Sometimes I get so caught up in all the books I’ve wanted to read for so long, that I own and never read, and so on that I forget to keep up with upcoming book releases. But, after reading 100 books in 2020 with several being new releases, I’m fully addicted to the hype. So, I’m excited to put together this list of 2021 book releases in anticipation.
These upcoming 2021 book releases are so exciting that I’ll never get that TBR pile down anytime soon.
This list will continuously be updated so check back often!
January 2021 Book Releases
Your Story, My Story by Connie Palmen (Translated by Eileen J. Stevens & Anna Asbury)
Genre: Biographical Fiction
Expected Publication: January 1, 2021
My Story, Your Story was my pick for Amazon’s December First Reads, and I cannot wait to start this one. Palmen tells a fictionalized story of Ted Hughes’s relationship with Sylvia Plath – through his eyes. Amazon | Goodreads
Lore by Alexandra Bracken
Genre: YA Greek & Roman Fantasy Set In NYC
Expected Release: January 5, 2021
I love a good cover and Lore is visually stunning. As punishment for their rebellion, nine Greek gods are banished to earth as mortals. Blood descendants hunt the gods hoping to gain their powers. Amazon | Goodreads
Concrete Rose by Angie Thomas
Genre: YA 20th Century Historical Fiction Set In Mississippi
Expected Release Date: January 12, 2021
Set 17 years prior to the events in The Hate U Give, Maverick Carter deals drugs for the King Lords to support his family. At 17 and now with a child of his own on the way, he decides that he wants to forge a new path. Amazon | Goodreads
You Have a Match by Emma Lord
Genre: Contemporary Fiction
Expected Release Date: January 12, 2021
When Abby signs up for a DNA service, it’s mainly to give her friend and secret love interest, Leo, a nudge. After all, she knows who she is already: Avid photographer. Injury-prone tree climber. Best friend to Leo and Connie…although ever since the B.E.I. (Big Embarrassing Incident) with Leo, things have been awkward on that front.
But she didn’t know she’s a younger sister.
Amazon | Goodreads
Across the Green Grass Fields by Seanan McGuire
Genre: YA Fantasy
Expected Release: January 12, 2021
A young girl discovers a portal to a land filled with centaurs and unicorns in Seanan McGuire’s Across the Green Grass Fields, a standalone tale in the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning Wayward Children series.
People Like Her by Ellerly Lloyd
Genre:
Expected Release: January 12, 2021
A razor-sharp, wickedly smart suspense debut about an ambitious influencer mom whose soaring success threatens her marriage, her morals, and her family’s safety.
February 2021 Book Releases
The Four Winds By Kristin Hannah
Genre: Historical Fiction Set In Texas
Expected Release Date: February 2, 2021
I fell in love with Hannah’s writing after The Great Alone and I can’t wait to read this new book. It’s 1934 in Texas during the Great Depression and Dust Bowl Era. Elsa Martinelli must decide if she’ll stay at fight or move further out west. Amazon | Goodreads
This Close To Okay by Leesa-Cross Smith
Genre: Southern Fiction Set In Kentucky
Expected Publication: February 2, 2021
This one is sitting on my bookshelf waiting for me. It was my pick for December’s Book of the Month. Newly divorced Tallie Clark is heading home when she saves a man from jumping off of a bridge. He doesn’t know that she is a therapist. Told through both of their perspectives, these two strangers help each other through a powerful weekend. Amazon | Goodreads
Muse by Brittany Cavallaro
Genre: YA Fantasy
Expected Release: February 2, 2021
American Royals meets The Winners Curse in the first book of bestselling author Brittany Cavallaro’s new duology, set in an alternate history American monarchy where a girl grapples for control of her own life in the middle of a looming war.
The Project by Courtney Summers
Genre: YA Thriller Set In Upstate New York
Expected Publication: February 2, 2021
This one sounds so fascinating to me. When their parents die, Lo’s sister Bea joins The Unity Project — a cult disguised as a seemingly charitable organization. Can Lo expose the group or will she fall under its leader’s charm? Amazon | Goodreads
What Big Teeth by Rose Szabo
Genre: YA Gothic Fantasy
Expected Publication: February 2, 2021
Rose Szabo’s thrilling debut What Big Teeth is a dark, gothic fantasy YA novel about a teen girl who returns home to her strange, wild family after years of estrangement, perfect for fans of Wilder Girls…
The Gilded Ones by Namina Forna
Genre: YA Fantasy Set In/Inspired by West Africa
Expected Release: February 9, 2021
One of the most-anticipated fantasy 2021 new book releases, Deka fails her blood ceremony. She must decide if she wants to accept a fate worse than death or fight for the emperor in an army of young women. Amazon | Goodreads
The Witch’s Heart by Genevieve Gornichec
Genre: Fantasy, Mythology
Expected Publication Date: February 9, 2021
When a banished witch falls in love with the legendary trickster Loki, she risks the wrath of the gods in this moving, subversive debut novel that reimagines Norse mythology.
Dark Horses by Susan Mihalic
Genre: Psychological Fiction
Expected Release: February 16, 2021
This heart-pounding, can’t-take-your-eyes-off-it debut novel is set in the rolling hills of Virginia horse country, where aspiring equestrian Roan trains for the Olympics, coached by her father. From the opening scene, in which the fifteen-year-old self-treats her own UTI, we wonder: who is it who is abusing Roan, and how long has it gone on?
The Burning Girls by C.J. Tudor
Genre: Thriller
Expected Publication Date: February 9, 2021
An unconventional vicar moves to a remote corner of the English countryside, only to discover a community haunted by death and disappearances both past and present–and intent on keeping its dark secrets–in this explosive, unsettling thriller from acclaimed author C. J. Tudor.
March 2021 Book Releases
Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley
Genre: Multicultural YA
Expected Release Date: March 2, 2021
After witnessing a murder, Daunis goes undercover for the FBI. She finds herself torn apart from her community, the Ojibwe reservation, her crush on Jaime, and a potentially deceiving and harmful investigation. Amazon | Goodreads
Phoenix Flame by Sara Holland
Genre: YA Fantasy
Expected Release Date: March 2, 2021
Maddie thought her problems were over. She saved the Inn at Havenfall—a sanctuary between magical worlds—from the evil Silver Prince. But there’s more work to be done to protect the Inn—Maddie must put an end to the black-market trading of magical objects and open the Inn’s doors to the once feared land of shapeshifters.
The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner
Genre: Historical Fiction Set In London
Expected Publication: March 2, 2021
In 18th-century London, Nella sells secret poisons to women who need protection from abusive and oppressive men. In present-day London, Caroline receives a clue to the historic and unsolved apothecary murders. Amazon | Goodreads
Later by Stephen King
Genre: Paranormal Thriller Set In New York
Expected Publication: March 2, 2021
I love me some Stephen King. Jamie has the ability to see and learns things that others cannot. An NYPD detective draws Jamie into a case, forcing him to grow up more quickly. Amazon | Goodreads
Lost in the Never Woods by Aiden Thomas
Genre: YA Fantasy
Expected Release: March 23, 2021
When children go missing, people want answers. When children go missing in the small coastal town of Astoria, people look to Wendy for answers.
She’s Too Pretty to Burn by Wendy Heard
Genre: YA Thriller
Expected Release: March 30, 2021
An electric romance set against a rebel art scene sparks lethal danger for two girls in this expertly plotted YA thriller.
Of Women and Salt by Gabriela Garcia
Genre: Literary Fiction
Expected Release: March 30, 2021
A daughter’s fateful choice, a mother motivated by her own past, and a family legacy that begins in Cuba before either of them were born
April 2021 Book Releases
Mother May I by Joshilyn Jackson
Genre: Thriller
Expected Publication Date: April 6, 2021
Growing up poor in rural Georgia, Bree Cabbat was warned by her single mother that the world was a dark and scary place. Bree rejected her mother’s fearful outlook, and life has proved her right.
House of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland
Genre: YA Fantasy
Expected Publication Date: April 6, 2021
Seventeen-year-old Iris Hollow has always been strange. Something happened to her and her two older sisters when they were children, something they can’t quite remember but that left each of them with an identical half-moon scar at the base of their throats.
Malice by Heather Walter
Genre: YA Fantasy
Expected Publication: April 13, 2021
A princess isn’t supposed to fall for an evil sorceress. But in this darkly magical retelling of “Sleeping Beauty,” true love is more than a simple fairy tale.
The Prison Healer by Lynette Noni
Genre: YA Fantasy
Expected Publication Date: April 13, 2021
Seventeen-year-old Kiva Meridan has spent the last ten years fighting for survival in the notorious death prison, Zalindov, working as the prison healer. But no one has ever survived.
The Light in the Midnight Stars by Rena Rossner
Genre: Fantasy
Expected Publication Date: April 13, 2021
Deep in the Hungarian woods, the sacred magic of King Solomon lives on in his descendants. Gathering under the midnight stars, they pray, sing and perform small miracles – and none are more gifted than the great Rabbi Isaac and his three daughters. Each one is blessed with a unique talent – whether it be coaxing plants to grow, or predicting the future by reading the path of the stars.
Sistersong by Lucy Holland (Hounsom)
Genre: Historical Fiction
Expected Publication Date: April 15, 2021
535 AD. In the ancient kingdom of Dumnonia, King Cador’s children inherit a fragmented land abandoned by the Romans.
Amazon | Goodreads
She Drives Me Crazy by Kelly Quindlen
Genre: YA LGBT
Expected Release: April 20, 2021
High school nemeses fall in love in this queer YA rom-com perfect for fans of Becky Albertalli and Casey McQuisten.
Witches Steeped in Gold by Ciannon Smart
Genre: YA Fantasy
Expected Release: April 20, 2021
This Jamaican-inspired fantasy debut about two enemy witches who must enter into a deadly alliance to take down a common enemy has the twisted cat-and-mouse of Killing Eve with the richly imagined fantasy world of Furyborn and Ember in the Ashes.
Lycanthropy and Other Chronic Illnesses by Kristen O’Neal
Genre: YA Fantasy
Expected Publication Date: April 27, 2021
Teen Wolf meets Emergency Contact in this sharply observed, hilarious, and heartwarming debut young adult novel about friendship and the hairy side of chronic illness.
May 2021 Book Releases
The Last Shadow Warrior by Sam Subity
Genre: Middle Grade Fantasy
Expected Release: May 4, 2021
Twelve-year-old Abby Beckett is proud to come from a long line of elite Viking warriors known as the Aesir. She’s spent her entire life training to hunt the horrific creatures known as Grendels – the ancient foe of the Aesir – just like her mother did before she died. But there’s just one, small problem: No one has seen a Grendel in centuries, and the Viking Council wants to disband the Aesir . . . forever.
Hurricane Summer by Asha Bromfield
Genre: YA Contemporary
Expected Release: May 4, 2021
In this sweeping debut, Asha Bromfield takes readers to the heart of Jamaica, and into the soul of a girl coming to terms with her family, and herself, set against the backdrop of a hurricane.
Sorrowland by Rivers Solomon
Genre: Fantasy
Expected Publication Date: May 4, 2021
Vern – seven months pregnant and desperate to escape the strict religious compound where she was raised – flees for the shelter of the woods. There, she gives birth to twins, and plans to raise them far from the influence of the outside world.
A triumphant, genre-bending breakout novel from one of the boldest new voices in contemporary fiction
A Special Place for Women by Laura Hankin
Genre: Contemporary
Expected Publication: May 11, 2021
It’s a club like no other. Only the most important women receive an invitation. But one daring young reporter is about to infiltrate this female-run secret society, whose beguiling members are caught up in a dark and treacherous business.
June 2021 Book Releases
The Sea Is Salt and So Am I by Cassandra Hartt
Genre: YA Contemporary Fiction
Expected Release: June 8, 2021
West Finch is one hurricane away from falling into the sea. Yet sixteen-year-old Harlow Prout is determined to save her small Maine hometown.
For the Wolf by Hannah F. Whitten
Genre: YA Fantasy
Expected Release: June 15, 2021
A dark, sweeping debut fantasy novel about a young woman who must be sacrificed to the legendary Wolf of the Wood to save her kingdom. But not all legends are true, and the Wolf isn’t the only danger lurking in the Wilderwood.
July 2021 Book Releases
Survive the Night by Riley Sager
It’s November 1991. George H. W. Bush is in the White House, Nirvana’s in the tape deck, and movie-obsessed college student Charlie Jordan is in a car with a man who might be a serial killer.
Genre: Thriller
Expected Release: July 6, 2021
Razorblade Tears by S.A. Cosby
A Black father. A white father. Two murdered sons. A quest for vengeance.
Provocative and fast-paced, S. A. Cosby’s Razorblade Tears is a story of bloody retribution, heartfelt change – and maybe even redemption.
Genre: Mystery
Expected Release Date: July 6, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead by Emily R. Austin
This hilarious and profound debut for fans of Mostly Dead Things and Goodbye, Vitamin follows a morbidly anxious young woman who stumbles into a job as a receptionist at a Catholic church and becomes obsessed with her predecessor’s mysterious death.
Genre: Contemporary Fiction
Expected Release Date: July 6, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
This Is Your Mind On Plants by Michael Pollan
In This Is Your Mind on Plants, Michael Pollan dives deep into three plant drugs–opium, caffeine, and mescaline–and throws the fundamental strangeness, and arbitrariness, of our thinking about them into sharp relief. Exploring and participating in the cultures that have grown up around these drugs while consuming (or, in the case of caffeine, trying not to consume) them, Pollan reckons with the powerful human attraction to psychoactive plants. Why do we go to such great lengths to seek these shifts in consciousness, and then why do we fence that universal desire with laws and customs and fraught feelings?
Genre: Nonfiction
Expected Publication Date: July 6, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
The Final Girl Support Group by Grady Hendrix
In horror movies, the final girl is the one who’s left standing when the credits roll. The one who fought back, defeated the killer, and avenged her friends. The one who emerges bloodied but victorious. But after the sirens fade and the audience moves on, what happens to her?
Genre: Horror
Expected Release: July 13, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
Well, This Is Exhausting: Essays by Sophia Benoit
From GQ columnist and Twitter sensation, this hilarious, clever, and eye-opening memoir-in-essays explores the ins and outs of modern womanhood—from finding feminism, the power of pop culture, and how to navigate life’s constant double standards—perfect for fans of Shrill and PEN15 .
Genre: Nonfiction essays
Expected Release Date: July 13, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
The Comfort of Monsters by Willa C. Richards
Set in Milwaukee during the “Dahmer summer” of 1991, A remarkable debut novel for fans of Mary Gaitskill and Gillian Flynn about two sisters—one who disappears, and one who is left to pick up the pieces in the aftermath.
Genre: Thriller
Expected Publication Date: July 13, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
Stolen: A Memoir by Elizabeth Gilpin
A gripping chronicle of psychological manipulation and abuse at a “therapeutic” boarding school for troubled teens, and how one young woman fought to heal in the aftermath.
Genre: Memoir
Expected Publication Date: July 20, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
The Book of Accidents by Chuck Wendig
A family returns to their hometown—and to the dark past that haunts them still—in this masterpiece of literary horror by the New York Times bestselling author of Wanderers
Genre: Horror
Expected Publication Date: July 20, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder
In this blazingly smart and voracious debut, an artist turned stay-at-home mom becomes convinced she’s turning into a dog.
Genre: Magical Realism
Expected Publication Date: July 20, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
They’ll Never Catch Us by Jessica Goodman
From rising star Jessica Goodman, author of They Wish They Were Us, comes a new fast-paced thriller about two sisters vying for the top spot on their cross-country team–the only way out of their stifling small town. But their dreams are suddenly thrown into peril when a new girl threatens to take away everything they’ve worked for… until she disappears.
Genre: Young adult
Expected Release Date: July 27, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
When We Were Strangers by Alex Richards
Seventeen-year-old Evie Parker is devastated in the wake of her father’s sudden death. But she knows something her mother doesn’t: the day of his heart attack, her dad was planning to move out. After finding his packed bags, an impulsive Evie puts everything away, desperate to spare her mom more heartache.
Genre: Young adult
Expected Releas Date: July 27, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
August 2021 Releases
We Were Never Here by Andrea Bartz
Genre: Thriller
Expected Release Date: August 3, 2021
An annual backpacking trip has deadly consequences in a chilling new novel from the bestselling author of The Lost Night and The Herd.
We Are the Brennans by Tracey Lange
In the vein of Mary Beth Keane’s Ask Again, Yes and Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney’s The Nest, Tracey Lange’s We Are the Brennans explores the staying power of shame—and the redemptive power of love—in an Irish Catholic family torn apart by secrets.
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Expected Publication Date: August 3, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
The Dead and The Dark by Courtney Gould
Courtney Gould’s thrilling debut The Dead and the Dark is about the things that lurk in dark corners, the parts of you that can’t remain hidden, and about finding home in places―and people―you didn’t expect.
Genre: Young adult
Expected Publication Date:
Amazon | Goodreads
Velvet Was the Night by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Genre: Historical Fiction
Expected Publication Date: August 17, 2021
From the New York Times bestselling author of Mexican Gothic comes a riveting noir about a daydreaming secretary, a lonesome enforcer, and the mystery of the missing woman that brings them together.
Eyes of the Forest by April Henry
Genre: YA Thriller
Expected Publication Date: August 24, 2021
After a bestselling fantasy author disappears, only his biggest fan believes he’s in danger and has the courage to uncover the truth in this fast-paced mystery with a chilling psychological twist.
Vampires, Hearts, & Other Dead Things by Margie Fuston
In this heart-wrenching debut YA novel that’s The Coldest Girl in Coldtown meets They Both Die at the End, a teen girl takes a trip to New Orleans with her estranged best friend to find a vampire to save her dying father.
Genre: YA Fantasy
Expected Release Date:
Amazon | Goodreads
The Witch Haven by Sasha Peyton Smith
The Last Magician meets The Lady’s Guide to Petticoats and Piracy in this thrilling and atmospheric historical fantasy following a young woman who discovers she has magical powers and is thrust into a battle between witches and wizards.
Genre: Fantasy
Expected Publication Date: August 31, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
September 2021 Book Releases
Under the Whispering Door by T.J. Klune
Under the Whispering Door is a contemporary fantasy with TJ Klune’s signature “quirk and charm” (PW) about a ghost who refuses to cross over and the ferryman he falls in love with.
Genre: Fantasy
Expected Publication Date:
Amazon | Goodreads
Empire of the Vampire by Jay Kristoff
From the New York Times bestselling author of the Nevernight Chronicle, Jay Kristoff, comes the first book of an astonishing illustrated dark fantasy saga.
Never Saw Me Coming by Vera Kurian
Meet Chloe Sevre. She’s a freshman honor student, a leggings-wearing hot girl next door, who also happens to be a psychopath. Her hobbies include yogalates, frat parties, and plotting to kill Will Bachman, a childhood friend who grievously wronged her.
Genre: Thriller
Expected Release Date:
Amazon | Goodreads
The Last Graduate by Naomi Novik
A budding dark sorceress determined not to use her formidable powers uncovers yet more secrets about the workings of her world in the stunning sequel to A Deadly Education, the start of Naomi Novik’s groundbreaking crossover series.
Genre: Fantasy
Expected Publication Date: September 28, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman
Elizabeth has received a letter from an old colleague, a man with whom she has a long history. He’s made a big mistake, and he needs her help. His story involves stolen diamonds, a violent mobster, and a very real threat to his life.
Genre: Mystery
Expected Publication Date: September 28, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr
From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of All the Light We Cannot See, perhaps the most bestselling and beloved literary fiction of our time, comes a triumph of imagination and compassion, a soaring novel about children on the cusp of adulthood in a broken world, who find resilience, hope, and story.
Genre: Historical fiction
Expected Release Date: September 28, 2021
Amazon | Goodreads
October 2021 Book Releases
The Family Tree by Steph Mullin & Nicole Mabry
Genre: Thriller
Expected Publication Date: October 5, 2021
The DNA results are back. And there’s a serial killer in her family tree…
