Brittany Kelley
Some of my favorite moments each month are the times when my friend and I don’t even speak; we instead just send each other more than 20 links of books we’ve recently heard of that sound interesting. From there, we see which ones we agree on and discuss. It’s a time when I can just ignore the outside world and talk about one of my favorite hobbies with one of my favorite people.
Sometimes, it’s an author we know and love and other times, it’s from a person we’ve never heard of in a genre we don’t frequently read, though, each time it’s always exciting to think about the possibilities.
You can only read so many books a year, so you miss a lot. There’s hundreds and thousands of books released each year, surely some of them to be classics and we’ll never be able to read them all, but I’m trying my best to.
That being said, here is my current list of pre-orders, in case you’re curious to upcoming releases. Maybe you’ll even see something that piques your interest.
July 14, 2026 "The Sea Hides Its Dead" by Megan Bontrager: Goodreads pitches the book as 2005 “The Descent” meets 2017 “The Ritual” sign me up. I grew up watching a lot of horror movies, since it was my dad’s favorite genre and “The Descent” was always a favorite — a group of people go caving, only to discover that they’re not alone. It’s classic for a reason, in my opinion. This seems to be the same, only set in a sea cave. Perfect.
July 28, 2026 “Fishbone Cinderella” by Elizabeth Lim: This book is a multigenerational novel, according to Lim, and takes place in 1940 Guangdong. Inspired by her grandmother, who hid in a cupboard when the Japanese invaded her village during World War II, it follows a girl who turns indivisible during this same raid and the daughter who is fighting to keep her mother from vanishing completely 40 years later. Lim never fails to write beautiful prose and although I’m not typically a fan of historical fantasy, I’d read anything she puts out, despite knowing I’ll cry at the end every time.
Aug. 4, 2026: “Kitten” by Stacey Yu: I’ve heard this is about a woman who is obsessed with her boyfriend’s cat … then starts to believe she is the cat? I’m not sure, but I won’t be reading the synopsis because I refuse to know too much going into it. I’ve been loving books about obsession this year, so a weird girl literary fiction sounds great to me. Additionally, the cover is so fun.
Aug. 18, 2026 “Barbie: Dreamscape” by Alex Aster: I’ll be honest. I know nothing about this book; I’ve never even read from Aster, but I know that reading “Wings of Starlight” by Allison Saft (which, by the way, is getting an interconnected novel titled “Wings of Reverie” by Anna Bright, releasing Aug. 4, 2026) last year was so fun and healed some of my inner child. I’d love to do that again, so this is an easy pick for me.
Feb. 2, 2027 “The Secret Lives of Zombie Wives” by Barbara Truelove: This one’s a bit far out from its release date, so it may change, but I couldn’t not include this. It sounds so fun. It’s a horror novella following a “reformed zombie” influencer who has to face the life she left behind when a zombie horde arrives in her community. I love zombies and firmly believe we should be writing about them more, so I’m incredibly excited.
I’m sure not everyone wants my comments on 50-plus more anticipated releases, so I’ll pause for now. But I will list a few more, in case someone has as much fun researching as I do:
• June 30, 2026 “When Dealing with Dragons” by Dana Swift — young adult, fantasy
• July 21, 2026 “If Books Could Kill” by Kate Eberle — slasher romance
• Sept. 1, 2026 “An Immaculate Deception” by Isabela Livino — horror, gothic
• Sept. 15, 2026 “The Lonely Girl’s Vegetable Patch” by Genevieve Plunkett — literary fiction
• Sept. 29, 2026 “The House of Gardenias” by Isabel Cañas — young adult debut, horror, gothic
• Oct. 13, 2026 “Once in a Timeline” by Iman Hariri-Kia — romance
• Nov. 3, 2026 “There Used to Be People Here” by Kennedy Cole — horror, science fiction
• March 2, 2027 “When The Woods Called Us Home” by Rachel Griffin — adult debut, mystery
• April 27, 2027 “Garden Girls” by Amanda Linsmeier — young adult, fantasy
I know that the cost of books can really add up, so I’d urge you to remember that a financial barrier doesn’t have to stop someone from accessing books. If there’s ever anything that interests you, request it at your local library, whose staff is waiting to take your requests with care. This way, we can all have a fun summer of sunshine and good reads.
Kelley is news editor of the Hays Free Press and News-Dispatch. She can reached via email at [email protected].
