There are always so many books to look forward to each year. So in this post, we tackle the impossible task of choosing some favorites that we’re most excited about in the next twelve months!
Serena’s Picks
Another year’s worth of books to look forward to, and, as always, I had such a hard time narrowing this down to only five titles. All of these happen to be books by authors whose books I have already loved, but there are also a bunch of debuts that look incredibly interesting! Some standouts (these include debut authors and also authors who I myself haven’t read yet) are “Weavingshaw” by Heba Al-Wasity, “Daughter of Crows” by Mark Lawrence, “Thistlemarsh” by Moorea Corrigan, and “The Geomagician” by Jennifer Mandula. There are also a bunch more books coming out from favorite authors of mine that didn’t make the dedicated list, and some of those would include “Agnes Aubert’s Mystical Cat Shelter’ by Heather Fawcett, “A Trade of Blood” by Robert Jackson Bennett, “This Kingdom Will Not Kill Me” by Ilona Andrews, “The Eye of Leviathan” by M.A. Carrick, and “Entwined” by H. M. Long.
Note: Yes, this first one is a sequel to a book I haven’t yet reviewed on the blog! But that review should be coming here in the next two weeks and, spoiler alert, I absolutely loved it!
Book: “The Half-Hearted Queen” by Charlie N. Holmberg
Publication Date: March 3, 2026
Book Summary: Nym never told Prince Renn she loved him. And now, as a captive and political pawn to the ruthless King Nicosia, Nym finds herself guarding more than her forbidden feelings for Renn as the kingdoms of Cansere and Sesta clash and the bloodshed of war rages. Nym’s connection to Renn is more than just romantic—it’s magical, and King Nicosia will stop at nothing to find Renn’s weakness and claim the kingdoms as his.
Now Nym must find a way to escape the cruel and twisted fate of imprisonment as she faces the unimaginable horrors and dangerous secrets hidden within King Nicosia’s palace walls. With the succession of kings on the line and a dangerous prophecy unfolding, Prince Renn faces his own impossible choice. The future of the throne hinges on a political alliance that means forsaking his love for Nym. If he can’t fulfill his destiny and unite the kingdoms, King Nicosia will destroy them all.
Book: “Wolf Worm” by T. Kingfisher
Publication Date: March 24, 2026
Book Summary: The year is 1899 and Sonia Wilson is a scientific illustrator without work, prospects, or hope. When the reclusive Dr. Halder offers her a position illustrating his vast collection of insects, Sonia jumps at the chance to move to his North Carolina manor house and put her talents to use. But soon enough she finds that there are darker things at work than the Carolina woods. What happened to her predecessor, Halder’s wife? Why are animals acting so strangely, and what is behind the peculiar local whispers about “blood thiefs?”
With the aid of the housekeeper and a local healer, Sonia discovers that Halder’s entomological studies have taken him down a dark road full of parasitic maggots that burrow into human flesh, and that his monstrous experiments may grow to encompass his newest illustrator as well.
Book: “The Tapestry of Fate” by Shannon Chakraborty
Publication Date: May 19, 2026
Book Summary: Amina al-Sirafi thinks she’s struck gold. Tasked with hunting down magical artifacts for the council of immortal peris, she can savour the occasional adventure on the high seas with her cherished criminal companions while still returning home to raise her beloved daughter.
But when Raksh, the spirit of discord with whom she is reluctantly wed, provokes the council’s wrath, Amina is charged with a seemingly impossible quest: steal a spindle capable of rewriting fate from a mysterious sorceress on an island no one can escape.
Forced to leave her daughter, Amina finds her mission almost immediately thrown into peril. But deadly storms, an erratic poison mistress, and old enemies are the least of her worries. For the peris’ story is unravelling, hinting at a far deadlier game whose rules Amina must swiftly puzzle out. A game that sets her against an adversary more cunning and powerful than she has ever faced.
A game that not everyone on her crew wants her to win.
Book: “The Unicorn Hunters” by Katherine Arden
Publication Date: June 2, 2026
Book Summary: Anne of Brittany was a child when her realm was invaded, her home besieged, and her royal father driven to his death.
Now her treasury is empty, her land occupied by her enemies, and she is ordered, under threat of renewed war, to become queen of her conquerors and marry the King of France.This marriage means her country’s annexation. But Anne promised her father that Brittany would never be conquered.
Defiantly, she betroths herself in secret to France’s greatest enemy. But in a world where courts may spy on each other by magic, there is only one way to solemnize this illicit union.
Anne takes her court deep into a legendary forest, where the court diviners’ skill cannot reach. The world thinks they are only a hunting party, coursing after unicorns. But that is a lie, a trick, a feint. No one in living memory has seen a unicorn. All Anne wants is this secret wedding, which is her only hope of salvation.
But when against all hope a unicorn appears and a stranger out of legend stumbles from the trees and falls at her feet, Anne is plunged into a world of enchantment where a doomed sovereign might find the power to change her own and her country’s destiny—or be lost in the shadows forever.
Book: “The Art of Charming a Changeling” by Sylvie Cathrall
Publication Date: August 25, 2026
Book Summary: On her first day working in the prince’s galleries, art conservator Florrie Hyverfell discovers that the most famous portrait in the collection is not only a fake-it’s also inhabited by Vern, a fairy trapped in the forged painting.
Tracking down the stolen original is the only way for Florrie to save her job and for Vern to escape his canvas. Yet as they journey to a famed fairy museum to find the missing artwork, Florrie finds herself taking more than an art historical interest in the changeling painting’s charming inhabitant.
Kate’s Picks
It’s always fun to look and see what books are coming out in a new year, and given that this year is already off to a crazy start (derogatory), I have been enjoying setting time aside from current events to look and see what kinds of stories I can dive into when the time comes. And while it’s true that a lot of my most anticipated books of the year are authors I have a solid love for already, there are a few new authors that are also catching my eye. It’s always hard to narrow it down to just a few choices, so some honorary mentions are of course in order. On the horror front I’m excited for “Maria the Wanted” by V. Castro, “The Curse of Hester Gardens” by Tamika Thompson, and “Molka” by Monika Kim. For thrillers my eyes are on, “The Unknown” by Riley Sager, “The Intrigue” by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, and “Hot Girl Murder Club” by Ashley Winstead. And I can’t forget that Jennette McCurdy has her debut fiction novel “Half His Age” coming out too!
Book: “Yesteryear” by Caro Claire Burke
Publication Date: April 7, 2026
Book Description: My name was Natalie Heller Mills, and I was perfect at being alive.
Natalie lives a traditional lifestyle. Her charming farmhouse is rustic, her husband a handsome cowboy, her six children each more delightful than the last. So what if there are nannies and producers behind the scenes, her kitchen hiding industrial-grade fridges and ovens, her husband the Republican equivalent of a Kennedy? What Natalie’s followers—all 8 million of them—don’t know won’t hurt them. And The Angry Women? The privileged, Ivy League, coastal elite haters who call her an antifeminist iconoclast? They’re sick with jealousy. Because Natalie isn’t simply living the good life, she’s living the ideal—and just so happens to be building an empire from it.
Until one morning she wakes up in a life that isn’t hers. Her home, her husband, her children—they’re all familiar, but something’s off. Her kitchen is warmed by a sputtering fire rather than electricity, her children are dirty and strange, and her soft-handed husband is suddenly a competent farmer. Just yesterday Natalie was curating photos of homemade jam for her Instagram, and now she’s expected to haul firewood and handwash clothes until her fingers bleed. Has she become the unwitting star of a brutal reality show? Could it really be time travel? Is she being tested by God? By Satan? When Natalie suffers a brutal injury in the woods, she realizes two things: This is not her beautiful life, and she must escape by any means possible.
A gripping, electrifying novel that is as darkly funny as it is frightening, Yesteryear is a gimlet-eyed look at tradition, fame, faith, and the grand performance of womanhood.
Book: “Japanese Gothic” by Kylie Lee Baker
Publication Date: April 21, 2026
Book Description: October, 2026: Lee Turner doesn’t remember how or why he killed his college roommate. The details are blurred and bloody. All he knows is he has to flee New York and go to the one place that might offer refuge—his father’s new home in Japan, a house hidden by sword ferns and wild ginger. But something is terribly wrong with the house: no animals will come near it, the bedroom window isn’t always a window, and a woman with a sword appears in the yard when night falls.
October, 1877: Sen is a young samurai in exile, hiding from the imperial soldiers in a house behind the sword ferns. A monster came home from war wearing her father’s face, but Sen would do anything to please him, even turn her sword on her own mother. She knows the soldiers will soon slaughter her whole family when she sees a terrible omen: a young foreign man who appears outside her window.
One of these people is a ghost, and one of these stories is a lie.
Something is hiding beneath the house of sword ferns, and Lee and Sen will soon wish they never unburied it.
Book: “It Came From Neverland” by Cynthia Pelayo
Publication Date: June 9, 2026
Book Description: Peter Pan meets Stephen King’s It in this twisted horror retelling of a classic childhood fairytale set during WWI.
1914, Wendy Darling works by day as a school teacher and by night, she assists soldiers who have returned home from the Western Front. There is one mysterious patient who despite all the care they’ve given him, is in a deep sleep, unable to wake up. One night, when he murmurs the words “Peter Pan,” Wendy is thrown back to a darker time, one that she wishes she could forget.
When one of her students goes missing, it brings back memories of when children went missing and were later found murdered in London many years ago. Wendy believes that Peter Pan, the entity that she believed killed those children, is back. She and her brothers had a close encounter with Peter Pan, after all. But her brothers only remember Peter Pan and Neverland as a fantasy of childhood games.
When another child goes missing and signs start to point to Wendy, Scotland Yard digs into old reports, finding that Wendy knew the names of all the children who had been killed. As Wendy tries to prove her innocence, she also has to find a way to stop Peter Pan once and for all.
Book: “You First” by Caroline Kepnes
Publication Date: June 9, 2026
Book Description: How did Joe Goldberg become Joe Goldberg? What led to his first love…first obsession…first kill? Find out in the highly anticipated prequel to New York Times bestselling author Caroline Kepnes’s hit You series, which inspired the blockbuster Netflix show.
Joe Goldberg is ready for his life to start. He’s seventeen years old, working in Mr. Mooney’s bookshop, falling in love with every girl on the subway all while wondering who will be the one. He knows what he A woman who will force him to get his GED, go to night school, and make something of himself. But who would ever fall in love with him?
Then he spots MISSED CONNECTION, NYC Bookstore Babe.
Someone is looking for Joe. And that someone is Vail Gunderson, a production assistant with a passion for rom-coms. The only she’s twenty-four, which means that Joe has no choice but to lie about his age…and, naturally, nearly everything else in his life. Joe thinks he’s found true love, but when Vail needs more convincing that Joe is her happily ever after, he’s determined to convince her…no matter what it takes…
With her incisive and darkly comedic prose, Caroline Kepnes captures Joe poised on the edge of manhood, entering the vicious, dog-eat-dog New York dating scene for the very first time, and buffeted by forces that will determine what kind of man he will become—and how he will write his own twisted love story.
Book: “What Feeds Below” by Tatiana Schlote-Bonne
Publication Date: October 6, 2026
Book Description: The darkness isn’t empty. It’s hungry.
At the edge of the City of the Void, a massive chasm extends miles into the earth, its treacherous terrain overrun with vicious monsters and carnivorous plants. For orphaned best friends Petra and Jade, guiding treasure-seeking tourists down into the Void is the only way to earn enough to pull themselves up out of the slums for good.
Petra prefers to play it safe and take jobs only in the Void’s upper levels, where the dangers are better understood, while Jade wants to risk a descent to the deepest and most mysterious Sixth Layer. Because the deeper they go, the better the payout, and the sooner their dreams can become reality. Their friendship is Petra’s whole world, and Jade’s approval means everything—so Petra agrees to do it Jade’s way.
When their job goes wrong and Jade is lost in the Void, Petra must plunge deeper than she’s ever dared to save her friend. But she doesn’t know the truth of the Void . . . or what really waits for her in its depths.
What books are you all looking forward to this year? Let us know in the comments!
The Library Ladies 