28-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Cosmopolitan
Read Jennifer Lynn Barnes' ‘Glorious Rivals' Excerpt
Jennifer Lynn Barnes is back with another game that will certainly keep us at the edge of our seat as we find out what happens after The Grandest Game. In this sequel, which also continues the Inheritance Games series, the game has begun, but how far are each of the seven contestants willing to go for the special prize? Of course, we're going to immediately going to pick up a copy to see what Jennifer has come up with next!
Cosmopolitan has an exclusive look at Glorious Rivals by Jennifer Lynn Barnes, which is set to be released on July 29, 2025. With the grand prize up for grabs and everything on the line, how far are these seven strangers willing to go to win it all? Here's some more info from our friends at Little, Brown Books for Young Readers:
Don't worry, we gained access to the Hawthorne vault to get a special look at what we can expect next and, trust us, you won't believe how this new book kicks off. Check out a special excerpt below! Just make sure to pre-order Glorious Rivals and check out Jennifer Lynn Barnes's other reads as well!
An Excerpt From Glorious RivalsBy Jennifer Lynn Barnes
Kissing Grayson Hawthorne felt like stepping out of time. Nothing else existed. Not the ground beneath Lyra's feet. Not the ruins or the cliffs. Just this. Every place their bodies touched. His lips and hers. A jagged breath— this.
The right kind of disaster just waiting to happen, Odette's voice whispered in Lyra's memory. A Hawthorne and a girl who has every reason to stay away from Hawthornes.
As if he'd heard Lyra's thoughts, Grayson pulled his lips slowly back from hers. 'I usually have more control than this,' he said, his voice achingly low.
'I usually have better sense,' Lyra replied, keenly aware of just how close her lips still were to his— and how close the two of them were to a repeat performance. That kiss, their first, their only, had been earth-shattering.
It had also almost certainly been a mistake.
The wind off the ocean picked up behind Lyra, sending her ponytail flying into her face— and his. Grayson tamed her long hair, pushing it back, and as he did, the wind calmed, too, so suddenly and completely that Lyra couldn't shake the illogical thought that he had calmed it through sheer force of will.
An alarm went off in the back of Lyra's mind. This wasGrayson Hawthorne.
And even if he wasn't the cold, above‑it‑all, asshole rich boy she'd thought him to be twenty-four hours earlier, he was still a Hawthorne. His blood wasn't just blue; it was practically cerulean. And soon enough, the Grandest Game would be over, and promises or not, Lyra and Grayson Hawthorne would go back to being what they'd always been: little more than strangers . . . with every reason to stay away from each other.
Neither one of you knows what you think you know. Another of Odette's warnings echoed through Lyra's memory, but even that couldn't distract her from the fact that she was still so close to Grayson that she could feel his every breath on her skin.
'We should try to get some sleep before phase two,' Lyra said. The words came out throaty and low. She'd been aiming for practical. They'd been given twelve hours to recover from the first phase of the game. So far, Lyra hadn't managed anything resembling respite.
'We should,' Grayson agreed, but instead of putting even a modicum of space between them, he brushed the knuckles of his right hand lightly over her cheek, stealing her next breath like a born thief. 'I meant what I said, Lyra. We'll figure this out— the game and all the rest.'
The rest. That was the understatement of the century, and even just thinking the words had others ringing through Lyra's mind. A Hawthorne did this.
A Hawthorne.
Omega.
There are always three.
Lyra took a step back. Maybe with a little more distance, she'd be able to breathe, to think, to focus on what came next. The two of them were standing on what had once been the cliffside patio of a glorious mansion that was nothing but ruins now, a charred and visible reminder of the way even the grandest things could be reduced to ashes.
'Someone sent me here.' Lyra focused on that. 'Someone put me in this game, and whoever that person is— they know about my father. I'm someone's pawn.' Lyra looked away from Grayson's pale and piercing eyes. 'Or a weapon. Or a bomb.'
That was the logical conclusion, wasn't it? That the person who'd sent her that ticket had put Lyra in the Grandest Game because of her history with the Hawthorne family? Because of her father's death.
Because of Alice Hawthorne's role in it.
'You are no one's weapon, Lyra,' Grayson said, his tone making it perfectly clear just how rarely he lost arguments of any kind, 'bomb or otherwise, and you are certainly not a pawn.'
'Then what am I?' Lyra retorted, her gaze returning to his like a homing missile.
'You are lethal,' Grayson said quietly, 'in the best possible way.'
Where did he get off saying something like that and sounding, for all the world, like he meant it? Lyra went to take another step back, but Grayson reached for her shoulder, and the next thing she knew, he'd reversed their positions. Now Grayson was the one standing with his back to the cliff's edge, and Lyra had the magnificent ocean view.
He'd just put himself between her and the drop-off. 'I don't need your protection, Hawthorne.'
Grayson arched a brow. 'Agree to disagree.'
The wind off the ocean picked up again. A front rolling in. A slight shiver passed through Lyra's body. Eyeing her, Grayson undid the top button on the jacket of his fits-like‑a‑glove suit. The middle button was next.
'What are you doing?' Lyra asked. She wasn't just talking about his suit jacket, and he was perceptive enough to know that. What are we doing?
'I would think the answer apparent.' Grayson undid the final button on his jacket, and then . . .
The jacket came off, and Lyra's body remembered: My lips and yours. A jagged breath.
'You'd better not be planning on offering me that jacket.' Lyra steeled her voice.
'You're cold.' Grayson's lips curved. 'And I believe that I have already acquainted you with the fact that when I encounter a problem, I solve it.'
This was about so much more than the damn jacket. It was about his family and hers and an unknown threat. It was about the fact that Odette Morales, the one person who might have known some fraction of the big picture here, had given up her spot in the Grandest Game— and her chance at millions— because of the danger that Lyra and Grayson somehow represented.
The right kind of disaster just waiting to happen.
'I don't need your jacket,' Lyra told Grayson.
'Perhaps I need to give it to you,' Grayson suggested. 'Chivalry. It's a coping mechanism.'
'I'm warning you, Hawthorne: If you try to put that jacket around my shoulders, I'm taking mine off and giving it to you.' To make her point, Lyra lifted a hand to the zipper on her own athletic jacket— which, to be fair, was more of an outer shirt.
Grayson took a moment to assess whether or not she was bluffing.
Lyra was not bluffing.
'Consider me warned,' Grayson replied archly. He slipped his suit jacket back on.
Lyra narrowed her eyes. 'Why do I feel like I lost this argument?' she said.
'Because,' Grayson replied, 'I'm still standing between you and the edge of the cliff.'
Copyright © 2025 by Jennifer Lynn Barnes. From GLORIOUS RIVALS, by Jennifer Lynn Barnes. Reprinted by permission of Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, a Division of Hachette Book Group.
Glorious Rivals, by Jennifer Lynn Barnes will be released on July 29, 2025. To preorder the book, click on the retailer of your choice:
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