Fantasy and science fiction books transcend boundaries, launching readers into new and fascinating worlds full of wonder and adventure. Two genres that seemed to have little headway when I was a teen have expanded, amplified, and it brings me joy to see a multitude of titles hitting shelves each month. Not only are science fiction and fantasy becoming more diverse – in scope, in audience, in sexuality – but genre-lines are continuing to blur. Science fiction and fantasy genres are growing tremendously, and have been for some time, each month bringing something a little bit different to the table.
Get lost in space, embark on a new quest, explore a new world – any possibility is at your fingertips, limited only by the speed at which you read (or listen!). Whether you’re looking for a single new adventure to embark on this month or would rather revel in the mystery of multitudes, you won’t want to miss the new fantasy and science fiction titles hitting shelves this February.
Science fiction mystery mashups seem popular this month. Kelly Link’s The Book of Love promises to be a fun ghost hunt of sorts, wherein a group of teens find themselves pitted against a series of magical tasks in a race to determine the cause of their own deaths. Robert Jackson Bennett pairs a murder mystery with fantasy in The Tainted Cup, reminiscent of both Sherlock Holmes and The Last of Us, wherein two investigators are tasked with uncovering the truth behind a high-ranking officer’s death, complete with the tree that spontaneously erupted from his body. Melissa Albert pairs horror with fantasy in The Bad Ones when cryptic messages about a missing girl lead to a goddess of local folklore. Malka Older pairs cozy sci-fi with mystery and romance in The Imposition of Unnecessary Obstacles, a short, sapphic space adventure that pairs history with the sudden disappearance of seventeen at a university.
Looking for something short to start off the new year? February’s new releases include a handful of short story collections to get a jump start on your reading goals! Wole Talabi’s Convergence Problems features sixteen near-future African sci-fi stories. Liliana Colanzi’s You Glow in the Dark (translated by Chris Andrews) features seven spec-fic stories, otherworldly, dark, gripping, set in Latin America. Sue Lynn Tan expands upon the Celestial Kingdom duology, filled with wonder and mysticism and romance, in a collection composed of three parts, featuring illustrations by Kelly Chong in Tales of the Celestial Kingdom. GennaRose Nethercott’s Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart pairs fantasy with horror, exploring love in all its iterations, even the most gruesome, across fourteen short stories. And, Anne Bishop expands upon her work, offering an anthology of twenty-five short stories in The Lady in Glass and Other Stories, a unique blend of all things spec-fic perfect for new and returning readers familiar with her canon.
Whether you’re looking to return to an established series, or are hoping to find something new, you won’t be disappointed with this month’s sci-fi sightings.
The Book of Love, Kelly Link
Late one night, Laura, Daniel, and Mo find themselves beneath the fluorescent lights of a high school classroom, almost a year after disappearing from their hometown, the small seaside community of Lovesend, Massachusetts, having long been presumed dead. Which, in fact, they are.
With them in the room is their previously unremarkable high school music teacher, who seems to know something about their disappearance—and what has brought them back again. Desperate to reclaim their lives, the three agree to the terms of the bargain their music teacher proposes. They will be given a series of magical tasks; while they undertake them, they may return to their families and friends, but they can tell no one where they’ve been. In the end, there will be winners and there will be losers.
But their resurrection has attracted the notice of other supernatural figures, all with their own agendas. As Laura, Daniel, and Mo grapple with the pieces of the lives they left behind, and Laura’s sister, Susannah, attempts to reconcile what she remembers with what she fears, these mysterious others begin to arrive, engulfing their community in danger and chaos, and it becomes imperative that the teens solve the mystery of their deaths to avert a looming disaster.
Publisher: Random House
Pub Date: February 8
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The Briar Book of the Dead, A.G. Slatter
Ellie Briar is the first non-witch to be born into her family for generations. The Briar family of witches run the town of Silverton, caring for its inhabitants with their skills and magic. In the usual scheme of things, they would be burnt for their sorcery, but the church has given them dispensation in return for their protection of the borders of the Darklands, where the much-feared Leech Lords hold sway.
Ellie is being trained as a steward, administering for the town, and warding off the insistent interest of the church. When her grandmother dies suddenly, Ellie’s cousin Audra rises to the position of Briar Witch, propelling Ellie into her new role. As she navigates fresh challenges, an unexpected new ability to see and speak to the dead leads her to uncover sinister family secrets, stories of burnings, lost grimoires and evil spells. Reeling from one revelation to the next, she seeks answers from the long dead and is forced to decide who to trust, as a devastating plot threatens to destroy everything the Briar witches have sacrificed so much to build.
Publisher: Titan Books
Pub Date: February 13
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What Feasts at Night, T. Kingfisher
Retired soldier Alex Easton returns in a horrifying new adventure.
After their terrifying ordeal at the Usher manor, Alex Easton feels as if they just survived another war. All they crave is rest, routine, and sunshine, but instead, as a favor to Angus and Miss Potter, they find themself heading to their family hunting lodge, deep in the cold, damp forests of their home country, Gallacia.
In theory, one can find relaxation in even the coldest and dampest of Gallacian autumns, but when Easton arrives, they find the caretaker dead, the lodge in disarray, and the grounds troubled by a strange, uncanny silence. The villagers whisper that a breath-stealing monster from folklore has taken up residence in Easton’s home. Easton knows better than to put too much stock in local superstitions, but they can tell that something is not quite right in their home. . . or in their dreams.
Publisher: Tor Nightfire
Pub Date: February 13
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Sun of Blood and Ruin, Mariely Lares
In sixteenth-century New Spain, witchcraft is punishable by death, indigenous temples have been destroyed, and tales of mythical creatures that once roamed the land have become whispers in the night. Hidden behind a mask, Pantera uses her magic and legendary swordplay skills to fight the tyranny of Spanish rule.
To all who know her, Leonora de Las Casas Tlazohtzin never leaves the palace and is promised to the heir of the Spanish throne. The respectable, law-abiding Lady Leonora faints at the sight of blood and would rather be caught dead than meddle in court affairs.
No one suspects that Leonora and Pantera are the same person. Leonora’s charade is tragically good, and with magic running through her veins, she is nearly invincible. Nearly. Despite her mastery, she is destined to die young in battle, as predicted by a seer.
When an ancient prophecy of destruction threatens to come true, Leonora–and therefore Pantera–is forced to decide: surrender the mask or fight to the end. Knowing she is doomed to a short life, she is tempted to take the former option. But the legendary Pantera is destined for more than an early grave, and once she discovers the truth of her origins, not even death will stop her.
Publisher: Harper Voyager
Pub Date: February 20
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Fate Breaker, Victoria Aveyard
Change your fate—or kneel to it.
The Companions are scattered and hopeless, torn from each other. After Corayne barely escapes with her life, she must forge on alone, leaving her blade broken and her allies behind her. Her only consolation: Corayne now has Taristan’s sword, the only Spindleblade left in existence. Without it, he can’t rip open any more Spindles. Without it, he can’t end the world.
But Taristan and Queen Erida will not be defeated so easily. Both will burn the world to bring down Corayne—and bring forth their demon god, What Waits, ready to claim the realm of Allward for his own.
In a final clash between kingdoms and gods, all must rise to fight—or be destroyed.
Publisher: HarperTeen
Pub Date: February 27
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Plastic, Scott Guild
Erin is a plastic girl living in a plastic world. Every day she eats a breakfast of boiled chicken, then conveys her articulated body to Tablet Town, where she sells other figurines Smartbodies: wearable tech that immerses them in a virtual world, a refuge from real life’s brutal wars and eco-terrorist insurgency. If you cut her, she will not bleed—but figurines can still be cracked by gunfire or crumble from nuclear fallout. Erin, who’s lost her father and the love of her life, certainly knows plenty about death.
One day, a terror attack at work leads Erin to meet Jacob, a blind figurine with whom she feels an instant connection. Together they start to explore the wonders of the virtual reality landscape. But just as they begin to heal from their traumas, secrets from Erin’s past threaten to crack the facade she’s built around her life, revealing everything vulnerable beneath.
Publisher: Pantheon Books
Pub Date: February 13
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Projections, S.E. Porter
As a young woman seeks vengeance on the obsessed sorcerer who murdered her because he could not have her, her murderer sends projections of himself out into the world to seek out and seduce women who will return the love she denied―or suffer mortal consequence. A lush, gothic journey across worlds full of strange characters and even stranger magic.
Publisher: Tor Books
Pub Date: February 13
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Moon of the Turning Leaves, Waubgeshig Rice
For the past twelve years, a community of Anishinaabe people have made the Northern Ontario bush their home in the wake of the infrastructural power failure that brought about governmental and societal collapse. Hunters and harvesters, they have survived and thrived the way their ancestors once did, but their natural food resources are dwindling, and the time has come to find a new home.
Evan Whitesky volunteers to lead a dangerous mission south to explore the possibility of moving back to their ancestral home, the “land where the birch trees grow by the big water” in the Great Lakes region.
Accompanied by five others, including his daughter Nangohns, a great archer and hunter, Evan begins a journey that will take him through the reserve where the Anishinaabe were once settled, the devastated city of Gibson, and a land now being reclaimed by nature. But it isn’t just the wilderness that poses a threat as they encounter other survivors. Those who, like the Anishinaabe, live in harmony with the land. And those who use violence to fulfill their needs. . .
Publisher: William Morrow
Pub Date: February 27
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You Glow in the Dark, Liliana Colanzi
Translated by Chris Andrews
The seven stories of You Glow in the Dark unfold in a Latin America wrecked and poisoned by human greed, and yet Colanzi’s writing―at once sleek and dense, otherworldly and intensely specific―casts an eerily bright spell over the wreckage. Some stories seem to be set in a near future; all are superbly executed and yet hard to pin down; they often leave the reader wondering: was that realistic or fantastic? Colanzi draws power from Andean cyberpunk just as much as from classic horror writers, and this daring is matched by her energizing simultaneous use of multiplicity and fragmentation―the book’s stylistic trademarks. Freely mixing worlds, she uses the Bolivian altiplano as the backdrop for an urban dystopia and blends Aymara with Spanish. Colanzi never gets bogged down; she can be brutal and direct or light-handed and subtle. Her materials are dark, but always there’s the lift of her vivid sense of humor. You Glow in the Dark seizes the reader’s attention (from the title on) and holds it: this is a book that announces the arrival of a major new talent.
Publisher: New Directions
Pub Date: February 6
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Where the Dark Stands Still, A.B. Poranek
Raised in a small village near the spirit-wood, Liska Radost knows that Magic is monstrous, and its practitioners, monsters. After Liska unleashes her own powers with devastating consequences, she is caught by the demon warden of the wood – the Leszy – who offers her a bargain: one year of servitude in exchange for a wish.
Whisked away to his crumbling manor, Liska soon discovers the sinister roots of their bargain. And if she wants to survive the year and return home, she must unravel her host’s spool of secrets and face the ghosts of his past.
Those who enter the wood do not always return…
Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books
Pub Date: February 27
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My Throat an Open Grave, Tori Bovalino
Growing up in the small town of Winston, Pennsylvania feels like drowning. Leah goes to church every Sunday, works when she isn’t at school, and takes care of her baby brother, Owen. Like every girl in Winston, she tries to be right and good and holy. If she isn’t the Lord of the Wood will take her, and she’ll disappear like so many other girls before her.
But living up to the rigorous standards of the town takes its toll. One night, when Owen won’t stop screaming, Leah wishes him away, and the Lord listens. The screaming stops, and all that’s left in the crib is a small bundle of sticks tied with a ribbon.
Filled with shame and the weight of the town’s judgment, Leah is forced to cross the river into the Lord of the Wood’s domain to bring Owen back. But the devilish figure who has haunted Winston for generations isn’t what she expects. He tells her she can have her brother back―for the price of a song. A song that Leah will have one month to write.
It’s a bargain that will uncover secrets her hometown has tried to keep buried for decades. And what she unearths will have her questioning everything she’s been taught to fear.
Publisher: Page Street YA
Pub Date: February 20
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The Book of Ile-Rien, Martha Wells
The Element of Fire
The kingdom of Ile-Rien lies in peril, menaced by sorcerous threats and devious intrigue, when Kade, bastard sister of King Roland, appears unexpectedly at court. The illegitimate daughter of the old king and the Queen of Air and Darkness herself, Kade’s true desires are cloaked in mystery.
It falls to Thomas Boniface, Captain of the Queen’s Guard, to keep the kingdom from harm. But is one man’s steel enough to counter all the magic of fayre?
The Death of the Necromancer
Nicholas Valiarde is a passionate, embittered nobleman and the greatest thief in all of Ile-Rien. On the gaslight streets of the city, Nicholas assumes the guise of a master criminal, stealing jewels from wealthy nobles to finance his quest for a long-pursued vengeance.
But Nicholas’s murderous mission is being interrupted by a series of eerie, unexplainable, and fatal events. A dark magic opposes him, and traces of a necromantic power that hasn’t been used for centuries abound. Nicholas and his compatriots find themselves battling an ancient evil.
And if they lose? Death would be preferable to the fate that awaits them….
Publisher: Tordotcom Pub
Pub Date: February 27
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A Flame in the North, Lilith Saintcrow
The Black Land is spent myth. Centuries have passed since the Great Enemy was slain. Yet old fears linger, and on the longest night of the year, every village still lights a ritual fire to banish the dark.
That is Solveig’s duty. Favored by the gods with powerful magic, Sol calls forth flame to keep her home safe. But when her brother accidentally kills a northern lord’s son, she is sent away as weregild—part hostage, part guest—for a year and a day.
The further north Sol travels, the clearer it becomes the Black Land is no myth. The forests teem with foul beasts. Her travel companions are not what they seem, and their plans for her and her magic are shrouded in secrecy.
With only her loyal shieldmaid and her own wits to reply upon, Sol must master power beyond her imagination to wrest control of her fate. For the Black Land’s army stirs, ready to cover the world in darkness—unless Sol can find the courage to stop it.
They thought the old ways were dead. But now, the Enemy awakens…
Publisher: Orbit Books
Pub Date: February 13
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Twice Lived, Joma West
Two Worlds. Two Minds. One Life.
There are two Earths. Perfectly ordinary and existing in parallel. There are no doorways between them, no way to cross from one world to another. Unless you’re a shifter.
Canna and Lily are the same person but they refuse to admit it. Their split psyche has forced them to shift randomly between worlds – between lives and between families – for far longer than they should. But one mind can’t bear this much life. It’ll break under the weight of it all. Soon they’ll experience their final shift and settle at last in one world, but how can they prepare both families for the eventuality of them disappearing forever?
Publisher: Tordotcom Pub
Pub Date: February 20
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Gogmagog, Jeff Noon & Steve Beard
Gogmagog tells the story of an epic journey through the sixty-mile long ghost of a dragon. We travel by boat, a rickety steam launch captained by Cady Meade, a veteran taxi pilot on the river Nysis. In her heyday she carried people and goods from the thriving seaports of the estuary into Ludwich, the capital city. But that was years ago. Now she’s drunk, holed up in a rundown seaside resort, telling her bawdy tales for shots of rum. All that’s about to change, when two strangers seek her out, asking for transport, one of whom – a young girl – is very ill, and in great danger. The other, an artificial being of singular character, has secrets hidden inside his crystal skull. And so begins the voyage of the Juniper.
The Nysis is unlike any other river. Mysteries unfold with each port of call. Not many can navigate these channels, not many know of its whirlpools and sandbanks, and of the ravenous creatures that lurk beneath the surface. Cady used to have the necessary knowledge, and the powers of spectral navigation. But her glory days are well behind her now.
This might well be her final journey.
Publisher: Angry Robot Books
Pub Date: February 13
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Medea, Eilish Quin
Among the women of Greek mythology, the witch Medea may be the most despised. Known for the brutal act of killing her own children to exact vengeance on her deceitful husband, the Argonauts leader Jason, Medea has carved out a singularly infamous niche in our histories.
But what if that isn’t the full story?
The daughter of a sea nymph and the granddaughter of a Titan, Medea is a paradox. She is at once rendered compelling by virtue of the divinity that flows through her bloodline and made powerless by the fact of her being a woman. As a child, she intuitively submerges herself in witchcraft and sorcery, but soon finds it may not be a match for the prophecies that hang over her entire family like a shroud.
As Medea comes into her own as a woman and a witch, she also faces the arrival of the hero Jason, preordained by the gods to be not only her husband, but also her lifeline to escape her isolated existence. Medea travels the treacherous seas with the Argonauts, battles demons she had never conceived of, and falls in love with the man who may ultimately be her downfall.
Publisher: Atria Books
Pub Date: February 13
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River Mumma, Zalika Reid-Benta
Alicia has been out of grad school for months. She has no career prospects and lives with her mom, who won’t stop texting her macabre news stories and reminders to pick up items from the grocery store.
Then, one evening, the Jamaican water deity, River Mumma, appears to Alicia, telling her that she has twenty-four hours to scour the city for her missing comb.
Alicia doesn’t understand why River Mumma would choose her. She can’t remember all the legends her relatives told her, unlike her retail co-worker Heaven, who can reel off Jamaican folklore by heart. She doesn’t know if her childhood visions have returned, or why she feels a strange connection to her other co-worker Mars. But when the trio are chased down by malevolent spirits called duppies, they realize their tenuous bonds to each other may be their only lifelines. With the clock ticking, Alicia’s quest through the city broadens into a journey through time—to find herself and what the river carries.
Publisher: Erewhon Books
Pub Date: February 20
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The Tainted Cup, Robert Jackson Bennett
In Daretana’s most opulent mansion, a high Imperial officer lies dead—killed, to all appearances, when a tree spontaneously erupted from his body. Even in this canton at the borders of the Empire, where contagions abound and the blood of the Leviathans works strange magical changes, it’s a death at once terrifying and impossible.
Called in to investigate this mystery is Ana Dolabra, an investigator whose reputation for brilliance is matched only by her eccentricities.
At her side is her new assistant, Dinios Kol. Din is an engraver, magically altered to possess a perfect memory. His job is to observe and report, and act as his superior’s eyes and ears–quite literally, in this case, as among Ana’s quirks are her insistence on wearing a blindfold at all times, and her refusal to step outside the walls of her home.
Din is most perplexed by Ana’s ravenous appetite for information and her mind’s frenzied leaps—not to mention her cheerful disregard for propriety and the apparent joy she takes in scandalizing her young counterpart. Yet as the case unfolds and Ana makes one startling deduction after the next, he finds it hard to deny that she is, indeed, the Empire’s greatest detective.
As the two close in on a mastermind and uncover a scheme that threatens the safety of the Empire itself, Din realizes he’s barely begun to assemble the puzzle that is Ana Dolabra—and wonders how long he’ll be able to keep his own secrets safe from her piercing intellect.
Publisher: Del Rey
Pub Date: February 6
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The Butcher of the Forest, Premee Mohamed
At the northern edge of a land ruled by a monstrous, foreign tyrant lies the wild forest known as the Elmever. The villagers know better than to let their children go near—once someone goes in, they never come back out.
No one knows the strange and terrifying traps of the Elmever better than Veris Thorn, the only person to ever rescue a child from the forest many years ago. When the Tyrant’s two young children go missing, Veris is commanded to enter the forest once more and bring them home safe. If Veris fails, the Tyrant will kill her; if she remains in the forest for longer than a day, she will be trapped forevermore.
So Veris will travel deep into the Elmever to face traps, riddles, and monsters at the behest of another monster. One misstep will cost everything.
Publisher: Tordotcom Pub
Pub Date: February 27
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Momo Arashima Breaks the Mirror of the Sun, Misa Sugiura
After vanquishing a demon king, saving her mom, and reconnecting with her friend Danny, Momo ought to be living the life she’s always wanted. But lately, Danny has been ditching her to hang out with mean-girl Ryleigh—and groups of kids have begun vanishing without a trace. Then a whole backyard full of cool kids at Ryleigh’s exclusive birthday party becomes the latest to disappear, leaving Momo, Ryleigh, Danny, boy band superstar Jin, and Momo’s old friend Niko the fox to fight a dangerous new enemy from Shinto legend.
This time they are up against Tamamo-no-mae—beautiful, bloodthirsty, and manipulative, she’s the ultimate mean girl of the Kami-verse. To defeat her, Momo must travel to the Sky Kingdom and steal the legendary Mirror of the Sun. But if she’s going to survive monster ambushes, escape giant snakes, and pull off the heist of the millennium, Momo will have to find a way to work with her team (even Ryleigh), and grapple with the growing power that connects her with her storm god grandfather, Susano’o’, and her greatest foe—Izanami the Destroyer.
Publisher: Labyrinth Road
Pub Date: February 27
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A Tempest of Tea, Hafsah Faizal
On the streets of White Roaring, Arthie Casimir is a criminal mastermind and collector of secrets. Her prestigious tearoom transforms into an illegal bloodhouse by dark, catering to the vampires feared by society. But when her establishment is threatened, Arthie is forced to strike an unlikely deal with an alluring adversary to save it—and she can’t do the job alone.
Calling upon a band of misfits, Arthie formulates a plan to infiltrate the dark and glittering vampire society known as the Athereum. But not every member of her crew is on her side, and as the truth behind the heist unfolds, Arthie finds herself in the midst of a conspiracy that will threaten the world as she knows it.
Publisher: FSG BFYR
Pub Date: February 20
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The Bad Ones, Melissa Albert
Goddess, goddess, count to five
In the morning, who’s alive?
In the course of a single winter’s night, four people vanish without a trace across a small town.
Nora’s estranged best friend, Becca, is one of the lost. As Nora tries to untangle the truth of Becca’s disappearance, she discovers a darkness in her town’s past, as well as a string of coded messages Becca left for her to unravel. These clues lead Nora to a piece of local folklore: a legendary goddess of forgotten origins who played a role in Nora and Becca’s own childhood games…
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Pub Date: February 20
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Convergence Problems, Wole Talabi
Containing brand-new stories, rewrites of early work, and a few previously published pieces, Wole Talabi’s new collection, Convergence Problems , consists of sixteen short stories and one previously unseen novella. All of the stories in this collection are set in, or relate to, Africa, and investigate the rapidly changing role of technology in our lives as we search for meaning, for knowledge, for justice; constantly converging to our future selves.
In Lagos, Nigeria, a roadside mechanic volunteers to undergo a procedure that will increase the electrical conductivity of his skin by orders of magnitude. On Mars, a woman races against time and a previously undocumented geological phenomenon to save her brother. In Nairobi, a tech support engineer tries to understand what is happening when an AI system begins malfunctioning in ways that could change the world.
Publisher: DAW Books
Pub Date: February 13
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Infinity Alchemist, Kacen Callender
For Ash Woods, practicing alchemy is a crime.
Only an elite few are legally permitted to study the science of magic―so when Ash is rejected by the Lancaster Mage’s College, he takes a job as the school’s groundskeeper instead, forced to learn alchemy in secret.
When he’s discovered by the condescending and brilliant apprentice Ramsay Thorne, Ash is sure he’s about to be arrested―but instead of calling the reds, Ramsay surprises Ash by making him an offer: Ramsay will keep Ash’s secret if he helps her find the legendary Book of Source, a sacred text that gives its reader extraordinary power.
As Ash and Ramsay work together and their feelings for each other grow, Ash discovers their mission is more dangerous than he imagined, pitting them against influential and powerful alchemists―Ash’s estranged father included. Ash’s journey takes him through the cities and wilds across New Anglia, forcing him to discover his own definition of true power and how far he and other alchemists will go to seize it.
Publisher: Tor Teen
Pub Date: February 6
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A Cloud of Unknowing, Andrew Gillsmith
Broken and scattered, the survivors of the strange events in the Taklamakan Desert are trying to make sense of what happened while the rest of the world tries to store balance by scapegoating the artilects.
The Process–an ancient, alchemical plan to transform human consciousness–goes far deeper than anyone thought, and only the artificial magnetosphere known as St. Michael’s Shield prevents its fulfillment.
The Lucifer Particles may hold the answers, but the path to understanding them leads through the strange, sub-quantum world of the Holomovement, guarded by the secretive scientific cult known as the Divers. The price of knowledge may be too high.
In Rome, the Princes of the Church converge to elect a new Pope, while Father Gabriel Serafian, an exorcist and former neuroscientist, is drawn even deeper into a conspiracy of global–and possibly supernatural–dimensions.
Confusion reigns. New discoveries threaten the very foundations of both science and faith. A cloud of unknowing has descended upon the world.
Meanwhile, visions of a young Chinese girl who died during the genocides may point to a way forward…
Publisher: Tor Teen
Pub Date: February 19
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Tales of the Celestial Kingdom, Sue Lynn Tan
Illustrated by Kelly Chong
Return to the Immortal Realm, a world of gods, magic, and legendary creatures—and embark upon new adventures of valor, danger, and love.
Tales from the Celestial Kingdom collects nine spellbinding stories—two previously published, seven original, including the epilogue to the duology—set in the enchanting world of Sue Lynn Tan’s stunning debut. Filled with magic and mythology, friendship and love, these stories intertwine through the past, present, and future of the two novels, told from the perspectives of multiple characters, including Chang’e, Shuxiao, Liwei, and Wenzhi.
Publisher: Harper Voyager
Pub Date: February 6
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The Imposition of Unnecessary Obstacles, Malka Older
Mossa has returned to Valdegeld on a missing person’s case, for which she’ll once again need Pleiti’s insight.
Seventeen students and staff members have disappeared from Valdegeld University—yet no one has noticed. The answers to this case could be found in the outer reaches of the Jovian system—Mossa’s home—and the history of Jupiter’s original settlements. But Pleiti’s faith in her life’s work as scholar of the past has grown precarious, and this new case threatens to further destabilize her dreams for humanity’s future, as well as her own.
Publisher: Tordotcom Pub
Pub Date: February 13
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The Fox Wife, Yangsze Choo
Manchuria, 1908.
A young woman is found frozen in the snow. Her death is clouded by rumors of foxes involved, which are believed to lure people by transforming themselves into beautiful women and men. Bao, a detective with a reputation for sniffing out the truth, is hired to uncover the dead woman’s identity. Since childhood, Bao has been intrigued by the fox gods, yet they’ve remained tantalizingly out of reach. Until, perhaps, now.
Meanwhile, a family that owns a famous Chinese medicine shop can cure ailments, but not the curse that afflicts them―their eldest sons die before their twenty-fourth birthdays. Now the only grandson of the family is twenty-three. When a mysterious woman enters their household, their luck seems to change. Or does it? Is their new servant a simple young woman from the north or a fox spirit bent on her own revenge?
Publisher: Henry, Holt & Co.
Pub Date: February 13
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The Lady in the Glass and Other Stories, Anne Bishop
A master of bringing fantasy worlds to life, this collection showcases Bishop’s impressive range, from rarities of her earliest writing to the Realms of the Blood, from darker fairytale retellings to the Landscapes of Ephemera, and from standalone stories of space exploration and fantastical creatures to the contemporary fantasy terrain of the World of the Others.
Includes previously published and unpublished tales, as well as two brand-new stories, written especially for this: “Friends and Corpses,” a murder mystery in which the corpse has some decidedly unusual qualities, and “Home for the Howlidays,” a heartwarming return to the Blood Prophet Meg Corbyn and the shapeshifting Simon Wolfgard from The Others.
Publisher: Ace Books
Pub Date: February 27
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The Eternal Ones, Namina Forna
Mere weeks after confronting the Gilded Ones—the false beings she once believed to be her family—Deka is on the hunt. In order to kill the gods, whose ravenous competition for power is bleeding Otera dry, she must uncover the source of her divinity. But with her mortal body on the verge of ruin, Deka is running out of time—to save herself and an empire that’s tearing itself apart at its seams.
When Deka’s search leads her and her friends to the edge of the world as they know it, they discover an astonishing new realm, one which holds the key to Deka’s past. Yet it also illuminates a devastating decision she must soon make…
Choose to be reborn as a god, losing everyone she loves in the process. Or bring about the end of the world.
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Pub Date: February 13
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Vangie’s Ghosts, Paul Di Filippo
Three-year-old Vangie is mute and unresponsive. She shows no interest in the people or world around her, much to the frustration of her callous adoptive parents. Little do they know, Vangie is otherwise occupied observing “ghosts”—an infinite number of versions of herself, in an infinite number of parallel universes.
When a tornado hits their trailer and Vangie is severely injured, she makes a desperate leap into another timeline where she survives the tornado, but her adoptive parents do not. So begins a life of shuttling through various foster homes, cultivating her abilities to seek out alternate timelines, and making jumps calculated to better her circumstances in order to avoid the exploitation of adults who seek to harness her powers for their own means.
Vangie never communicates with her avatars, until one day the “Council”—a group of Vangies—appear to her and warn her of an ominous, growing threat in the multiverse: a man they call the Massive. And thus begins an epic conflict, spanning millennia and worlds, in a brutal effort to control the fate of the multiverse.
Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
Pub Date: February 20
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Kindling, Traci Chee
Once, the war was fought with kindlings—elite, magic-wielding warriors whose devastating power comes at the cost of their own young lives.
Now, the war is over, and kindlings have been cast adrift—their magic outlawed, their skills outdated, their formidable balar weapons prized only as relics and souvenirs.
Violence still plagues the countryside, and memories haunt those who remain. When a village comes under threat of siege, it offers an opportunity for seven kindlings to fight one last time. But war changed these warriors. And to reclaim who they once were, they will have to battle their pasts, their trauma, and their grim fates to come together again—or none of them will make it out alive.
Publisher: HarperCollins
Pub Date: February 27
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Fathomfolk, Eliza Chan
Welcome to Tiankawi – shining pearl of human civilization and a safe haven for those fleeing civil unrest. Or at least, that’s how it first appears. But in the semi-flooded city, humans are, quite literally, on top: peering down from shining towers and aerial walkways on the fathomfolk – sirens, seawitches, kelpies and kappas – who live in the polluted waters below.
For half-siren Mira, promotion to captain of the border guard means an opportunity to help her downtrodden people. But if earning the trust and respect of her human colleagues wasn’t hard enough, everything Mira has worked towards is put in jeopardy when Nami, a know-it-all water dragon and fathomfolk princess – is exiled to the city, under Mira’s watch. When extremists sabotage a city festival, violence erupts, as does the clampdown on fathomfolk rights. Both Nami and Mira must decide if the cost of change is worth paying, or if Tiankawi should be left to drown.
Publisher: Orbit Books
Pub Date: February 27
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Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart, GennaRose Nethercott
From the author of the breakout fantasy novel Thistlefoot : a collection of dark fairytales and fractured folklore exploring all the ways love can save us—or go monstrously wrong.
The stories in Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart are about the abomination that resides within us all. That churning, clawing, hungry the desire to be loved, and seen, and known. And the terror of those things to be loved too well, or not enough, or for long enough. To be laid bare before your sweetheart, to their horror. To be known and recognized as the monstrous thing you are.
Two young women working at a sinister roadside attraction called the Eternal Staircase explore its secrets—and their own doomed summer love. A group of witchy teens concoct the perfect plan to induce the hated new girl into their ranks. A woman moves into a new house with her acclaimed artist boyfriend and finds her body slowly shifting into something specially constructed to accommodate his needs and whims. And two outcasts, a vampire and a goat woman, find solace in each other, even as the world’s lack of understanding might bring about its own end.
Publisher: Vintage
Pub Date: February 6
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All This Twisted Glory, Tahereh Mafi
As the long-lost heir to the Jinn throne, Alizeh has finally found her people—and she might’ve found her crown. Cyrus, the mercurial ruler of Tulan, has offered her his kingdom in a twisted exchange: one that would begin with their marriage and end with his murder.
Cyrus’s dark reputation precedes him; all the world knows of his blood-soaked past. Killing him should be easy—and accepting his offer might be the only way to fulfill her destiny and save her people. But the more Alizeh learns of him, the more she questions whether the terrible stories about him are true.
Ensnared by secrets, Cyrus has ached for Alizeh since she first appeared in his dreams many months ago. Now that he knows those visions were planted by the devil, he can hardly bear to look at her—much less endure her company. But despite their best efforts to despise each other, Alizeh and Cyrus are drawn together over and over with an all-consuming thirst that threatens to destroy them both.
Meanwhile, Prince Kamran has arrived in Tulan, ready to exact revenge…
Publisher: HarperCollins
Pub Date: February 6
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