August 2026 list by K. Pearson |
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Alchemy of Souls
by Adriana Mather
Alchemy of Souls follows two magically bound teens as they race to solve the mystery of an ancient magical key before it's too late.
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Alex, by Proxy
by Karen Myna Cantor
Welcome to sixteen-year-old Alex's life, ripped straight from the headlines. Alex is a victim of Munchausen by proxy, but he's also a witty, sarcastic kid with unusually good crossword skills and a penchant for astronomy. At least he used to be. Now that he's recovered from years of illness induced by his mother, he sort of has to figure out who he is all over again... And most importantly, he'll have to decide if he can testify against the woman who gave birth to him. As Alex awaits the trial, his friends convince him to start a podcast as a way to tell his story.
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Armor for Liars
by S. E. Grove
In a world where magic is stolen from the dead, enchanters bind spirits to fuel their power. Sam, the son of islander immigrants, was murdered after using magic to fit into Commonwealth University, home to a secret society of elite enchanters. Now a spirit, he must solve his own murder and save Clementine Quinn, a young woman disguised as a male student, before she shares his fate.
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Augusta Pine Does Not Exist
by Emily Lloyd-Jones
A teen criminal hacker turned secret operative must outwit a band of cyberterrorists in this gripping novel from the acclaimed author of The Bone Houses.
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Deathless
by Julie Kagawa
To defeat the immortal Deathless King, Sparrow must journey into the deadly World Scar to find a fragment of the goddess of Fate's loom—the only force powerful enough to challenge him. But if she reaches it, the power of a goddess may destroy her before the King ever can.
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Everything We Couldn't Say
by Emma Scott
They were supposed to be rivals. They weren't supposed to fall in love. Harper Bennett has fought for every inch of her life: for her dreams, her brother, and the roof over their heads. The Novus Science Prize is her ticket to a brilliant future, and she won't let anything stand in her way. Especially not Orion Mercer. Golden boy. Heir to one of Castle Hill's elite Big Five families. Orion is all effortless charm, endless jokes, and a future already written within a billion-dollar chemical empire. But Orion isn't what Harper expected. Behind the polished confidence is a secret battle he's been fighting alone and a musical talent no one saw coming.
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The Gilded Blade
by Jennifer Lynn Barnes
Everyone is a player. In the grandest of games, there is everything to win--money, love, power, revenge--and even more to lose. From Texas to Prague to London and beyond, the Hawthorne family, the players from the Grandest Game, and allies old and new are drawn into a web of centuries-old secrets and mind-bending puzzles. Every clue pulls them deeper; every answer demands a price. To survive, they must unravel the mysteries that bind them together...but some truths are deadly.
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Hell to Pay
by Lora Beth Johnson
A story about a teenage con artist and her ragtag crew teaming up for their toughest job yet: stealing a soul from the Afterlife. Elle Fields comes from a long line of thieves who specialize in breaking into the Afterlife to steal secrets--and magic--from the dead. But after her parents' disappearance and her brother's death, Elle is left adrift, without even her crew to rely on. Until a mysterious stranger offers her a job she can't refuse: stealing a soul from the Afterlife. If Elle can get it done, it could be the key to restoring the life she lost. The only problem is getting her crew back together.
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How (Not) to Renovate a Haunted House
by Jenny L. Howe
An amateur ghost hunter and a supernatural skeptic team up for a haunted home renovation project. But is their relationship the real fixer upper? Amity Callaway is sick of being known as the weird girl. As annoyed as she is that her recently divorced mom just moved them across the country to the tiny, quirky town of Harlow's Rest, Massachusetts, it could be the fresh start she needs. Until Amity discovers their absolute disaster of a new house is supposedly haunted.
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I Didn't Do It
by Elle Gonzalez Rose
I Killed Zoe Spanos meets The Counselors in this YA thriller about the daughter of a killer who must prove her innocence after a night of fun turns deadly.
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The Killing Rules
by Bree DeSpain
Harper Westbrook isn't afraid of monsters...she is one. For the past three years, she's been one of the Blood Bound--girls and women cursed with a bloodlust only satisfied by killing terrible men. Once every three months, she trades in her pom-poms for a lethal throwing axe. Her life is led by a strict set of rules to keep her dark secret as hidden as the bodies she buries. And her number one rule? Stay away from Grayson Jones. The boy she was totally falling for until the night her curse manifested, everything went horribly wrong, and she killed his father. It was self-defense. Or at least that's what she keeps telling herself.
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The Lure of Wolves and Whispers
by Amanda Connolly
On the mist-shrouded Isle of Eireann, buying magic comes with a price. But when her beloved older sister is gravely injured, Maeve risks everything to buy the forbidden magic that might save her. In exchange, Maeve trades her life to a ruthless and dangerously alluring rebel leader. Bound to do his bidding, Maeve finds herself thrown into a deadly competition to become the next queen and stand beside a prince rumored to be more brutal than his tyrannical father. With the isle on the brink of war, trust and survival come at a terrible cost--one that will tear Maeve's world, and her heart, in two. What would you sacrifice to survive?
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Metamorphosis
by Shelby Nicole
A teen girl is swept into an opulent world of love, lies, and ghosts after she moves in with the wealthy, mysterious family she never knew she had. The year is 1985, and seventeen-year-old Jade Whitney is about to discover that her family holds a dark secret that will change her life forever. Sent to live with her great-aunt Ruth, Jade moves into Blythe House, her family's sprawling, gilded mansion--but picturesque Grove Hollow, New York, is anything but welcoming. At Jade's new private school she's shunned by everyone except the Misfits, the school's outcasts, who spend their weekends exploring abandoned haunted mansions and listening to The Cure.
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Our Wicked Gifts
by Kathryn Foxfield
Cicely is the black sheep daughter of the powerful Winter family, who made a deal with the devil in exchange for riches and ruthless magic. Soren is the boy her family banished to the underworld. Their fates intertwine when Cicely's loathsome Uncle Dorian winds up dead at a masquerade ball. Once overlooked for her lowly gift of discovering secrets, Cicely is now her family's only chance at survival, tasked with finding the killer before he takes out every last Winter.
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Rootbound
by Margaret Owen
A cunning king. A devious princess. Best. Week. Ever. Rapunzel knows nothing about her neighboring kingdom, Astera - and not just because she only left her tower a month ago. The famously reclusive island has limited its contact with outsiders for decades. So when a suspicious invitation arrives welcoming Rapunzel to the Asteran princess's coming of age ceremony, and offering her a chance to be useful for the first time since she lost her healing powers, Rapunzel accepts - and unwittingly plunges herself and her companion, Eugene, into a tangled knot of political intrigue and magical secrets. Eugene is just happy to get one last adventure with Rapunzel before his criminal background catches up with him and prevents their happy ending.
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Ruinous Ends
by I. V. Marie
The Decennial is over, but for the students of Blackwood Academy, the fight for the afterlife has just begun. The infamous school was hiding more secrets--and lies--than any of the Decennial's participants could have imagined. And there's still so much that remains buried beneath its ancient foundations. Now the future of the academy, and all the souls within it, rests in the hands of six former pupils: The charmer and the golden boy . . .The traitor and the girl desperate to save her . . .The Chosen One and the one who would choose her over and over again . . . Any of them could be the hero the afterlife needs . . . or the villain who will destroy it for good.
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Shadow Over the Pumpkin Queen
by Megan Shepherd
Can Sally save Jack from the shadows? Sally should be at ease now that she has proven herself as Pumpkin Queen by saving Halloween Town from destructive spells twice. But the villain behind the town's most recent troubles--a mysterious figure cloaked in darkness--is still at large, and Sally refuses to rest until she and her king, Jack Skellington, can find their enemy and stop them forever. Then, strange storm clouds and directionless wind begin to haunt Halloween Town, and soon, citizens start to go missing. It becomes clear that the dark foe has decided to make the first move, and Sally will need allies from across the Hinterlands to stop him. But as Sally and Jack gather their friends to fight back against this attack, the unthinkable happens: the mysterious force takes Jack, too.
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Tides of Fortune
by Lauryn Hamilton Murray
Having survived three treacherous trials to win her crown, Blaze is soon to become Queen of the Aquatori. However, before she can take the throne, she must set out to find the Eye of the Soul, one of the realm’s most powerful weapons, lest another claims it for themself.
Her journey will take her deep into the forests of Ostacre and into a temporary alliance with the infuriating yet undeniably compelling Fox. She can’t resist feeling drawn to him, even as she questions if she can truly trust him. Fortune favors the brave, but will it protect the Storm Weaver on her most dangerous mission yet?
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To Drown a Witch
by Lindsey Olsson
In Gadore, the Witch is feared above all else. Reborn into each generation, she is the only person with magic running innately through her veins, able to wield that magic with a single thought. So when guards across the city begin to drop dead, gruesomely murdered by violent and vicious magic, everyone knows the Witch has returned--and no one will be safe until she's killed. Toran is the Prince's Crown, the most highly skilled fighter in the King's Guard. Tasked with the responsibility of leading the hunt for the Witch, Toran tries to focus on his assignment to forget the ghosts of his past. And after he learns of Nes, a thief with an uncanny ability to sniff out magic, he forcibly recruits her into joining his hunt.
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Where Lost Girls Go
by Kody Keplinger
A group of teenage girls living in a cult in the Kentucky woods become unsettled by the arrival of an astute new member.
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