THE TROUBLE WITH TIMBER FALLS

She’s a color-coded city event planner whose biggest client just walked, whose professional confidence is cracked, and whose boss sent her to a Colorado mountain town she’s never heard of to produce a centennial festival on a gutted budget. She has six weeks, a wall of spreadsheets, and zero interest in being charmed by anyone.

Then a flooded town hall forces her into the restoration workshop of a sawdust-covered carpenter who thinks her fog machine is a personal insult to his grandmother’s festival — and the only thing more combustible than sawdust and espresso is the tension between two people who argue about string light placement like it’s a blood sport.

Before she can produce the festival and get the promotion that takes her back to Denver, there’s a workshop that smells like cedar and old tools, a town that has opinions about everything including her oat milk, a diner owner who keeps feeding her whether she ordered or not, a grandmother who built this festival forty years ago and is watching with specific interest, and a man who drives twenty minutes for her coffee order and builds her a custom desk without being asked — because his love language is acts of service and he doesn’t know how to stop.

She’s spent seven years building a career that proves she belongs in the room. He’s spent his whole life building things for other people and never asking for anything back. Six weeks of shared workspace and festival chaos is about to wreck every wall they’ve built — and the leave-or-stay question has no answer that doesn’t cost one of them everything.

Small-town romance with aspen gold, woodsmoke, and a carpenter who speaks fluent acts of service. The kind of book that makes readers want to move to Colorado, marry a man who builds things, and never attend another corporate event again.

WHY THIS WILL SELL

→ Small Town Romance (6.4 sales-to-comp ratio, Hot Mainstream) is one of the most consistent and high-volume performers in all of Romance — sitting above Mafia, Sports, and Billionaire subcategories on daily sales volume

→ Enemies to Lovers remains Hot Mainstream (4.5 ratio) despite increased competition — the -145% trend signals that execution quality and trope stacking are the differentiator, and this book delivers both

→ Grumpy/sunshine layered over enemies-to-lovers and forced proximity is a proven trifecta — adding fish-out-of-water gives the sunshine character a built-in growth arc without softening her competence

→ Festival-saving external plot creates a ticking clock that maintains pacing and justifies forced proximity without manufactured drama

→ San Juan Mountains of Colorado during fall taps proven reader appetite for seasonal, place-specific romance — strong cover and marketing hook with high shareability

→ Acts-of-service love language (building a desk, driving for coffee, shoveling without asking) is the most requested emotional register on BookTok right now

TROPES:

• Grumpy / Sunshine
• Enemies to Lovers
• Forced Proximity (Shared Workshop)
• Fish Out of Water
• Workplace Rivals to Lovers
• Festival Deadline / Ticking Clock
• Acts of Service Love Language
• Craftsman Hero
• Career vs. Heart
• Dual First-Person POV
• Small Town Community
• Leave or Stay Dilemma

HEAT LEVEL: Steamy — open door, 3-4 scenes; every intimate scene advances the emotional arc

Perfect for fans of: Elsie Silver, Abby Jimenez, Lyla Sage, and Lucy Score