their wake are only a few steps behind, ready to claim more than just their newfound love. Can Rowan and Sloane dig themselves out of a game of graves? Or have they finally met their match?
26. Reckless by Elsie Silver
Theo Silva―notorious ladies’ man and scorching hot trouble wrapped up in a drool-worthy package―is looking at me like I might be his next meal.
But I’m almost free of my toxic marriage and have sworn off men entirely. So all I see when I look back is temptation served up with a heaping side of heartbreak.
The man is hard to trust—and even harder to resist because Theo is persistent. And no matter how hard I try to freeze him out, he melts my icy exterior and pulls apart all my defenses.
Over a drink in a small town bar, I blurt out my deepest, darkest secrets. Then I spend the singular hottest night of my life with him. He worships my body. He makes me blush. I come alive beneath his hands.
It was supposed to be a one-time thing. But that little plus sign is going to make this secret impossible to keep!
27. Pucking Around by Emily Rath
My name is Rachel Price, and two months ago, I walked away from The Perfect Man—sweet, funny, and so sexy he should be illegal. We shared one magical night. No names. No strings. I never thought I’d see him again. I was wrong.
As it turns out, Mr. Perfect is the playboy grinder for the Jacksonville Rays, the NHL’s hottest new hockey team… and thanks to the ten-month fellowship I just landed, I’m his new physical therapist.
Imagine my anticipation as those familiar muscled legs walk towards me, the way my pulse races as he reaches out to… shake my hand. The jerk doesn’t even recognize me!
This is going to be the longest ten months of my life. Because now Mr. Perfect Mistake is determined to use his every seductive trick to win me back. Meanwhile, I also have to contend with his best friend, the surly team equipment manager, and an exasperatingly stubborn, superstitious goalie who’s convinced I’m his good luck charm.
Conclusion
Spicy romance novels offer readers a thrilling escape into passionate worlds of love and desire. By exploring these steamy stories, you can discover new favorite authors and captivating characters.
If you love this genre and are always looking for new titles to read, BookTok can be an excellent resource for discovering spicy romance books that are currently trending.
Don’t hesitate to branch out and try different subgenres. From sports romance to reverse harem, there’s a spicy book for every taste!
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