Monster · Shifter · Paranormal Romance

Black Love.Wild Monsters.Quick HEAs.

Short romances with big monsters and bigger feelings. Every book is a Black woman, the creature who has decided she's his, and a happy ending you get to in one sitting. Welcome to Tarver, Georgia.

✦ Featured Book ✦
Cover of The Orc Next Door
Out Now

The Orc Next Door

Monsters of Tarver — Book One

Camille Pruitt moved into the Marbury with a sofa that wouldn't fit through the door and a plan to stay single until Easter. The orc across the hall carried the sofa in like it weighed nothing, fixed her sink on a Sunday, and ate her greens without saying much at all.

He knows exactly what she is to him. He isn't allowed to tell her.

Lena Lynch monogram

About the Author

Meet Lena Lynch

The woman writing Tarver, Georgia. Who she is, how the town works, and why the love story is always the whole point.

Explore Tarver, Georgia

Orcs. Gargoyles. Dragons.
And every one of them is hers.

They have been here since before the bridge went up, and they are not going anywhere. One small Southern city, one couple at a time, and every book its own story.

Orcs
Minotaurs
Gargoyles
Nagas
Dragons
Vampires
Krakens

What you'll find in her books

Black Heroines Monster Romance Fated Mates Small-Town Georgia Scorching Heat He Falls First Size Difference HEAs Always One-Sitting Reads
✦ Stay Connected ✦

A book a week. Here's how to keep up.

The Tarver Post

What's out, what's coming, and the occasional bonus scene.

Follow Lena

Behind-the-book, cover reveals, and which monster is getting his woman next.

The Monsters of Tarver

Every Book in Tarver

Every novella stands alone. The town, the rules, and the neighbors carry over. Start anywhere.

✦ Out Now ✦
Cover of The Orc Next DoorBook One

The Orc Next Door

Orc

Her sofa didn't fit through the door. Her neighbor did not care. He got it inside without a word, and he has not told her the truth yet.

Read It Now
✦ Coming Soon ✦
Cover of Mated to the MinotaurBook Two

Mated to the Minotaur

Minotaur

There's a working labyrinth under the old mill, and no one goes down without a Bramlett walking them. People take a wrong turn and come out married.

Cover of The Gargoyle Who Guards the GraveyardBook Three

The Gargoyle Who Guards the Graveyard

Gargoyle

He's been on the cemetery gate since the 1870s compact. She keeps the office's books. He has been watching her lock up for two years.

Cover of The Snake in My GardenBook Four

The Snake in My Garden

Naga

Every morning Nikki's tomato bed is flattened like a grown man slept in it. Nothing eaten. Nikki knows everyone's business in this town except her own.

Cover of Dating the MothmanBook Five

Dating the Mothman

Mothman

He only appears to her. That is not a warning sign. That is the whole courtship.

104 Books. One Town.

A new novella every week, until every monster in Tarver has his woman. Bears, dragons, krakens, yetis, demon landlords, the Headless Horseman, and the thing under the bed.

Lena Lynch monogram

About the Author

Lena Lynch

Short Romances. Big Monsters. Black Love. Happy Endings.

Lena Lynch writes love stories for Black women who have always known the monster deserves a romance, too.

She is in her thirties, a Virgo, and based in Fulton County, Georgia. Her novellas are quick, filthy, and funny, the kind you finish in an evening and feel good about all week. The creatures range from orcs, dragons, and gargoyles to cryptids, folklore, and monsters pulled straight out of her own head.

Her books live in Tarver, Georgia, a mid-sized city an hour south of Atlanta where monsters have always been here. They came over on the same boats, walked the same roads, and built half the state. No one blinks at an orc in the produce aisle. There's a troll in the basement of the Marbury who answers every question with "Tuesday," an orc-owned bakery on Main whose sweet potato pies sell out by October, and a bar called Big Sadie's where every couple in town eventually ends up.

Southern storytelling and a lifelong love of the supernatural got her here. In her worlds Black women are not standing at the edge of the fantastic. They are in the middle of it, desired and protected and pursued by creatures the rest of the world is wise enough to fear.

The women in these books are never rescued from their lives. They have jobs, mamas, church cousins, and opinions. He moves into her life, not the other way around. Every book ends with her chosen, claimed, and still entirely herself.

Something living in the garden, guarding the graveyard, lurking under the water, or moving in next door — Lena will find it a love story.

Pick up any one of them. They all end happy.

The Lay of the Land

Where Every Book Happens

Founded in 1834 by human settlers and the troll family who built the river bridge. Old money and old monsters downtown, shifter packs out past the county line.

Illustrated map of Tarver, Georgia: the Tarver River and the 1834 troll bridge on the west, downtown with Main, Broad, Ninth, Fenwick and Poplar streets, the Marbury, Haney’s Bakery, the Tarver Community Garden, Big Sadie’s, Tarver Family Dental and Tarver General, the Mill and its labyrinth by the river, Old Tarver Cemetery and Pine Hill Baptist in the pine hills, Lake Tarver and the marina, and the swamp past Route 9.

One town, book after book. The neighbors carry over.

How It Works Here

The Rules of Tarver

The Knowing

Every monster recognizes his mate on sight, scent, or first touch. Once he knows, he's done. She feels nothing supernatural until he touches her — and even then it's a pull, not a compulsion. She always chooses.

The Silence

He doesn't tell her. He stays close, does for her, and keeps his mouth shut until she's said yes with no idea what she said yes to.

The Claim

The bond seals with an act particular to his kind, and only when she says yes out loud. After: she heals faster, sleeps deeper, and feels his mood from across town. It doesn't break.

Long Lives, Slow Hearts

The big ones live 150 to 400 years, marry late, mate once, and treat "forever" as a literal number.

✦ The Tarver Post ✦

A New Book Every Week.
Don't Miss One.

New-release alerts, cover reveals, sale news, and bonus scenes that don't go anywhere else. No spam, no daily emails, unsubscribe whenever you like.

Say Hello

Get in Touch

Review copies, collabs, or just to tell me which monster to write next.

Write to hello@lenalynch.com, or use the form.

Heat & Content

Lena Lynch novellas are explicit, consensual, and written for adult readers. Every book carries its own content notes on its book page. If a story goes somewhere you'd rather it didn't, the note is there before you buy.