Nora Roberts

If you read romance and you've somehow never picked up a Nora Roberts, the librarian in me wants to fix that immediately. She has written hundreds of bestsellers and has more than a billion books in print, and what's remarkable is the range: contemporary love stories, romantic suspense, sprawling family sagas, and trilogy after interconnected trilogy. Under the name J.D. Robb she also writes the long-running 'In Death' series, blending near-future police procedural with a central love story.

What makes her a perennial recommendation is craft. The relationships are grounded, the dialogue snaps, and the plots actually hold together. Heat levels vary by book — generally warm rather than explicit — but the emotional payoff is consistent. She's the author I hand to someone who says they don't usually read romance.

• For readers who want expertly crafted romance across many subgenres
• Warm, emotionally grounded heat — rarely explicit
• Famous for her trilogies and, as J.D. Robb, the 'In Death' series