New Books, 27 August 2024
Abtahi, Olivia: Twin Flames
(Lee & Low/Tu Books 9781643790435, $24.95, 368pp, formats: hardcover, audio, 08/27/2024)
Young-adult fantasy novel about teenaged Argentinian Iranian twin girls living in a small town, each one very different the other. On their eighteenth birthday a neighbor’s barn mysteriously burns down, and when one of the twins discovers a djinn arising from the fire she suddenly gains strange powers and can no longer touch iron.
Ballingrud, Nathan: Crypt of the Moon Spider
(Tor/Nightfire 9781250291738, $17.99, 112pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 08/27/2024)
Horror novella, the first in the Lunar Gothic trilogy. A gargantuan spider with magical silk once lived in a cave beneath the dense forests and streams on the surface of the moon. Now in 1923 the Barrowfield Home for Treatment of the Melancholy operates on the moon and uses this spider silk to cure mental illnesses.
Beck, Hazel: Truly Madly Magically
(Harlequin/Graydon House 9781525804731, $18.99, 352pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Humorous fantasy romance novel, third in the Witchlore series begun in Small Town, Big Magic. Cursed by her own mother to always tell the truth and one of the only half-witches around, Ellowyn Good has never considered herself an equal part of the Riverwood coven. But when the Joywood, the evil rulers of the witching world, target her directly, she begins to wonder why they want her gone.
Brennan, Sarah Rees: Long Live Evil
(Orbit US 9780316568715, $19.99, 464pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Fantasy novel, the first in the Time of Iron series. A dying woman makes a magical bargain that lets her enter her favorite fantasy series — as the villain.
[Long Live Evil] is simultaneously a wholehearted embrace of, and a commentary on, the high-fantasy high-angst high-romance end of the fantasy genre: the ones whose stereotype is a love triangle centred on a naive (innocent, good) young woman, featuring honourable young men who’d defend her with their lives and the bad boys who’d burn the world for her.
It’s very entertaining.
—Liz Bourke, Locus, August 2024
Cottingham, Kayla: Practical Rules for Cursed Witches
(Penguin Random House/Delacorte 9780593813973, $19.99, 432pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Young-adult fantasy novel. A teen witch must complete her magical training by breaking a powerful family’s curse. But her own affliction—to never find true love—gets in the way when she falls for the girl she’s trying to save.
Glaze, Amanda: The Lies of Alma Blackwell
(Sterling/Union Square Kids 9781454951926, $19.99, 384pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, 08/27/2024)
Young-adult gothic mystery/horror novel. Teen witch Nev Blackwell is ready to take over the family’s job as witch protector of the town of Hollow Cliff, but a stranger’s arrival leads her to uncover family secrets.
Graudin, Ryan: The Enchanted Lies of Céleste Artois
(Orbit US/Redhook 9780316418690, $30, 544pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Historical fantasy novel of magic in early 1900s Paris. Céleste, a forger and con artist, is coughing blood and determined to make the most of the time she has left when she discovers the city’s magical side, and mysterious stranger in an enchanted salon offers her extended life if she will use her forging talents for him.
Hall, Alexis: Confounding Oaths
(Penguin Random House/Del Rey 9780593497586, $18.99, 448pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Fantasy romance novel, second in the Mortal Follies series. Set in 1815 Britain, a nobleman must work with a dashing soldier to save his sister from a mystical bargain gone awry.
Handman, Wren: A Midnight So Deadly
(Parliament House Press 9781956136807, $17.99, 296pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, 08/28/2024)
Fantasy thriller. Two “dreamers” who record their dreams and publish them for their fans, start to experience nightmares that bleed into the waking world, and must find each other to answer the questions they both have.
Hardinge, Frances: Island of Whispers
(Abrams/Amulet 9781419774331, $19.99, 120pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Upper middle-grade gothic fantasy novella. Milo is unexpectedly thrust into the role of Ferryman of the Dead, replacing his father, who is his first passenger. Soon after, the local lord, grieving his daughter, chases Milo’s ferry with soldiers and magicians, determined to get her back.
Hawkins, Karen: The Bookshop of Hidden Dreams
(Simon & Schuster/Gallery 9781982195960, $18.99, 384pp, formats: trade paperback, hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Fantasy/magical realism novel in the Dove Pond series. A historian finds an antique tin of love letters in her family home, and heads to the magical town of Dove Pond to investigate. But the letters only raise more questions, and the 80-year-old owner of the local bookshop and town archive is resistant to grant access. Includes recipes and a reading group guide.
Howard, Alex: The Ghost Cat
(Harlequin/Hanover Square 9781335012333, $21.99, 272pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Fantasy novel. In 1902 Edinburgh, Grimalkin the cat passes on to become the Ghost Cat. Unseen among the inhabitants of the tenement where he lives, he witnesses history from a cat’s-eye view for the next 120 years.
Kane, Paul & O’Regan, Marie, eds.: Folk Horror Short Stories
(Flame Tree Collections UK 9781804177327, $26.99, 416pp, formats: hardcover, 08/27/2024)
Anthology of 17 stories, five new, covering a wide range of mythologies and dark corners from around the world, revealing tales from the shadows of isolation, creepy forests and horrors rising from the land itself. Authors include Neil Gaiman, Alison Littlewood, and Adam L.G. Nevill. Part of the Beyond and Within series.
Kurtagich, Dawn: The Madness
(Harlequin/Graydon House 9781525809811, $28.99, 336pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Horror/suspense novel. Mina, a psychiatrist in London, gets a letter from her childhood friend, who is displaying mysterious symptoms, similar to an amnesiac patient she has been treating. To help the two women, Mina leaves her practice and returns to her hometown in Wales where she must confront her own dark secrets along with an evil beyond comprehension.
Lee, Audrey: The Mechanics of Memory
(CamCat Books 9780744310399, $28.99, 384pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
SF novel. Hope Nakano undergoes reconsolidation treatment at a corporation specializing in memory recovery, to try to remember what happened in her lost year. But each procedure reveals inconsistent fragments, and the corporation seems to be protecting its own secrets. A first novel.
Madson, Devin: Between Dragons and Their Wrath
(Orbit US 9780316417983, $19.99, 480pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Epic fantasy novel. Three women, a glassblower/poisoner, a laundress with strange new abilities, and a sharp-shooting dragon rider, fight to survive political enemies, long-buried secrets, and monsters both within and without.
McCaig, Iain: Smalltown Tales
(Titan Books 9781803367415, $30, 72pp, formats: hardcover, 08/27/2024)
Illustrated collection of 12 short stories about Smalltown “where Lake Wobegon meets Norman Rockwell, with monsters” and its special inhabitants, including ghosts, vampires, demons, sea monsters, a house that steals things, and more, with art by McCaig.
Meltzer, Jean: Magical Meet Cute
(Harlequin/Mira 9780778368106, $18.99, 336pp, formats: trade paperback, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Fantasy romance novel. Feeling stressed and lonely one night, Faye, a Jewish potter, has a little too much to drink and tries to relax with making some pottery. When she meets a hot stranger the next day, she thinks maybe she created a golem.
Norton, Preston: The House on Yeet Street
(Sterling/Union Square Kids 9781454950400, $17.99, 336pp, formats: hardcover, trade paperback, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Middle grade haunted house horror novel. Aidan Cross, 13, yeets his journal containing feelings about his secret crush into the haunted house on Yeet Street. Then, to his horror, his best friends — including his crush — plan a sleepover there the very next night. All Aidan wants is to recover his mortifying journal, but instead he finds a ghost and a mystery to solve.
Parker, Natalie C.: Come Out, Come Out
(Penguin Random House/Putnam 9780593619391, $19.99, 336pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Young-adult horror novel. A group of queer teens, unable to come out to their families, band together and hide in an old abandoned house in the woods when they need safety. But one of their number vanishes, and the others can’t remember what happened. Five years later, a spirit that looks like the missing girl begins to haunt the survivors.
Ralph, Vincent: One House Left
(St. Martin’s/Wednesday Books 9781250882189, $12, 320pp, formats: trade paperback, hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Young-adult horror novel about a street cursed by the vengeful spirit of the Hiding Boy; every six years a different house on the street is the scene of a tragedy. Nate and his family try to outrun the curse, but Nate gets involved in an urban legend club, and the stories start to blur.
Riggs, Ransom: Sunderworld, Vol. 1: The Extraordinary 
Disappointments of Leopold Berry
(Penguin Random House/Dutton 9780593530931, $21.99, 336pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Young-adult portal fantasy novel, the first in a series. 17-year-old Leopold sees weird things around Los Angeles that come from a 1990s TV show he was once obsessed with, and soon learns that Sunderworld is real, and in grave danger — but when he decides he’s a chosen hero, everything goes excruciatingly wrong.
Scott, Megan: The Temptation of Magic
(HarperCollins/Inkyard Press 9781335006950, $19.99, 480pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Young-adult fantasy novel, the first in the Empyreal trilogy. Shapeshifter Nicole Palmer lives in hiding from the Wake, a shadowy organization who will force her to join or kill her if she’s discovered. While searching for a secret message about how to destroy the Wake for good, Nicole is forced to team up with a handsome Empyreal assassin, and must hide her identity from him. A first novel.
Shepherd, L.J.: The Trials of Lila Dalton
(Sourcebooks/Poisoned Pen Press 9781728298429, $27.99, 368pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Legal mystery novel with supernatural elements. A woman with amnesia, trapped on an island where the most serious crimes are tried, has to prove her client’s innocence and clear herself, but doesn’t know anything about the case. A first novel.
Walter, Heather: Crimson Crown
(Penguin Random House/Del Rey 9780593598368, $29.99, 544pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Fairytale fantasy novel, a queer, Tudor-inspired version of the story of Snow White. Ayleth — who will someday become the wicket queen — is a young witch who lives in the forest with her coven, practicing in secret to hide from the White King. But Ayleth’s magical gifts haven’t revealed themselves yet, and she sets out on a quest to the White Palace to prove herself.
Wunder, Wendy: Mysterious Ways
(St. Martin’s/Wednesday Books 9781250770202, $20, 336pp, formats: hardcover, ebook, audio, 08/27/2024)
Young-adult fantasy novel mixing humor and tragedy. 17-year-old Maya literally knows everything about the people she meets upon sight. This makes her depressed and she is sent to a psychiatric facility and starts over at a new school. There she meets a cute guy, and thinks maybe her power will be useful for once.
