30+ Most Anticipated Releases of 2023! (July-Dec)📚

Hello friends! How are we all doing today? Today we are doing my most anticipated releases for the second half of the year and I'm so excited! I was trying to bang the desk but still drumroll. I started doing these at my desk so I can more clearly see my spreadsheet and also if I have to look up any of the synopses again I can. I have read through all these synopses multiple times but I'm not going to read out the whole synopses of each of these to you because that's not interesting. So I'm just going to give you the key bits of information that I remember and I think make each of these books interesting. So this is all the releases from July to December and I'm just so excited for so many of these. I always seem to think that I have a better second half of the year in terms of reading wise and I'm just really excited for a lot of these releases. So shall we just get into it? I don't think there's anything else to say. It's hot. I'm hot by the way. It's hot in the UK. You think, Megan why are you wearing a long sleeve shirt? That's because all of my t-shirts I've worn already and I need to do a clothes wash. Let's just get into it and discuss my most anticipated releases for the second half of the year. So first we have Jade Shards by Fonda Lee. I'm really excited for this. I don't know how accessible this is going to be in terms of like how easy it is going to be to get your hands on it but this is a novella collection following characters from the Greenbone Saga. So if you've read Jade City, Jade War, Jade Legacy, I'm not ready for more stories following these characters. I think it's going to be mainly prequels is my understanding of it but yeah I loved this series. Particularly Jade War and Jade Legacy I thought were incredible. You're following like this mafia family where also Jade is like this, what's the word? People get their magic, their power from Jade and I just loved the series and the family and everything and so I'd be excited to follow more but again I don't know how easy this one's because I think it's kind of like indie published a little bit maybe or like it's a small publisher publishing this novella so I don't know how easy it's going to be to get your hands on it. Then we have The Only One Left by Riley Sager. Listen I have read every Riley Sager. It's one of the only authors that I've read all of their books. That's not normal and I think you know you should maybe get some help or something. But like me and Riley we have our ups, we have our downs. I really enjoyed The House Across the Lake which was his release last year. So listen I'm hoping for good things and The Only One Left sounds really good. We're following this character who I think in the 80s her whole family was killed and there's this kind of old folklore, old nursery rhyme that says that she killed her whole family. I think it's now that she can't speak, she's now elderly and we've got a character looking after her and I think trying to find out the truth. But yeah I really enjoyed some of the direction that Riley Sager's been taking his books. I mean Survivor Night was hot trash but that's okay. No Survivor Night didn't necessarily work for me because it was like there's an event happening in the moment and that we know that one of these characters in the storyline is responsible for and we've got a very small cast of characters. Whereas this one is more like focusing on this woman. Did she do what is suspected of her? Then we've got Myrtle. We'll just mention this one quickly. This is like a puzzle book. I've seen a lot of murder mystery authors that I follow like on Twitter and Instagram getting copies of this. It's not like a book, it's not like a fiction book or a non-fiction book, it's like a puzzle book where you're trying to solve different murders. You have to cross things out, you get clues and it helps you find out the true culprit. I don't know, I am intrigued. I would like to get my hands on it and do some mystery puzzles, why not? Then we've got Everyone Here Is Lying by Shari Lapina. Oh I also just want to say all these release dates are UK release dates and some might have moved around a bit. I tried to double check these but sometimes I might have put this book on my spreadsheet like at the start of the year and now the date has changed so much of it. But all of these, I double, I checked most of them so unless I missed something, you know, this is roughly when these books are being published. We've got a dad who I think is having an affair and he's visiting his mistress and the affair breaks down. He goes home and he's like angry or whatever. His daughter is there and then his daughter is missing. So it's like did he do something to the daughter? What happened there? Shari Lapina is an author I've read a lot from before as well and I have mixed, you know, I've had mixed experiences. I didn't like her most recent release, Not A Happy Family, as much as some of her other books. All of her other books I've enjoyed. She's been like a solid four star thriller author for me. Then we have A Very Lively Murder by Katie Watson. I'm really excited about this. Not a lot of people have read The Three Dahlias but I read it last year and The Three Dahlias, the first book in the series, is basically just a love letter. Oh ----. It's basically a love letter to the golden age of murder mysteries, you know. It's like very, we're talking about Agatha Christie but we're not, we have this author who wrote this very famous detective and we're following three women who have played that very famous detective throughout the years and they're going to the estate of the author and there's like a fan convention being held there and then murders start to ensue. In this one, I think two of them are on a film set for like the new film following this detective and murders start happening on the film set. These are just fun books, right? I don't think these are like five star but I really enjoyed the like respect and the love that it showed the genre in the first book so I'm hoping that will continue in the second. Then we have A Guide to the Dark. This one I just heard about and I thought sounded cool. It's YA and I believe it's sapphic. It's pitched as A Haunting of Hill House meets Nina LaCour who, if you know me, you know I love Nina LaCour. Also, hang on, hang on, hang on, hang on. Does Nina LaCour have a book coming out? She does but I think it's like kids. Okay, she's got like kids not like picture books coming out. Okay, so we've got these two best friends who I think are stranded in this like motel or hotel. I think it's like this ghost story. Yeah, I think one of them's brothers died but in the hotel I think people have died there before and it's them trying to connect with the ghost. I don't know, I really liked the cover. I thought this sounded interesting and I'm trying to read like more, I think, YA horror I do enjoy. I'm not a big scaredy girl for like mainstream horror. I just don't think I can hack it. I can't do it. You can. You can do it. You can. You can. And then we have Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia. Something about Silvia Moreno-Garcia, I always struggle to pitch her plots. Like, I've struggled with it with Doctor Doctor Moreau, with Velvet Was the Night. Like, I do struggle with her plots. This one I think is about the film industry. I think we're following characters in the film industry in, I think, the 90s in Mexico City. There's something about like magic in Silver Nitrate and like magic films being made. I don't know. The thing with Silvia Moreno-Garcia is I do just kind of go into her books blind and I just accept that that's something I'm gonna do. But Silvia Moreno-Garcia has got a new book coming out and everyone should be excited because I'm excited. So then we have None of This is True by Lisa Jewel and I'm really excited for this one. I'm excited for the audiobook of this one in particular because this one, we're following these two women. One of them is a podcaster, meets the other one and I think they become kind of entangled up in their lives and they're getting to know each other and one of them goes missing and the other one is producing a podcast about it and the podcast, it says, is like fully produced. Like, full cast, audio sound effects. This was the no-brainer. This was the banker. This was the one that couldn't fail. This was one that's never failed. If you're gonna do a podcast, the audiobook needs to be full cast. It needs to be sound effects. It needs, it needs to give me everything. I'm sorry, anything less is an insult. If you're giving me a podcast and a book, the audiobook has to like step it up, you know? So I'm really really excited for this. Lisa Jewel, I have read how many books? Maybe just the one, maybe the final episodes which I did enjoy, I did love. I have a few more I think on my TBR, maybe one more. But I'm intrigued by this one. It sounds interesting and I'm a sucker for a podcast. I'm a sucker for any mixed media element. Next we have The List by Yomi Adedike and I think this author was like a non-fiction author? I think she's like a, what did she write? Like Slayin' Your Lane? I think that was, I think that's what she wrote before. But this is her fiction debut and all I know about this one is that we're like following this character who has a boyfriend, she wakes up, there's this list published of all these terrible people who have done terrible things and usually she'd be like tweeting it out, like calling these people out. Turns out though her guy is on the list. He's on the list. I was shocked. I was shocked. So yeah, I'm really intrigued by this one. I think this one is gonna get a lot of hype so I'm excited to see what I think of it. Then we have Ruth Ware's new book Zero Days which I'm a bit nervous about. It like sounds like Mr and Mrs Smith kind of thing? Like I don't know if they're assassins? So it's about a husband and wife and then the husband is found dead and she's like the main suspect essentially. And here's the thing, right, we know husband and wife thrillers is not my thing. I think this is more of a suspense kind of thriller than like a mystery which I prefer from Ruth Ware. I tend to prefer her mysteries. Me and Ruth Ware, typically she does me well. Like I have a lot of five stars from her. I think I love some Ruth Ware's that like other people haven't loved. You know, I think I've given her three five stars at this point. So like we have good luck with each Next we have Mr. Magic by Kirsten White. I'm really excited for this one guys. I'm really excited for it. So I think this is where there was this like kids tv show back in the day with Mr Magic and it got like wiped. There's no- you can't see shows of it anymore. You can't see like old tapings of it. There's no tapings that exist of this show and the cast I think are called to this location where maybe Mr. Magic is there, maybe like death is gonna happen. I've never read Kirsten White and I know Hyde didn't have the best, you know, reception but I'm really excited about this one. It reminds me of like, you know, a Disney show like and then it's been wiped and it's like old like, you know, internet lore about this show. It just sounds so juicy to me. So this is actually what I'm most excited for. I can't wait and I'm hoping it's gonna be good. Then we have Thornhead by T. King Fisher. This is her like fantasy release. She's had a kind of horror release earlier this year and this is her fantasy release and I just know there's like a princess, there's a toad, there's a knight in shining armor. That's what I really need to know. I really want to get into more T. King Fisher. Have I read a T. King Fisher yet or do I just own lots of them? I sort of think I've read one. No, I think I own like three T. King Fishers but I haven't read one yet but like it's on the list. We're gonna get around to it eventually. Just Another Missing Person by Gillian McAllister I'm really excited for. So this girl goes missing. I mean we know I love Wrong Place, Wrong Time by Gillian McAllister but this girl goes missing and the policewoman is like trying to find out what happened but in order to save her family this policewoman has to pin the missing disappearance on someone else. Just let that sink in. It's camp! It's camp! I don't know what to tell you. I'm excited! I'm so excited. I really love Wrong Place, Wrong Time so I'm so excited to see what does next. Then we have Family Law by Elizabeth Acevedo. This is following this group of women, this family and I think they can kind of sense like how someone's gonna die or one of them can and she calls for like a living wake essentially and the girlies are like does she know she's gonna die? What's going on? And that's all I really know about it other than that. I think there's a lot of other women and they've got individual storylines and characteristics but I'm really excited about this. I love Elizabeth Acevedo's stuff and I think this is her adult debut so I'm really excited to see how I mean she has the most beautiful like lyrical lush writing so I'm really excited to see how that transfers into an adult book. Then we have Lights by Brenna Thumna. This is the third in the Sheets graphic novel series where we have Wendell who's like a ghost but he's like just like a sheet with a heart. This is all and I really love this series. I particularly love the second one. Excited to finish off this series. I thought the second one was the end but it's not. This is like the promised finale basically. Then we have Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Cañas. I'm really excited for this one too. It's vampires. It's vampires. I think there's like a war going on and we're following two characters who had previously been lovers as well and there's a vampire like killing everyone. I'm into vampires. I feel like I haven't read a good vampire book in a long time. I used to. I mean I was a Twilight girlie. What can I say? We are going to pretend we didn't hear that. So then I was like a paranormal romance girlie when I was like 13. Like I read a lot of paranormal. Like Evermore, The Beautiful Dead. Like if anyone remembers any of these you know that was my that was my ----. So I'm excited for a vampire vibe. Then we have A Fire at the Exhibition by T.E. Kinsey. I'm putting this on the list. This is like the 10th Lady Hardcastle mystery. I'm only up to like the sixth so I have got a way to go but I'm aiming to get caught up on the series this year. Like I'm just loving reading them. They're just so fun right. It's my favorite cozy mystery series. We're following Lady Hardcastle and her maid Flo and it's just joyous and funny and I love their relationship and it's oh I just love it. This one I think there's like a There's always a murder. Then we have Mammoths at the Gates by Nevo. This is the fourth in the Singing Hills cycle. I still haven't read the third one but I am excited about this one. So this is like short novellas kind of focusing on the act of storytelling. We're following Chi who's a cleric and they absorb stories. They like listen to stories from other people and like record them. It's like a spoken history through stories essentially and this one I think um their and when they go back home their mentor has died and the mentor's sisters are like trying to get in to take the mentor's body but that's not what the mentor wanted. So yeah I really love the first two in the series. I would like to get to the second two as quickly as I can. Then we have Rouge by Mona Award. I know a lot of you are Mona Award girlies. I am yet to be. I haven't read all as well but Bunny. I didn't love it. I didn't hate it. I enjoyed it but I wasn't like oh my god which I feel like a lot of people were. A horror tinted gothic fairy tale about a lonely dress shop clerk whose mother's unexpected death sends her down a treacherous path in pursuit of youth and beauty. Can she escape her mother's fate and find a connection that is more than skin deep? So it's very much about like beauty and like the quest for beauty and like how that can be like I don't know horror you know. So I'm intrigued. I listen maybe I'll become a Mona Award girlie. Who knows? Then we have The Last Devil to Die by Richard Osman. This is the fourth and the murder club series. I've already got it pre-ordered. I'm so excited. It comes out in September, mid-September here in the UK but like I've said before I always tend to read this in November. November to me is murder mystery month. Like it's murder mystery hotspot, murder mystery vibes, murder mystery month you know. I'm really excited for this one. I think like an old friend of theirs dies and so they're on the quest to find out what happened but again this is one that I don't feel like you really need to do the synopsis. You know we've got the Thursday murder club who are a group of elderly characters who are solving murders together and it is my favourite series ever. Maybe. It's up there. I mean I've given them all five stars. It's one of my favourite series ever. I love Richard Osman's writing. I didn't expect to love it as much as I do but I do. Like it to me is perfection. It's everything I want in a murder mystery. I'm obsessed. I know it's not for everyone. I think if you're not from the UK a lot of the humour and particularly the references like it's got some niche niche niche niche British references. I can understand how it might not be your thing. You know particularly like in the third book I'm just thinking about we've got a is like a local news anchor and like if you're not from the UK you don't understand the kind of people that are local news anchors. Not the national news anchors but like are a local news anchor. As someone who used to do journalism and so like I visited some local news radio stations and stuff when I used to do like work experience. It's a certain kind of person. It's a certain kind of person and I just feel like those references you know if not from the UK I can understand why you wouldn't love it as much as I do but I mean I'm obsessed. I'm obsessed. Oh then we have one I'm really excited for. We have The Collectors which is an anthology. It's edited by A.S. King which like A.S. King I love you. I need to finish reading like my backlist of all my A.S. Kings but um yeah I know Annamie Mccamore is also in this anthology. It's a short story about characters who collect things basically. It sounds very interesting but I'm really excited. I don't read enough anthologies I feel like. So guys just oh my god you don't understand. I love making this video so much because just talking about this to you is like igniting a fire within myself. I'm like sorry if the position has changed I just closed the window because I felt like I was getting a bit noisy but it is hot so you know but I will suffer in the heat for you. Next we have The Odds by my friend Lindsay Puckett. I got to meet Lindsay a couple weeks ago in London when she was over visiting and it was amazing. It was so nice to meet her. I still haven't read The Glass Witch because it's a pain to get in the UK. I'm not gonna lie it's like it's a little bit tricky to get in the UK so I haven't managed to get my hands on it yet but I'm really excited for The Odds which is her next book. I think this is following a girl who's like grown up in an old people's home or something and she has to find out what her power is by a certain birthday. I always remember her calling this The Odd Book when she was writing it. She called it The Odd Book and now it's called The Odds but yeah it sounds really really really fun and um I want to read more middle grade. I feel like I don't read enough middle grade right now. Then we have Midnight is the Darkest Hour by Ashley Winstead. I've only read one. Ashley Winstead at the moment which is In My Dreams I Hold a Knife but I do really want to read more. I Own a Lost Housewife is wrapped up. It's one of the books I'm most excited to read and like most want to read right now. Ashley Winstead is another author whose synopses always evade me a little bit so I've just pulled this one up to try and remember. We're set in like the south in like a baptist like devil fearing place but there's like myths about a vampire um and a scum is found deep in a swamp next to mysterious cult symbols. Everyone goes crazy. It's getting weird. I don't know I am excited for this one. It's one that the synopses like some synopses like stick in your brain like okay I get the vibe I know what we're going for. This one I still don't know what we're going for but I do I really love religion as like a theme in books and I think dark like you can really get like dark with religion. I don't know um so I'm excited for this one. Okay then we've got Last to Leave the Room by Caitlin Starling. So I've only read one Caitlin Starling and it was The Death of Jane Lawrence I feel like it was called um which I didn't love but I still own The Luminous Dead and I really want to read it and I feel like I would love The Luminous Dead but Last to Leave the Room we're following this scientist who like opens a door I think like another world or whatever and finds like her doppelganger like a clone of her and as her and the clones spend more time together she starts like losing her memory or whatever and the clone seems to be getting better and it sounds very dark and very strange and I'm hoping that me and Caitlin Starling will vibe this time. I feel in my bones, I feel good vibes, I'm hopeful for us so we'll see how we go. Oh then we have The Moon of the Turning Leaves by Warbeechig Rice. I am so excited for this one. So this is the sequel to The Moon of the Crusted Snow where in that first book we're following an indigenous community basically in the apocalypse and like what happens when they are kind of like already cut off from the rest of like you know big cities whatever they're kind of living in their own community and how they find out about this apocalypse and like how they cope with that and this seems to be a sequel like 10-20 years on or something like that and I'm nervous because I feel like The Moon of the Crusted Snow was a perfect like standalone kind of eerie it's classed as horror I guess I don't know what I would class it as but I loved it I loved Moon of the Crusted Snow I thought it was incredible and so I'm excited for a sequel but I'm also incredibly nervous because I thought The Moon of the Crusted Snow firstly has a great ending that's kind of like an open ending that is open to interpretation in many ways and I thought that was so great about it so I'm really nervous about this one and I just don't know if it needed a sequel so I'm intrigued to see where this one goes but I'm gonna read it because I loved the first one so much. Then we have The Fall of Rivera by Crystal Maldonado so this is gonna be my third Crystal Maldonado. I loved Fat Chance, Charlie Baker. I didn't love the other one or the original one. I read it on holiday last year. No Filter in Other Lives. I didn't love No Filter in Other Lives as much but this one sounds fun. I think this one is like ex-relationship like you know exes to lovers kind of thing. Crystal Maldonado writes what I think is like fun YA but also tackles difficult topics so I think this one is going to tackle some difficult topics. I think the main character maybe has polycystic ovaries which I haven't read a lot in YA and I love to see that representation because I as a young as a young girl believed I had polycystic ovaries. Basically I got told oh yeah you have polycystic ovaries when I was like 16 and then when I was like 20 I went back for another scan they're like no you don't so whatever but as someone who you know experienced that I feel like it would have been great to read that representation when I was young so I'm so glad to see that in a book. Then we have The Christmas Appeal. Guys guys Janice Hallett has written the sequel to The Appeal set a Christmas. I'm gonna collapse. No I don't. I feel faint. I've struck gold ladies. I'm excited. I didn't love The Appeal but I've gone on to love her other books so I'm hoping that was just like a debut. Some aspects of it didn't really work for me. I still think it's great like I still think it's great but I didn't. Here's the thing The Appeal was a five star prediction and it was like not a five star. The fact it was not a five star was so crushing to me I think I gave it like a 3.5 but really it's a four like if we're being honest with ourselves it was a four. It was so much fun. So yeah they're holding like a Christmas fate or something and Santa dies. I'm so excited. I'm so excited and I think Janice Hallett she's got like another book coming out in like January or February next year. This woman is crazy. She's churning them out. Then we have Starling House. This is Alex E Harrow's next book. This is another one that I've read the synopsis so many times for and it hasn't quite sunk into my brain. We've got a haunted house so no one remembers when the house was built. Everyone agrees it's best that the house and its last lonely heir go to rot. The house is uncanny and ugly and full of secrets just like its heir. Okay I'm excited. I love Once and Future Witches by Alex E Harrow. I love it like deeply love it. So I'm really excited for her to have a new like novel release. She's had like novellas the past couple years but I'm excited for a full-length novel. Then we have got Heartstopper Volume 5 by Liz Isaac. It's no longer the last Heartstopper guys. We've got one more of this. I feel a little bit like protective of Heartstopper because like I loved it and then now everyone loves it and I'm like that's not allowed. I think we're kind of almost catching up with the plot of the novella Nick and Charlie where Nick is gonna go away to university. Starting to think about what university he's going to. Obviously Charlie is a year younger like school-wise than him and so it's them figuring it out and like being sad that they're all gonna be together basically. Oh and then we have Bookshops on Bone Dust by Travis Baldrick. I'm so excited. This is the prequel to Legends and Lattes which is probably still my favorite book that I've read this year. This is a prequel set at a library. I think it's like some kind of owl creature. I'm just so excited. Legends and Lattes is everything I've ever wanted in a book. It is heartwarming. It is beautiful. The relationship. The journey. Ah! It was so good. So I'm really excited for Bookshops on Bone Dust to come out. One of my most anticipated releases of the year. Then we only have two more guys. We have Check and Mate by Ali Hayswood. This is Ali Hayswood's first YA which I'm really excited for. I think it's about like chess players and a prom and like falling in love. You don't need to know the plot. You just need to know it's YA Ali Hayswood. I was telling my mum because she loves Ali Hayswood. She was like yeah but like there's not gonna be any sex. She's like that's where I come to Ali Hayswood from. Like okay but like we can still we still love her writing relationships and whatever. So um I'm really excited for this. I'm excited to see how she transfers into YA. And finally we have Dark Corners by Megan Golding. This is the sequel to The Night Swim if you've read that. We're following the same podcaster. I think there's this guy in prison and an influencer visits him and then she goes missing or is found dead or something along those lines and the podcaster is investigating it. I really love The Night Swim. I thought it was a great book. Podcast element was great but also you know that one was like tackling sexual assault and like a court case around that and I'd love to read more court case books actually. I feel like I don't read a lot of them but I really love that setting. So yeah excited for that one to come out. That is all my most anticipated releases for the second half of the year. Like I said nothing for December yet. Let me know if any of these you're excited for and let me know what other new releases you're excited for. Like I tried to keep this list fairly. I could go crazy right and add every book that I think sounds incredible but a lot of these are from authors that I have read before and that's kind of what I prioritize apart from like if there's any books that I just think sound so cool that I need to include. So yeah that is my most anticipated releases for the rest of this year. Thank you guys so much for watching and I'll see you very soon in another video.