by Blake Black
Part of Lucid Longing Duet, book 1
First published 2026
After losing her mother and boyfriend, the narrator packs her Boston life into two suitcases and drives three thousand miles to a town she abandoned over a decade ago. Her best friend has been unconscious for twelve years, but he reaches her through dreams with a simple message: come to me. She never planned to stay, but three men complicate her return. A writer enters her dreams uninvited and questions everything she believes. A psychologist watches her with a mixture of dread and longing. An innkeeper with paint on his hands makes her feel valued in ways she never experienced. As these three men circle her daily life, she ventures deeper into a dream realm where normal rules dissolve and every detail has meaning. The dreams grow more bizarre. The boundary between sleeping and waking starts to blur. Most dangerous of all, the man who has held her best friend captive for twelve years begins to take notice of her presence.
Genres: contemporary, adult-fiction, psychological-thriller, dark-fantasy, paranormal-romance
Vibes: atmospheric, dreamlike, emotionally-intense, haunting, mysterious, suspenseful
Tropes: found-family, love-triangle, mysterious-connection, second-chance-romance, unreliable-reality
Setting: Boston, unnamed-small-town
Period: contemporary, twelve-years-prior
540 pages · Kindle Edition · Blake Black Publishing
Content warnings: death, kidnapping