August Lane
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3.8 • 12 Ratings
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
A Southern small-town romance about the visibility of Black women’s voices in country music, perfect for fans of Beyonce's Cowboy Carter and The Final Revival of Opal & Nev.
"The best romance I've read all year." —The New York Times
A New York Times Notable Book
Every Thursday night, former country music heartthrob Luke Randall has to sing “Another Love Song.” God, he hates that song. But performing his lone hit at an interstate motel lounge is the only regular money he still has. Following another lackluster performance at the rock bottom of his career, Luke receives the opportunity of his dreams, opening for his childhood idol—90’s era Black country music star, JoJo Lane, who’s being inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. But the concert is in Arcadia, Arkansas, the small hometown he swore he’d never see again. Going back means facing a painful past of abuse and neglect. It also means facing JoJo’s daughter, August Lane—the woman who wrote the lyrics he’s always claimed as his own.
August also hates that song. But she hates Luke Randall even more. When he shows up ten years too late to apologize for his betrayal, she isn’t interested in making amends. Instead, she threatens to expose his lies unless he co-writes a new song with her and performs it at the concert, something she hopes will launch her out of her mother's shadow and into a songwriting career of her own. Desperate to keep his secret, Luke agrees to put on the rogue performance, despite the risk of losing his shot at a new record deal.
When Luke’s guitar reunites with August’s soulful alto, neither can deny that the passionate bond they formed as teenagers is still there. As the concert nears, August will have to choose between an overdue public reckoning with the boy who betrayed her, or trusting the man he’s become to write a different love song.
An instant USA Today bestseller
An NPR 2025 Book We Love
A New York Times Notable Book of 2025
A Book Riot Best Book of 2025
A Publishers Weekly Best Romance Book of 2025
A Chicago Public Library 2025 Must-Read Romance
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Black (The Art of Scandal) wows with this showstopping contemporary romance that doubles as both a love letter to and a critique of the country music scene. Small-town waitress August Lane's semi-estranged mother, Jojo, is about to become the first Black woman inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame and invites August's high school sweetheart Luke Randall, the only other semi-famous musician from Arcadia, Ark., to open for her at a celebratory concert in their shared hometown. A washed-up and only recently dried out one-hit wonder at 31, Luke harbors a big secret: he didn't write the love song that made him famous—August did. Their emotional and impressively nuanced second-chance romance plays out over dual timelines, chronicling their messy reunion in 2023 and flashing back to show how their shared love of music brought them together in 2009 before a series of painful events tore them apart. Both leads feel achingly real, with painful backstories involving familial abuse and adolescent bullying that are refreshingly unsensationalized, and it's as satisfying to see them renegotiate their creative collaboration as reignite their romance. The incisive indictment of the country music industry's treatment of Black artists is carried off just as skillfully. Full of heart and unafraid of wading into thorny territory, this is a tour de force.
