Rooted Book Study

The Heart Beneath the Thorn — A Modern Beauty and the Beast Retelling 💔 In a glittering city of fortunes and façades, The Heart Beneath the Thorn reimagines Beauty and the Beast through the broken glass of betrayal, redemption, and forbidden love. Emilia Grace, a fierce yet quietly bruised soul, is just trying to survive. Between juggling hospital shifts, family debts, and the ghosts of her past, she’s never had the luxury of dreaming. But fate has a cruel sense of humor when she’s assigned to care for Max Carter—the cold-hearted billionaire who once made her school years a waking nightmare. Max was the golden boy with the cruel smirk—the privileged heir with everything, except peace. Years later, a tragic accident leaves him scarred, not just physically but emotionally. Isolated and emotionally exiled, Max is now a man haunted by his past choices and a legacy wrapped in barbed wire. When Emilia walks back into his life, she's no longer the girl he mocked—she's the woman who might just be his undoing. Forced into each other’s orbit, what begins as a war of words slowly melts into lingering stares, late-night confessions, and an unraveling of everything they thought they knew. Max, the beast of her memories, begins to reveal the tender man beneath the mask—a man who collects poetry he never shares, who builds gardens no one sees, and who might have always loved the girl he couldn’t protect. But trust doesn’t bloom easily in thorn-covered soil. And when old enemies, buried secrets, and a scandalous inheritance come to light, Emilia must decide: can she love the man who once broke her, now that he’s the only one trying to piece her back together? A tale of enemies-to-lovers, second chances.

Amara had only ever known two things: fear and survival. Running from a past that left scars deeper than skin, she never expected to find safety — let alone love — in the arms of Rafael Moretti, the most feared man in the city’s underworld. Ruthless, powerful, and haunted by his own demons, Rafael never imagined someone like Amara could slip past the armor he wore like a second skin. Saving her was never part of his plan. Needing her was never supposed to happen. But when her past comes hunting and his enemies see her as his one weakness, Rafael will stop at nothing to protect her — even if it means burning down the world they know. As danger tightens its noose around them, Amara and Rafael fight for a love that was forged in chaos and baptized in blood. Together, they will build a sanctuary — a home, a family, and a future no one can ever take from them. In a world where trust is a weapon and love is the most dangerous risk of all, will they find their forever — or will the past destroy them before they ever have the chance?

With God as her witness, Holly Sullivan had always been a good girl. Taken in by the Hoffman family at a young age, she had spent eighteen years longing for a way to repay Ronald Hoffman's kindness and the life he gave her. However, she could not bring herself to accept the marriage proposal he put forward—not when her heart already belonged, entirely and irreversibly, to Luke Hoffman. On the night of her eighteenth birthday, Luke—drunk and dangerously charming—lured her into bed. From that moment on, it was not just her heart she had given away. She gave him everything.

My name is Greyson Langley-just call me Lang. I'm a heavy-metal band player who just back from a concert tour. On my Clofus campus, I reunited with my friends and my beautiful four crushes. Later, I heard about the largest prostitution complex in South East Asia was threatened by being evicted by the government. There, I met a prostitute with a golden voice with a dark past. So, I promised to free her from that despicable valley. Later, I found myself torn between five different women in five irreconcilable lives. The deeper I became involved in their lives, I catapulted into the intrigues of a world that threatens my life and may shatter my heart. And even my nation's democracy. One day, I found a diary written by my grandfather, which made me enlightened also threatened. Stranded amid love, danger, passion, and violence, I should choose between myself, my lover, or my nation. What I begin in compulsion now becomes my urgent need. Come, read my story ... If you dare! WARNING: This story contains adult, explicit, disturbing, and sensitive material. Reader discretion is advised.

This is the darkest kind of story - pull at it and you will bleed. Be ready for consequences. The deeper you read, the harder it will clutch at you. A violent night. Two lives shattered. One child plucked from the river and hidden away. Years of running, of fierce protection, of desperate love that wears the face of a wound. When the disease drags them back to the city that stole everything, the past wakes like a predator. He is a monster wrapped in grief - magnetic, ruthless, and obsessed. She is the woman who saved a life and raised a devil of her own making, unaware that the blood she shields belongs to the man who destroyed her world. He does not know; she does not know. Fate will tell them both.

After being kicked out of his family home because of his sexuality, Jackson Stroud is left with nothing but his pride. Desperate for a place to stay, he posts a tweet offering his body in exchange for shelter. Charles Thorne, a ruthless billionaire CEO, offers Jackson a temporary place in his luxurious mansion, under one condition: Jackson must be his bedmate. The arrangement quickly spirals into something neither expected. Will Jackson be able to resist falling for Charles, or will their toxic bond become too powerful to break?