It’s the end of the month, which means it’s once again time to look ahead to some great upcoming book releases. August has lots of great new books, including a new Ana and Din mystery and releases from Natasha Pulley, S.A. MacLean, Richard Swan, Olivie Blake, and many others. If you missed my list of July 2026 releases, you can find it HERE. Without further ado, here are 20 of my most anticipated August 2026 book releases (covers link to Goodreads):

Brilliant detective Ana Dolabra must prove a man’s innocence to stop a civil war in the third book of the series that began with The Tainted Cup, named an Edgar, Hugo, and World Fantasy Award Finalist and one of the best books of the year (New York Times Book Review, NPR, Elle)—from the bestselling author of The Founders Trilogy.

In the canton of Sapirdad, two of the Empire’s most powerful families are moments away from going to war with each other, their hundreds of retainers gathered with swords drawn. If blood is spilt, the whole of the empire may be plunged into starvation and chaos.

To de-escalate matters, someone must do the impossible: prove that one family’s eldest son is innocent of a gruesome and unforgivable murder, despite the incontrovertible evidence against him.

It is with this undertaking that the great detective Ana Dolabra is tasked, her assistant Din at her side—and the two find themselves racing with great speed and little dignity to the scene.

As ever, the impossible proves little obstacle for the deadly combination of Ana’s intellect and Din’s keen eye, and mere hours after riding into the dusty town, Ana glimpses the greater pattern behind the crime. A deeper, subtler web of death is being woven in plain sight, by a mastermind with an ancient magical technology at his disposal.

But even Ana’s uncanny insight is of little use when each new suspect she uncovers ends up dead–with each new killing calculated to bring tensions between the two rival clans past the boiling point. And as Din pursues their adversary through the canton’s wild ranges, sprawling ranches, and reeking slaughterhouses, he finds his loyalties divided in unexpected ways.

Max has never had time for a relationship – working in the high-stakes world of international diplomacy, the best he can manage is squeezing in one-night stands with “himbos” between his ongoing efforts to win a promotion. But when he tries to multitask by hooking up with a visiting dignitary at a black-tie dinner, it blows up spectacularly in his face and Max is discreetly advised that his personal life is not helping his career ambitions. In this line of work, appearances matter, and Max is losing ground to his long-term rival, happily married ‘family man’ Quentin.

Max decides to beat Quentin at his own game by recruiting a fake boyfriend, Leo, from an actors’ agency. But some visa complications force Max and Leo to make their relationship official by getting married, the stakes are raised higher than Max ever intended. There’s only one thing that could make all this even more complicated – if Max and Leo’s feelings for each other start becoming real . . .

International Relations is a fake dating romance filled with glamorous locations, laugh-out-loud set pieces, and a love story that will capture your heart.

Fi has toppled immortal beasts. Antal welcomes being conquered.

After helping the Lord Daeyari reclaim his territory, semi-reformed smuggler Fi dons a daunting new role: rebuilding a city alongside her monstrous partner, a haven free from bloody sacrifice. So when Antal’s father unexpectedly summons him home, Fi’s first instinct is to ready her claws.

Only, claws won’t be enough for this adversary.

Antal faces his first homecoming in five decades, dreading two truths. From his father’s seat on the governing council, he could undo everything Antal has built. And their last argument ended with Antal’s lover dead on the floor.

But a greater danger lurks: the appearance of a creature that even the daeyari fear, burning its way through the Planes. With Antal’s father leading the hunt, he and Fi must ally with a team of immortals who could turn fangs on them at any moment.

Or worse, strain their still-fresh love until it snaps.

From the author of Voidwalker comes the conclusion to the Beasts of the Void duology where spicy monster romance meets the epic fantasy of the Cosmere.

Amongst mountains as old as time, the jackalopes and ghouls are the least of your worries.

Working in Human Resources was not what Alexys had in mind when she joined Entity, the company who categorise and manage the monsters and cryptids of the world. But after her dad was killed as a Warden in the Appalachian Mountains, she was filled with noble ideas of carrying on his legacy… from behind the safety of a desk.

But when one of her new Wardens, Elliot, goes missing, her chances of promotion go missing too. Determined to find him safe and sound, she marches off into the mountains to find him herself.

Because Elliot had been talking about sightings of a highly dangerous and never-recorded monster, The Hollow Walker, and she’s promised herself that no Warden will ever die on her watch.

Meanwhile Nic, Director of Research and Cataloging, is not one to ignore the words ‘never-recorded’. With Alexys, his work nemesis, leading the charge into the mountains, he’s not going to let her have all the fun. If he can be the youngest Entity employee to discover a new monster, his name will go down in the annals of cryptozoology… and if it means spending some extra time with Alexys then he’s not one to argue.

But Alexys and Nic are about to discover why the Appalachian Mountains are the last place you want to find yourself after dark.

A cozy vampire vacation mystery set in a seaside Italian village, featuring a reformed vampire, his magical talking cat, and a handsome, brooding detective

Bastian may be a vampire, but he doesn’t bite.

Not anymore, at least.

These days, Bastian just wants to live his best undead life: visit charming Italian villages, maybe dance in the square with a cute boy, all with Whitby, his best friend (and magical talking cat) by his side. What he doesn’t want? To stumble across a dead body on the beach, a girl who appears to have been killed by a vampire.

It wasn’t Bastian. He swears—on his own grave.

But the local police chief doesn’t trust Bastian, or any vampire, for that matter, so he assigns detective Nico De Luca to keep an eye on him until his trial. And while Bastian normally wouldn’t complain about having a gorgeous, mysterious man by his side, he has more important things to worry about, because the police chief has called the Vampire Council, and if the real killer is still at large when they arrive, the whole town could be in danger. As more bodies begin to pile up, Bastian, Whitby, and De Luca must get to the bottom of who in Vernazza is framing vampires, before it’s too late.

Charming, twisty, and laugh-out-loud funny, Be Still My Unbeating Heart by Josh Winning is a delightful romp through a swoon-worthy magical murder mystery.

In this blistering science fiction epic, international bestselling author Richard Swan presents a thrilling tale of survival and an eviscerating examination of totalitarianism.

THE INFINITE STATE begins at a flashpoint in the lives of a widowed party member, a disgraced investigator, and a hypersled pilot—entangled in a plot to escape the suffocating authority of a fascist state.

WHO GIVES YOU LIFE?
PATER AETERNUS.

Katherine Fuller’s husband is dead. As an esteemed member of Pater Aeternus—governing party of the fascist, galaxy-spanning Decurion Empire—he has left behind an estate of immeasurable wealth. And Katherine is going to inherit it.

WHO GIVES YOU PURPOSE?
PATER AETERNUS.

Life under the Eternal Father is rigidly stratified, surveilled, and controlled—each new day to be endured, not lived. But with Katherine’s newfound fortune, she is presented with a rare and dangerous opportunity: purchase a virgin world, and create a better, fairer society.

WHO GIVES YOU JOY?
PATER AETERNUS.

But the Empire cannot allow its wayward daughter to succeed. And as Katherine works in secret, recruiting allies she’s not even sure she can trust, she will discover exactly how far Pater Aeternus is willing to go to stop her. Because Katherine is going to create something nobody has seen for many years.

A democracy.

He’s a scandal. He’s a role model. Together, they’re a headline.

When a candid photo of professional problem Mo – son of the Arizona Canyons’ owner – and Adam, the league’s first openly drafted golden gay, hits the internet, it doesn’t spark rumors. It confirms them. According to everyone, they’ve been secretly together for years.

Mo is one scandal away from losing everything, including his family’s support. Captain Adam, Phoenix’s most eligible gay bachelor, has spent his entire career being careful, respectable, unmessy. Publicly denying Mo could have a negative impact on him and his team.

So they make a deal: fake it.

What starts as damage control turns into a full-time performance, public appearances, staged dates, late nights that feel a little too real. The more convincing they are, the safer they’ll be. But the closer they get, the harder it is to tell what’s real and what’s strategy. Because somewhere between the arguments, the chemistry, and the us-against-the-world pressure… they stop pretending. Too bad the rules of the game don’t leave room for catching feelings…

Return to Camelot in the much anticipated and funny follow-up to the instant New York Times bestselling and YA Book Prize winning Gwen and Art Are Not in Love.

They fell in love. They won a great battle. It should have been happily ever after. But now, Camelot’s famous couples have fallen apart.

Newly crowned King Gabriel is having panic attacks in cupboards in-between council meetings. He can’t tell Arthur just how not okay he is – so he’s set him free, to find love with someone who can get through the day without breaking down.

Bridget has lost her spark for sparring, forfeiting again and again in the lists. When she’s invited to join Gabriel’s round table, she hopes it’ll be the change she needs. But trying to navigate the post-happily-ever-after reality of a relationship with Gwen, when Bridget no longer feels like the dashing knight Gwen fell in love with, feels impossible.

With the kingdom still reeling from an attempted uprising, and rumoured sightings of the holy grail, the questing beast and the green knight happening across the country, the gang depart on a PR tour destined for disaster. Can Gabriel be the king his country deserves? Can Bridget get her jousting groove back? And will they find their way back to the courtly love that once seemed fated?

From New York Times bestselling author Olivie Blake comes a tantalizing story of power, seduction, and the omens you’ll ignore when everything you’ve dreamed of feels just within reach.

The headlines are calling it the “summer of exsanguination” in LA—girls are being murdered, the Santa Ana winds are blowing a strange energy into the city, and all signs point to fire season.

More pressing for Anya Morris, though, is the drudgery of living at home, working part time at the family store, and contending with her mother’s disdain for the acting career Anya knows she’s destined for but that feels more impossible by the day.

It’s in this suffocating late summer heat that Anya receives a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, an invitation to work for the de Witt family, one of LA’s most influential film dynasties. Soon, she’s spending her days and nights at their strange villa high in the Hollywood hills, where she meets Jude, a recluse who is both the family’s heir apparent and its most closely guarded secret.

There’s a magnetism to Jude that Anya cannot resist, despite warning signs that scream like sirens in the night. Because the villa holds generations of bloodstained history, and an occult family curse may even live within its walls—or within Jude himself.

In this city, everyone cuts a deal with the devil. When Anya comes face to face with a devil of her own, she’ll learn just how far she’s willing to go to get everything she’s ever wanted.

Cole is spending the rest of his eternity as an overworked Afterlife Clerk, reaping souls for the Afterlife Administration. But when he accidentally reaps the wrong Verdella Rodgers, Cole and Verdella must race to fix his cosmic blunder—and try not to catch feelings along the way. A swoony and whimsical romp, You’ll Be the Death of Me is a romance to die for.

Verdella “Dell” Rodgers is at the top of her game. As the chef de cuisine at San Francisco’s hottest new restaurant and on the cusp of marrying the mayor’s son in the social event of the season, her life is perfect. That is until the week before her wedding when she wakes up and find herself very much dead.

Enter Cole, a charming but bumbling entry-level clerk in the Afterlife Administration who accidentally confuses Dell for a 95-year-old woman in Kansas with the same name, reaping the wrong soul. When Cole tries to fix his mistake, their worlds collide in life- and death-changing ways.

Now walking the city as a ghost only visible to Cole, Dell is frantic to get back to her perfect life but soon learns that it wasn’t what it appeared to be, particularly when it came to the man she was about to marry and his high-profile family.

Meanwhile, Cole has no memory of who he was before working for the Afterlife Administration. As they try to uncover Cole’s past and remedy Dell’s future, they realize the mistake that brought them together might just be a twist of fate. With time running out to bring Dell back to the land of the living, she’ll have to decide if the life she left behind is truly what she wants, or if Cole’s untimely appearance could lead to an unexpected change that she didn’t know she needed.

Sometimes, you just want to belong.
When Claire’s fiancé mysteriously dies of an unknown neurological illness, seemingly destroying her chances at the belonging she’s sought, she’s prepared to sink back into the lonely life she lived before. Orphaned by a freak boating accident in her childhood, she never expected to find connection like she did with Elias, anyway. Even if sometimes, that connection seemed more like something he felt obligated to than something he wanted.

Their relationship wasn’t perfect—his coldness, his secrets, his strange aversion to the ocean—but what relationship is?

When Elias’s family reaches out—his incredibly wealthy family, from whom he was estranged—and invites Claire to a wake at their family home on a private island, Claire is given the chance to have connection again. To belong to something, just like she’s always wanted. Just like Elias knew she was desperate to have.

Even if that family is a little strange. Even if their home built partially into the sea stirs up memories of the accident that killed her parents and sister. Even if Ash, Elias’s older brother, seems insistent on Claire leaving as soon as possible.

Claire can’t bring herself to be lonely again. And as the strange circumstances of Elias’s familial connection with the sea becomes more and more apparent, her window for escape is rapidly closing.

Does she even want to?

A novel about belief, religion, and the power of myth that blends the gripping, end-of-the-world storytelling of The Passage with Natasha Pulley’s biting wit and queer romance.

Jesuit priest Avelyn Brocken was born into a mining family in Hreodwater, a small, isolated salt town in England. At 16, after a mining disaster killed his family, he fled.

When a fellow priest is miraculously healed only to then be turned to salt after a visit to Hreodwater, Avelyn is sent to investigate. When he arrives, the town’s doctor, Jericho, tells him that the priest is not the only one experiencing strange cures—and may not be the only one in danger from a substance in the mine that the locals call “salt light.”

As Avelyn and Jericho team up to protect the Hreodwater from salt light, strange happenings occur at mines around the world. At an archaeological dig on the Dead Sea, electrical devices froth salt, while at a huge salt works in Poland, communication is lost, and rumors circulate of total annihilation.

As salt light devastates cities around the world, Avelyn must decide what to believe—and whether his faith is strong enough to withstand an apocalypse.

There’s something lurking in the stifling darkness and labyrinthine tunnels that run below London… something old, something vicious, and something very, very hungry.

It’s the hottest summer on record and London is dying. Prices are high, pay is low, and stressed commuters are packed onto London Underground trains again like the pandemic never happened. To add to the misery, the temperatures underground just keep climbing and climbing, the heat trapped in the clay with nowhere to go.

Then one fateful morning five travellers on an unlucky tube carriage find themselves bound together as witnesses to a single horrific event – an event they can’t quite seem to remember.

They make an unlikely team – a weary tube driver, a disillusioned civil servant, an ambitious city trader, an overwhelmed hotel worker, and an unhoused young man just trying to get by – but now they must come together to confront what they have seen and stop it in its tracks before it kills them all.

From the dark and twisted mind behind Thirteen Storeys, Family Business, and podcast sensation The Magnus Archives, The Burn Line is a sinister and socially conscious horror masterclass perfect for fans of Stephen King, Jordan Peele, and Black Mirror.

From critically acclaimed, UK bestselling author M.K. Lobb comes a noir romantic fantasy set in a world in which sin is a fatal disease, and the rich hire the poor to carry out their basest instincts—until the forbidden romance between a sinner and a mysterious figure threatens to destroy everything.

From New York Times bestselling author Laura Sebastian comes a swoony, second-chance romance set in a magical Gilded Age world, where a con artist targets her biggest mark yet—and unexpectedly reunites with the one who first stole her heart.

The Ryskamp family fortune is in trouble. And Arden’s gift for invisibility can’t stave off his creditors…or the shame of catastrophic courtships. His only recourse is to marry a highborn Luster girl of his great-aunt’s choosing. But when Arden goes to meet her, another woman catches his the copper-haired beauty who ran away with his heart. And engagement ring.

Newly betrothed to yet another wealthy bachelor, Mavis has gone by many names—Arabella then, Delphinia now. Unlike the Lusters, however, Mavis lacks magical abilities, relying instead on her charms and her cons to get by. But no amount of money can repay her debts. And no amount of distance could prepare her for a reunion with her first mark.

Thrown together by fate, Arden and Mavis put aside their past to pull one last con that could save them both. The only price may be falling in love again. This time, for real.

Set in Victorian London during Jack the Ripper’s reign of terror, this gripping, original novel is perfect for fans of V. E. Schwab, Dana Schwartz, and Sarah Penner.

When Caroline Foster arrives at the Whitechapel Full Moon Society in search of her missing brother, she finds a dilapidated façade belying an interior as opulent as any exclusive gentlemen’s club. In exchange for room and board, Caroline is hired as the Full Moon’s maid, where she is given three orders: don’t ask personal questions, stay out of the iron-barred room on the second floor, and remain in her bedroom from sunup to sundown on the full moon.

But when it is revealed that the previous maid was murdered—an early victim of Jack the Ripper—and her brother has left behind no answers, only more questions, Caroline begins to suspect her hosts might be hiding something. As more bodies turn up with a connection to the Society, Caroline fears she may have unwittingly stumbled into a bedtime story, the kind with monsters and curses, family secrets and ancient lore.

Tantalizing and pulsing, Elizabeth DeLozier’s sophomore novel gives an exciting alternative look into the infamous Jack the Ripper story with a major, supernatural twist.

Brace yourself for an exhilarating epic fantasy trilogy with a diverse cast, polyamory, and chaotic sentient magic, for fans of V.E. Schwab and Antonia Hodgson.

In the twisted city of Amaris, magic spawns from chaos. Prone to driving humans mad, it can only be wielded safely by the Wraiths—seven immortal beings magically bound to obey the king.

Esme is the most notorious Wraith. She has spent the last century forced to kill on behalf of the nation that stole her from her homeworld while building a secret life for herself and her wife away from violence.

That is, until the current king turns up murdered, and a magical will demands his successor be chosen through three trials. Esme cannot break the magical shackles that bind her, but she will suffer no more tyrants. She rigs the king’s succession trials in favour of her chosen the righteous General Balthazar, who she can’t help but fall for.

As Esme weaves together the threads of the court on Balthazar’s behalf amid a strange tide of sentient magic in the city and a growing war on the horizon, she will come face to face with Balthazar’s bloody past, troubled present, and countless betrayals.

He isn’t the man Esme thought he was—but she was born to make and break kings.

When destroying the world and killing the hero grows boring, what’s a Demon Overlord to do but quit while he’s ahead?

Galornus Prime was the Scourge of Nations, Ender of Hope, and Master of the Cardinal Sins. After achieving all that, what else was left?

His retirement plan was Get a goat, farm quietly, and don’t accidentally conquer anything. Evil never sleeps… but it does plant turnips.

When corrupt officials and greedy merchants threaten his infuriatingly loveable neighbors, Galornus faces his greatest challenge saving his village without revealing he’s the very monster parents invoke to make children eat their vegetables.

Demon Overlord’s Retirement Plan is a cozy fantasy with teeth, where the hardest battle isn’t defeating heroes—it’s staying retired and learning how to live after 444 lifetimes of villainy.

Begin the conquest of ordinary life today.

The World’s Fair has packed up, the tents and food stalls disappeared. And the dybbuk, a restless spirit that possessed Alter, is gone. Life returns to normal for Frankie and Alter, as both boys inspire each other to start a detective agency—using skills from Frankie’s dark past and Alter’s desire to do good in their community. But when children start to go missing, Frankie is certain the supernatural is once again to blame, as they race to track down a sheyd, a demon-like entity. But in order to save his future with Alter, Frankie will have to confront his past.

Learned Edmund, a disillusioned scholar, is transporting yet another precious relic from one stuffy temple to a different stuffy temple. Another great adventure for the ages…

But when Edmund is set upon by bandits, in desperation, he breaks the cardinal rule and grabs for the relic, an ancient sword. To his surprise, instead of unsheathing a rusty, ancient weapon, an alarmingly handsome man appears, wielding daggers of blue steel and cutting the thieves down.

This man is the Dervish, an immortal warrior who’s been trapped for centuries in a sword of enchanted steel, and is angry as hell about it. He hates the curse that put him there, and he wants to hate Edmund, just as he has hated every wielder before him.

But the damned scholar is just so sweet and clever and kind. And while the Dervish may be able to protect Edmund from bandits, cultists, dragons, and strange inhuman diplomats, he may find it much harder to protect his own heart.

What August 2026 book releases are you most excited about finally reading? Let me know in the comments below or over on BlueSky!