April 2026 list by Donalee Jacobs |
|
|
|
The Beheading Game
by Rebecca Lehmann
When Anne Boleyn wakes up the day after her beheading, she sews her head back on and sets out to seek revenge-in a queer-feminist retelling of one of history's most egregiously wronged women.
|
|
|
|
The Book of Fallen Leaves
by A. S. Tamaki
Shogun meets Game of Thrones in the blockbuster epic fantasy event of the year. Sen Hoshiakari is an exiled prince of a clan that lost everything in his father's failed rebellion. Deprived of his birthright, Sen is determined to restore his family's lands and honor at any cost. Rui is a peasant girl who saved Sen's life on the night his family were put to the sword. But now, she is adrift and unsure of her place in the world, not knowing that the gods themselves have plans for her ... As civil war throws the empire into chaos, and demons seek vengeance on the living, Sen and Rui must fight for both their clan and their shared future ... But vengeance demands a bloody price.
|
|
|
|
The Bookshop of 99 Doors
by Jaime Jo Wright
In 1910, Minnie Tipton finds herself beset by the onslaught of superstitions that envelop the Pennsylvania mansion her father bought. In the present, ghostly havoc breaks loose when Triss Bellamy takes a position managing a bookshop in that same building. As each hunt for answers, the doorway to the past threatens to close on any remaining hope.
|
|
|
|
The Bridge Back to You
by Riss M. Neilson
Olivia owes everything to Celia's Place. It's where she learned how to be a great chef. It's also where she first fell in love. But at nineteen, Olivia had a wanderlust she couldn't deny. And Carmello, whose mother owned the restaurant, couldn't leave Celia's Place behind any more than he could force Olivia to stay. Now, ten years later, when Carmello learns that his mother left shares of her beloved restaurant to both him and Olivia, he plans to buy her half of the shares back quickly and painlessly. That is until Olivia shows up at the restaurant, ready to help run it. Soon enough, sparks begin to fly, but can Olivia and Carmello avoid the mistakes of the past?
|
|
|
|
The Counting Game
by Sinéad Nolan
Into the woods. Count to ten. Only one of us comes home again. When a teenager disappears from her small Irish town and a therapist is brought in to break the silence of the only witness, old wounds are opened in a search that becomes a race against time--perfect for fans of God of the Woods and The Witch Elm.
|
|
|
|
Daughter of Egypt
by Marie Benedict
In the 1920s, archeologist Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon of Highclere Castle discovered the treasure-filled tomb of the boy Pharaoh Tutankhamun. Behind it all stood Lady Evelyn Herbert--daughter of Lord Carnarvon. Nearly 3,000 years earlier, another woman defied the expectations of her time: Hatshepsut, When Evelyn becomes obsessed with finding Hatshepsut's secret tomb, she risks everything to uncover the truth about her reign. But as danger closes in and political tensions rise, she must choose to protect her father's legacy or forge her own. Propelled by high adventure and deadly intrigue, Daughter of Egypt is the story of two ambitious women, both forced to hide who they were during their lifetimes, yet ultimately they changed history forever.
|
|
|
|
The Fortune Flip
by Lauren Kung Jessen
Hazel Yen would love to be that person who doesn't believe in bad luck. But having lost her job, her mom, her optimism, and even her dim-sum leftovers, she's sitting in a fortune teller's booth, desperate for a sign that her luck might change. When fate crashes into her, disguised as Logan Wells and his chaotic cat, Hazel's misfortune takes a turn for the miraculous. Money problems vanish. A new job lands in her lap. And she's crushing-hard-on the guy who started it all. The only problem: Logan's luck has taken a turn for the worse. A shared lottery ticket could be just the answer they're seeking or a disaster waiting to happen. Has Hazel's fortune truly changed? And if so, could winning at life mean losing at love?
|
|
|
|
The Geomagician
by Jennifer Mandula
When a Victorian fossil hunter discovers a baby pterodactyl, she vows to protect him, with the help of a fellow scholar—her former fiancé—in this enchanting and transporting historical fantasy.
|
|
|
|
Heap Earth Upon It
by Chloe Michelle Howarth
1965, the O'Leary siblings arrive in their new village under suspicious circumstances. Desperate to make a new start, the O'Learys offer few details about their past. As they settle in to town, the siblings are taken under the wing of Betty and Bill Nevan, a wealthy couple who have always wanted children. However, as one O'Leary sister grows close to Betty, lines are crossed and their relationship becomes difficult to define. All the while, the O'Leary's buried secrets keep bubbling up, threatening to ruin their new future. Gothic, lush, and suspenseful, Chloe Michelle Howarth spins a tangled web that leaves you wondering who to trust until the very last page.
|
|
|
|
Hell's Heart
by Alexis Hall
They are monsters, legends, gods. They are our prey. Earth is dead. Which leaves us stuck living in atmospheric domes on planets that will kill us if we blink wrong, or run out of fuel. And by fuel I mean the cerebrospinal fluid of gargantuan, quasi-psychic space monsters. I joined the hunt hoping to get paid. I followed a captain chasing abominations in the skies of Jupiter. We battled the Möbius Beast itself, there in the red eye of the world. Spoiler: we lost.
|
|
|
|
The Hired Man
by Sandra Dallas
1937. It's been seven years since the dust storms started in Colorado. High school student Martha Helen Kessler and her family are luckier than most; they still eke out a living from the land. Evidence of the Dust Bowl's grim impact on families is everywhere. When Martha Helen's mother insists they take in a handsome drifter who saves a local boy from a vicious storm, she discovers a darker side to their rural community. Suspicion, jealousy, and prejudice grip their neighbors -- and emotions reach a frenzy after her best friend, Frankie, disappears and is found murdered. Martha Helen is forced to make sense of her conflicting feelings and loyalties in order to help find retribution and to reconcile the difference between the law and justice.
|
|
|
|
The House of Hidden Letters
by Izzy Broom
Skye MacKinnon is desperate for an escape. When she wins a lottery to buy a run-down cottage on a Greek island for only one euro, Skye jumps at the chance to get out of England and start over. As she unlocks the tattered blue door of her new cottage, Skye immediately feels like she's found her true home. Skye and the other lottery winners--the first residents in these houses since the 1940s--form a tight-knit group, finding in one another the strong relationships they'd been missing in their own lives. When Skye and local contractor Andreas find a set of mysterious letters, they begin to unravel the history of the prior residents, and the truth about life on Folegandros during World War II.
|
|
|
|
Killing Me Softly
by Sandie Jones
Charlie and Freya were the perfect couple. Freya enjoyed a rewarding job leading a charity's fundraising efforts, and Charlie was becoming one-to-watch on the London culinary scene. They had it all until an accident tears their lives apart, and they're awoken by police, asking whether they are aware that their car had been involved in a hit and run. Torn apart by accusations and guilt, the trust that Freya and Charlie once shared is shattered as they look for someone to blame for the fallout. Told from both Freya and Charlie's perspectives, a cat and mouse game ensues, both desperate to have someone to point the finger at. But is it more important to be right, or to win?
|
|
|
|
A Lady for All Seasons
by TJ Alexander
Verbena Montrose must marry to save herself and her family from poverty. When she hears a rumor about her friend Tienne that could ruin him, she proposes a marriage of convenience. But when Verbena discovers a poet, Flora Witcombe, has been publishing verses that hint she is onto their scheme, Verbena pretends to be a poet herself to confront her in a local salon. Flora is terrified by and smitten with Verbena. But she holds a secret of her own: he is also William Forsyth, a novelist and son of a minor noble family. And if circumstances don't allow Flora to woo Verbena, perhaps William can. Faced with two suitors and a fiancé, Verbena realizes she may need to think outside of society's constraints to find true happiness.
|
|
|
|
Life: A Love Story
by Elizabeth Berg
As Florence Flo Greene nears the end of her life, she writes a letter to Ruthie, the woman who grew up next door to her, describing the items Flo is leaving Ruthie in her will. The letter starts off as an autobiography in things, but it transforms Flo and those around her. In the time she has left, Flo decides to take herself up on tiny dares. And as these adventures lead her to make new friends, Flo helps them, too, find the fulfillment that living a full life has led her to understand. Life: A Love Story is a reminder that whatever your circumstances, as long as you're alive, you can keep on investing in life. The joy will inevitably follow.
|
|
|
|
Magic and Mischief at the Wayside Hotel
by Elizabeth Everett
When Number Five Wayside Inn gets stranded on a non-magical world, manager Pax Nomenta's trusty Hotel Management Handbook can't help him. How is he going to re-boot the hotel and keep it on its magical journey? Josie LaChiusa is a single mom experiencing debt, having parenting doubts, and tipping towards depression, when an ad appears about an available apartment in a building she's never seen before. Pax needs a new guest to re-start his hotel, and Josie needs a nudge to re-start her life. In a building occupied by faeries, gargoyles, and a gnome with a bad attitude, two souls from very different places come together to create a home like no other.
|
|
|
|
The Moonlight Runner
by Karen Robards
Ireland, 1918. In a world brutalized by the Great War and devastated by the Spanish flu, Rynn Carmichael is pulled into the war of independence when Donal O'Reilly, the boy she loves, takes up gunrunning in support of the rebellion. Rynn is working as a nurse in a convalescent home for soldiers when she overhears a British officer gloating over the trap that has been set for Irish gunrunners bringing a boat full of smuggled arms ashore. Knowing that Donal must be involved, she rushes to warn the incoming boat, only to find herself caught up in a terrifying and tragic series of events that take her from the glittering ballrooms of London to the narrow back alleys of Dublin as she and those she loves fight for their lives and their country.
|
|
|
|
My Grandfather, the Master Detective
by Masateru Konishi
As a lover of classic crime stories, it's no surprise that schoolteacher Kaede encounters everyday mysteries more often than your typical twenty-seven-year-old. Solving them is another matter, though. For that, she turns to her beloved grandfather, who retains a keen sharpness of mind despite his dementia, and who was once a key member of The Waseda Mystery Club. From impossible locked room murders to confounding missing persons cases, the grandfather-granddaughter duo weave stories to get to the bottom of every mystery. But all the while, an insidious shadow from Kaede's past slowly closes in on her.
|
|
|
|
The News from Dublin: Stories
by Colm Tóibín
From Colm Tóibín comes a brilliant collection of short stories, many never-before-published, set across Ireland, Spain, and America—about the complexities of family, longing, loss, and love.
|
|
|
|
Nonesuch
by Francis Spufford
It's the summer of 1939, and the air in London is thick with the tension of impending war. Iris Hawkins has a chance encounter with Geoff, a genius engineer from the new technology of television. What was supposed to be one night of abandon draws her instead into a reality where time bends, spirits can be summoned, and history hangs by a thread. Soon there are Nazi planes droning overhead. In a time when death falls randomly from above each night and all the men are away in uniform, the defense of the city is in the hands of its women. But Iris has more to contend with than just the terrors of the Blitz because a fascist fanatic is travelling with a gun in her hand, and only Iris can stop her from altering the course of history forever.
|
|
|
|
Nothing Tastes as Good
by Luke Dumas
Emmett Truesdale has never fit the Southern California mold, over three hundred pounds, he carries the weight of childhood trauma and millennial ennui around his waist and in his soul. Desperate for help, he enrolls in a clinical trial for a weight loss product called Obexity. The treatment is as horrifying as the results are miraculous and as Emmett sheds pounds, every part of his life improves overnight. Unfortunately, Obexity comes with side effects. Worse, people who were cruel to him are disappearing and when the police warn of a cannibalistic killer on the loose, he fears that Obexity is turning him into a monster. But how can he give it up now that people are finally starting to treat him like he's human?
|
|
|
|
The Pie & Mash Detective Agency
by J. D. Brinkworth
Jane Pye and Simon Mash are a millennial couple with extra time on their hands so they sign up for a private detective class. Their instructor, having a feeling his two worst students don't stand a chance, assigns them the case of Nellie Thorne, a woman recently reported missing. But she's the fifth Nellie Thorne to disappear in fifty years. The investigation leads the newly minted Pie and Mash Detective Agency to places they never thought they'd go, including haunted woods, mysterious archives, and, most terrifyingly for Jane, Simon's mum's house. As clues emerge, more questions than answers begin to pile up, but Jane and Simon are determined to uncover the truth in time to pass the class and save the day.
|
|
|
|
Ruinous Creatures
by Jessi Cole Jackson
For fans of One Dark Window and T. Kingfisher, comes a standalone romantasy debut about a woman who accidentally awakens the power to siphon magic from two phoenix skulls, binding her fate to a vengeful stranger and forcing them to navigate the devastating cost of their unbreakable bond.
|
|
|
|
Ruins
by Lily Brooks-Dalton
Professor Ember Agni is a rising star in archeology, trying to balance an unfulfilling career in academia and a crumbling marriage, all while pursuing her true passion: unearthing a lost empire that no one else believes existed. Just as she's about to give up, a message arrives from overseas. A former student claims to have found an artifact that hints at the forgotten world lying beneath history's tidy surface. With vindication finally within reach, Ember risks everything for the sake of discovery and undertakes an odyssey that will either make her name or ruin her.
|
|
|
|
Seasons of Glass and Iron: Stories
by Amal El-Mohtar
Seasons of Glass and Iron: Stories is a collection of acclaimed and awarded work from Amal El-Mohtar. With confidence and style, El-Mohtar guides listeners through exquisite and sharply observed tales about life as it is, was, and could be. Like miscellany from other worlds, these stories are told in letters, diary entries, reference materials, folktales, and lyrical prose. The acclaimed stories include The Green Book, The Lonely Sea in the Sky, And Their Lips Rang with the Sun, and more.
|
|
|
|
The Subtle Art of Folding Space
by John Chu
Ellie's universe--and this one--is falling apart. Her ailing mother is in a coma; her sister accuses her of being insufficiently Chinese; and a shadowy cabal of engineers is trying to hijack the skunkworks. Daniel, Ellie's cousin, finds an illicit device in the skunkworks -- one that keeps Ellie's mother alive while also creating destabilizing bugs in the physics of this universe. If she can confront her mother's legacy and overcome her family's generational trauma, she just might find save the skunkworks, but digging into her family's past is thornier than it seems, and the secrets she uncovers will force Ellie to choose between her family and the universe itself.
|
|
|
|
Toe to Toe
by Falon Ballard
Allegra Hart has been working her whole life to become a principal ballerina. When her director holds auditions for the lead role in the company's latest production, Allegra sees this as her chance. But the director wants someone with sex appeal, so Allegra enlists the help of the lead dancer of an all-male revue, classically trained dancer Cord Donovan. In exchange, she promises to help Cord choreograph a partner piece for his show. As they practice their moves, Allegra and Cord find themselves battling a growing attraction. Except Allegra is determined not to let a man derail her career . . . but what if she could have both love and success?
|
|
|
|
Witness Protection
by Robert Whitlow
Jon Tremaine has created a new life in Brunswick, Georgia, as part of the Federal Witness Protection program after testifying against the former drug cartel he was involved with. Only his wife, Sarah, and a handler with the US Marshal's office know his true identity, and he is now the manager of a large commercial tree farm with a baby on the way. But when one of Jon's employees is arrested for allegedly smuggling drugs into the United States, he comes out of the shadows to help him. Perfect for fans of John Grisham and Charles Martin, Witness Protection is a legal drama with a deep undercurrent of faith.
|
|
|
|
Yesteryear
by Caro Claire Burke
A traditional American woman, a beautiful wife and mother who sells her pioneer lifestyle of raw milk and farm-fresh eggs to her millions of social media followers, suddenly awakens cold, filthy, and terrified in the brutal reality of 1855--where she must unravel whether this living nightmare is an elaborate hoax, a twisted reality show, or something far more sinister in this sensational debut novel. A gripping, electrifying novel that is as darkly funny as it is frightening, Yesteryear is a gimlet-eyed look at tradition, fame, faith, and the grand performance of womanhood.
|
|
|
|
You Did Nothing Wrong
by Cg Drews
Single mother Elodie's life has become a fairy tale. She's met Bren, equal parts Golden-retriever-devoted and sinfully handsome. He's whisked her and her autistic son, Jude, to the crumbling family house he's renovating. She has a new husband, a new house, and a new baby on the way. Everything is perfect. Until Jude claims he can hear voices in the walls. He says their renovations are hurting the house. Even Elodie can't ignore it. Something strange is going on. The question is, Is it with the house, or with her son? And what is Elodie hiding?
|
|
|
|
|