Must-Have Monday is a feature highlighting which of the coming week’s new releases I’m excited for. It is not meant to be a comprehensive list of all books being published that week; only those I’m interested in out of those I’m aware of! The focus is diverse SFF, but other genres sneak in occasionally too.
SEVEN books this week!
(Books are listed in order of pub date, then Adult SFF, Adult Other, YA SFF, YA Other, MG SFF.)
Genres: Queer Protagonists, Sci Fi
Representation: Bisexual MCs
Published on: 8th January 2024
Goodreads
Plagued by anxiety, medic-in-training Georgie Wicks is teetering on the brink of emotional collapse. When her settlement's trade groups, including her father, vanish under mysterious circumstances, the future of her home hangs in the balance. Now, she must risk everything and venture beyond the walls into a dangerous, mutated version of a world she once knew.
Adam Kulyk is a quick-witted survivor with a lethal knack for sniping. His fierce determination to protect Oliver, the last bastion of peace in his life, fuels his relentless survival instinct. But beneath his cheerful facade, Adam grapples with addiction and past trauma that threatens to consume him entirely.
When their paths collide, Georgie discovers the deadly fungus that decimated humanity is not the only danger lurking in the shadows. With not only her home but the entire city on the line, the stakes are higher than she could've ever imagined
One is driven by the hope of saving humanity, the other is scarred by its cruelty and indifferent to its survival. Now, they must find strength in their differences to protect their loved ones and find a way through the looming darkness-or risk being devoured by it.
Fungal apocalypses do not sound fun! Well, not to live through, anyway. To read about? Perhaps! Adam especially sounds like an interesting character…
Genres: Fantasy, Portal Fantasy
Representation: Secondary queer and BIPOC characters
Published on: 9th January 2024
Goodreads
Dinosaurs and portals, and a girl who can find both in the latest book in the Hugo and Nebula Award-Winning series.
Antsy is the latest student to pass through the doors at Eleanor West's School for Wayward Children.
When her fellow students realize that Antsy's talent for finding absolutely anything may extend to doors, she's forced to flee in the company of a small group of friends, looking for a way back to the Shop Where the Lost Things Go to be sure that Vineta and Hudson are keeping their promise.
Along the way, temptations are dangled, decisions are reinforced, and a departure to a world populated by dinosaurs brings untold dangers and one or two other surprises!
A story that reminds us that finding what you want doesn't always mean finding what you need.
NEW WAYWARD CHILDREN BOOK NEW WAYWARD CHILDREN BOOK NEW WAYWARD CHILDREN BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOK!!! Do I really need to say anything else?
Well, maybe a couple of things: first off, this is not a good book to start with, if you’re not already familiar with the series; secondly, this is not a dinosaur book. From what McGuire’s said about it, we’re only going to get a glimpse of dinosaurs, they won’t be featured. So don’t dive into Mislaid in Parts Half-Known expecting The Land Before Time, okay?
I’m very worried about people judging this book unfairly, being disappointed by it and blaming it for that disappointment, all because the marketing department was stupid enough to set up false expectations with that cover.
Personally, I can’t wait to see how this one goes. Eee!
Genres: Fantasy, Historical Fantasy, Magical Realism
Representation: Desi MC
Published on: 9th January 2024
Goodreads
Rebecca meets Fatima Farheen Mirza in this sweeping, gorgeously atmospheric novel about a ruined mansion by the sea, the djinn that haunts it, and a curious girl who unearths the tragedy that happened there a hundred years previous
Akbar Manzil was once a grand estate off the coast of South Africa. Now, nearly a century since it was built, it stands in an isolated boardinghouse for misfits, seeking to forget their pasts and disappear into the mansions dark corridors.
Until Sana. She and her father are the latest of Akbar Manzil’s long list of tenants, seeking a new home after suffering painful loss. Unlike the others, who choose not to look too closely at the mansion’s unsettling qualities—the strange assortment of bones in the overgrown garden, the mysterious figure seen to move sometimes at night—she is curious and questioning and finds herself irresistibly drawn to the history of the mansion. To the eerie and forgotten East Wing, home to a clutter of broken and abandoned objects—and to the locked door at its end, unopened for decades.
Behind the door is a bedroom frozen in time, with faded photographs of a couple in love and a worn diary that whispers of a dark the long-forgotten story of a young woman named Meena, the original owner’s second wife, who died there tragically a hundred years ago. Watching Sana from the room’s shadows is a grieving djinn, an invisible spirit who once loved Meena and has haunted the mansion since her mysterious death. Obsessed with Meena’s story, and unaware of the creature that follows her, Sana digs into the past like fingers into a wound, awakening the memories of the house itself—and dredging up old and terrible secrets that will change the lives of everyone living and dead at Akbar Manzil.
Sublime, heart-wrenching, and lyrically stunning, The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years is a haunting, a love story, and a mystery, all twined beautifully into one young girl’s search for belonging.
I’m a little unclear on whether this’ll be historical fantasy or more magical realism – I’m hoping for the former, but the early reviews have been very contradictory. Fingers crossed!
Genres: Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy
Published on: 9th January 2024
Goodreads
The last witch on Earth takes on interdimensional invaders, tentacled overlords, and local politics in this fun, funny, and fast-paced urban fantasy series.
The witch of Tophet County has three primary Kentucky bourbon, Amish romance novels . . . and protecting her true identity from the chthonic monsters who rule humanity with an iron tentacle.
Despite her best efforts to get fired, the witch is trapped in a draconian, century-long contract that condemns her to work for the Archons of the Nether Realms in the banal misery of county government. But when she accidentally pleases her many-armed overlords, the Dread Lord of Human Resources curses her with an unwanted promotion. And it involves meetings.
As she enters a new bureaucratic hellscape, the witch is assigned to lead a task force investigating recent attacks on senior Archons. Fortunately, her boss has offered her a if she solves the case, they’ll knock fifteen years off her sentence. And if that doesn’t work out, well, she just might have to find a way to help take down the tentaclarchy—or else be doomed to permanent civil servitude . . .
Filled with quick-witted banter, hilariously relatable office politics, and fantastically original characters, The Witch of Tophet County is Lovecraft meets Parks and Recreation—an explosive start to a new series guaranteed to have you glued to your seat until the very last page.
The first volume of the hit horror fantasy series—with more than 100,000 views on Royal Road—now available on Kindle, Kindle Unlimited, and Audible!
“[The Witch of Tophet County] explores zany situations with a large cast of strange characters, effectively playing off the concept of an office in a fantasy realm.” —Kirkus Reviews
It’s always a good sign when there’s a raccoon on the cover! This sounds like a lot of fun – I mean, anything that uses the term ‘tentaclarchy’ is something I definitely have to read!
Published on: 9th January 2024
Goodreads
From the author of Mr. Malcolm's List comes a delightful romantic comedy set in Regency England about a widow who takes high society by storm.
Diana Boyle, a wealthy young widow, has no desire to ever marry again. Particularly not to someone who merely wants her for her fortune.
So when she discovers that she’s listed in a directory of rich, single women she is furious, and rightly so. She confronts Maxwell Dean, the man who published the Bachelor’s Directory, and is horrified to find he is far more attractive than his actions have led her to expect.
However, Diana is unmoved by Max’s explanation that he authored the list to assist younger sons like himself who cannot afford to marry unless it’s to a woman of means.
She gathers the ladies in the directory together to inform them of its existence, so they may circumvent fortune hunters’ efforts to trick them into marriage. Though outraged, the women decide to embrace their unique position of power and reverse the usual gender roles by making the men dance to their tune. And together… the ladies rewrite the rules.
I mostly stick to SFF, but I sometimes enjoy Romance novels, especially ones that are a bit nontraditional – which this one might be? I definitely love the idea of swapping gender roles, especially in a historical setting! Very intrigued to see what that ends up looking like in this story!
Genres: Fantasy
Representation: South Asian-coded setting and cast
Published on: 9th January 2024
Goodreads
Seventeen-year-old Krescent Dune is buried under the weight of her dead parents’ debt and the ruinous legacy they left behind. The only way she can earn enough money to escape her unforgiving island is by battling monstrous creatures in an underground fighting pit. After a fight goes terribly wrong, she’s banned from the pits. Now hopeless, she is offered a deal: in exchange for the erasure of her debts, she must join and protect a hunting party for a rescue mission deep within the mining caves beneath the island.
Krescent is determined to keep her head down and fulfill her role as the dutiful bodyguard, even though she is trapped underground with her childhood enemy and a company of people who would gladly kill her if they knew who her parents were. As they come across creatures she believed only existed in legends, it becomes clear they are in far more danger than she could have imagined. But someone doesn’t want her to make it out alive. And she’ll have to figure out who before she’s left alone… in the dark.
From the author of Monsters Born and Made comes an action-packed South Asian inspired fantasy that will have your heart racing at every turn.
More tentacles! Probably scarier ones; Somewhere In the Deep looks like it’s going to be more serious in tone than Witch of Tophet County. But it is, allegedly, not outright Horror, so I’ll probably be checking it out!
Genres: Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Brown cast, pansexual MC
Published on: 12th January 2024
Goodreads
From the author of the critically-acclaimed fantasy novel A TASTE OF GOLD AND IRON comes a sequel/spinoff novella about loyalty and grief:
Long before Tadek Hasira ever made it to the Gold Court to serve as one of the royal family’s elite bodyguards and servants, he was nothing more than a grubby street urchin in the poorest district of the capital city—that is, until her Highness, the Crown Princess Mihrişah, held out her hand in kindness, lifted him out of his circumstances, and gave him a future to dream of.
But that was twenty years ago, and tragedy befell the palace only a few years into Tadek’s training. Ever since, Tadek held his unwavering love and loyalty to his princess in silence. No one knows what she was to him, and he is prepared to carry that secret for the rest of his life...
Unless someone—the right person—happens to find him standing vigil at her portrait.
I CAN’T BELIEVE WE’RE GETTING A NEW WAYWARD CHILDREN BOOK AND A PREQUEL/SEQUEL TO A TASTE OF GOLD AND IRON IN THE SAME WEEK!!! I feel very, very spoiled and I’m very okay with that!
Will you be reading any of these? Let me know!
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