When a sinkhole nearly swallows her whole, burned-out history professor Philippa Flynn takes it as a wake-up call. Leaving her carefully planned but unfulfilling life behind, she moves into an old seaside house she inherited from her grandmother, a bestselling author of swashbuckling romances. Philippa expects the clutter, disrepair, proximity to the family she deliberately moved away from, and reclusive writer she’ll be sharing the house with. She doesn’t expect that writer to also be the cover model who personified Iris Flynn’s bare-chested, cavalier-booted pirate king.
While navigating their awkward cohabitation and searching for creative inspiration, the pair discovers the outlines for six more novels they could work on together. But Philippa’s used to facts, Dylan has writer’s block, and neither can craft a love scene while real sparks are flying.
To write the story on the page, Philippa will have to embrace the one she’s living, even if it means swapping tenure for treasure maps and plans for pirate kings.
Lake Union Publishing 9/1/2026
"Writing with a bracing sense of wit and working with a cast of charmingly quirky, all-too-relatable characters, Firkins (The Predictable Heartbreaks of Imogen Finch, 2023) fashions a radiant love story that truly shines when it comes to the small, everyday moments of connection between two people from which a romance is born. Add to this Firkins's cleverly cogent assessments on the current state of academia, the enduring appeal of old-school historical romances, and the courage it can take to start over in life, and you have a reading experience worth more than any pirate’s treasure." --Booklist starred review