Balanced

Obviously any great fic will have elements of fluff, angst, and smut. I'm organizing these lists based on what is the MOST prevalent aspect of the fic.

These fics strike a nice balance between all three categories which is why they ended up here.

The Courtship

Author: Lilyofthevolume

Time Period: Regency

Rating: Explicit

Status: Complete

Words: 118,779

Chapters: 21

Series: Part 2 of Partners. Lovers. Friends.

Summary: Colin and Penelope return to Mayfair ready to court properly before announcing their engagement.

However, their plans for a scandal free season culminating in a perfect wedding are interrupted at every turn. Will our favorite couple rise to the challenges presented by society or will they trip before ever making it down the aisle?

Dance Card

Author: Katie_500, Stillpink

Time Period: Regency

Rating: Mature

Status: Complete

Words: 36,712

Chapters: 10

Summary: Penelope never expected to spend her first season with the Bridgertons.

And Colin never expected that the young debutant would capture his heart, one dance at a time.

Five Feet To Be Exact

Author: KatofKanals

Time Period: Modern

Rating: Explicit

Status: Complete

Words: 70,804

Chapters: 19

Summary: Colin Bridgerton is a jet-setting 28-year-old travel writer and social media influencer. He’s constantly moving from place to place and person to person. That’s the way he likes it. Everything changes when a skiing accident has him stuck back in London in his childhood home for several months while he recovers. One good thing about being home, however, is his proximity to Penelope Featherington. They’ve been good friends for years, but this newfound consistency of his presence and communication between them brings some feelings that have been simmering for a long time finally to the surface.

A Gentleman's Guide to Planning the Perfect Romantic Getaway

Author: KatofKanals

Time Period: Modern

Rating: Explicit

Status: Complete

Words: 94,687

Chapters: 14

Summary: Colin Bridgerton is a rather popular travel influencer on Instagram and contributor to GQ magazine. He goes home for the holidays to visit his family after a particularly long stretch abroad. Somehow, he ends up going on an all-expenses paid trip to a little slice of heaven in the Caribbean with his best friend, Penelope Featherington. He’s not used to traveling with another person, but he finds himself rather looking forward to the time away with her even if he’s not sure what to expect. He expects it will all go according to plan. What could possibly go wrong when embarking on a trip with your best friend after all?

Penelope works in a junior position at a publishing house in London, scraping her way financially through young adulthood. She’s also doing her best to get over her decade plus long infatuation with her best friend Eloise Bridgerton’s older brother Colin. Somehow, she finds herself agreeing to accompany him on a trip to Turks and Caicos after the Christmas holiday. She doesn’t know how she’ll manage it, but Penelope is determined to ensure this trip goes smoothly and that she doesn’t let her heart get ahead of her brain. She and Colin will never be together romantically. Not in a million years.

I'm Having His Baby

Author: KatofKanals

Time Period: Modern

Rating: Explicit

Status: Complete

Words: 140,795

Chapters: 26

Summary: Penelope Featherington has a drunken one-night stand with her best friend, Colin Bridgerton, and there are major consequences. They now have to figure out how to mend the pieces of their broken friendship all while navigating this complicated and life-changing journey they've found themselves on together.

An Officer and a Gentleman

Author: Allthatwehaveshared

Time Period: Regency

Rating: Explicit

Status: Complete

Words: 20,702

Chapters: 8

Summary: Coming back from Number Five, the situation looked grim indeed. The last letters from Colin had been received six weeks ago. It was so unlike him. Penelope was convinced something was wrong. Very wrong. Although she was well aware of the dangers of travelling to war-torn countries, to say nothing of the voyage across the temperamental Channel, she made a rather rash decision to pack her bag and book a passage from London to Bordeaux, Colin’s last known location.

But will she find what she was looking for?

One of Me Is Cute, But Two Though?

Author: KatofKanals

Time Period: Modern

Rating: Explicit

Status: Complete

Words: 129,202

Chapters: 19

Series: Part 2 of The Short n'Sweet World

Summary: Initially brought together by a chain of events set off by a skiing accident, Colin and Penelope Bridgerton are now married and blissfully in love. Two years after the wedding, the young couple have some new beginnings to navigate. Alongside them throughout their journey are the two strong, motherly figures in their lives: Violet Bridgerton and Agatha Danbury. Changes are in store for all four of them in the coming year and they'll need to come together and support each other along the way.

This is a follow-up fic to Five Feet To Be Exact and picks up a few years after the epilogue. I don’t think you have to read the first one necessarily to follow along, but I’d definitely recommend it!

Our Mess

Author: Lilyofthevolume

Time Period: Regency

Rating: Explicit

Status: One Shot

Words: 5,822

Chapters: 1

Summary: Colin helps Penelope relax after a long day of sorting through issues with the Featherington estate.

Pandemic Romantic

Author: KatofKanals

Time Period: Modern

Rating: Explicit

Status: Complete

Words: 77,952

Chapters: 11

Summary: Penelope Featherington finds herself spending the pandemic lockdown at Aubrey Hall with a good number of the Bridgerton clan gathered. There's one Bridgerton that she isn't planning on seeing-- her best friend Eloise's older brother Colin. They used to be friends--very close friends. But now, they're more like strangers and she harbors a good amount of bitterness towards him. Sure enough, though, Colin Bridgerton is staying at Aubrey Hall too and she's forced to interact with him. Can Penelope and Colin repair their friendship? And can they possibly find maybe a little more for themselves than friendship along the way?

Remembering Mrs. Bridgerton

Author: Stillpink

Time Period: Regency

Rating: Mature

Status: Complete

Words: 23,639

Chapters: 12

Summary: When Colin awakens, the world as he knows it has changed.

Snowflakes in Her Eyelashes

Author: KatofKanals

Time Period: Modern

Rating: Explicit

Status: Complete

Words: 61,485

Chapters: 9

Summary: The Bridgertons are all jetting off to the Scottish Highlands for Christmas and Penelope Featherington is coming with them this year. She's a close family friend and gets along famously with each and every member (young and old) with one significant exception-- the third eldest son, Colin Bridgerton. They may have been best friends as children, but now, in their mid and late twenties, they couldn't be further from friends. These days they can't even be in the same room with one another without trading verbal jabs that intensify steadily until someone literally has to pull them apart. After a lot of deliberation, though, Penelope accepts Violet's invitation despite this fact. She figures they'll be staying in a huge house and there will be a crowd of other people to distract herself with. What she can't possibly know, however, is that the storm of the century and a series of unforeseen events are going to make that house and that crowd much, much smaller.

The Storm

Author: Lilyofthevolume

Time Period: Regency

Rating: Explicit

Status: Complete

Words: 37,400

Chapters: 11

Series: Part 1 of Partners. Lovers. Friends

Summary: Colin insists on escorting Penelope to Aubrey Hall for Christmas, even though that's the last place she wants to be. She is determined to rid herself of the Bridgertons for good and find her happiness elsewhere. However, when a carriage accident and the nastiest snow storm in years finds them trapped at a roadside Inn unchaperoned more than one secret may be revealed.

Sugar

Author: lixabiz, wantisamlindyla

Time Period: Modern

Rating: Explicit

Status: In Progress

Words: 83,246

Chapters: 19/20

Summary:

“I—” she stared up at him and said in a small voice, “it’s too much to ask of you.”

“It’s not,” Colin said firmly. “Don’t overthink it,” he urged her.

Ten minutes ago, she had no home and no chance that she would ever know where her dad was. Colin had just walked into the room and taken control of everything within a matter of minutes, like her own personal white knight.

“Just let someone take care of you for once.”

The one in which Colin slowly, inadvertently, inevitably becomes Penelope’s sugar daddy.