Welcome to Future Fiction, my reimagining of the Waiting on Wednesday meme! There are so many amazing new books coming out, that I can no longer pick just one. My goal with Future Fiction is to share at least three new books each week, a combination of recent cover reveals and books that I’ve recently added to my TBR pile. I’m still going to be linking up with Wishful Endings/Can’t Wait Wednesday, and I also want to give a shout out to Jill at Breaking the Spine for starting the original Waiting on Wednesday meme. I hope you’ll find some new books to add to your TBR piles, and as always, I look forward to hearing what YOU’RE looking forward to:-D
I’m hitting all three of my favorite genres today: science fiction, fantasy and horror. Take a look:
When her cousin gets kidnapped by a dastardly trickster, Luzia is forced to sell herself in servitude to the Eoi in exchange for his life. But the terms of the deal turn out to be much more complicated than she ever imagined…
Luzia N.E. Drainway never really thought too much about the Astrosi. They lurk above and below Bastion City – a giant multileveled megalopolis she calls her home – and they tend to keep to themselves. On the rare occasions they use their magics to meddle with human affairs, most people with an ounce of sense steer clear of whichever unfortunate soul happens to be their victim. Luzia is far too dedicated to repairing and maintaining the frequently-damaged Bastion to pay them much attention, and prefers to ignore the Astrosi just like everyone else.
That disregard gets blown out of the water when a rogue Astrosi and nefarious trickster named Carrion kidnaps her nephew and sells him to the Eoi, one of the Astrosi courts.
With no other options to save her nephew, Luzia trades her life for his and finds herself in service to the Eoi. Unfortunately for her, Astrosi logic is acrobatic in ways even the most devious human mind can barely comprehend. It’s not until the deal is struck that she realizes she’s trapped in the most abstruse verbal contract imaginable. She is essentially conscripted into their ranks, and her devotion to her city becomes stretched to breaking point by her new masters’ orders.
As she struggles under this weight, she begins to uncover the secrets of the Astrosi people – the internal battles for power between the two kingdoms, the never-ending conflict between them, the trickster Carrion who somehow bridges that gap, and the very nature of the Bastion itself.
Terms of Service by Ciel Pierlot. Releases in June 2025 from Angry Robot. I loved Pierlot’s Bluebird, and I will read anything she writes. This sounds really good, and wow that cover!
Blood once turned the wheels of empire. Now it is money.
A new age of exploration and innovation has dawned, and the Empire of the Wolf stands to take its place as the foremost power in the known world. Glory and riches await.
But dark days are coming. A mysterious plague has broken out in the pagan kingdoms to the north, while in the south, the Empire’s proxy war in the lands of the wolfmen is weeks away from total collapse.
Worse still is the message brought to the Empress by two heretic monks, who claim to have lost contact with the spirits of the afterlife. The monks believe this is the start of an ancient prophecy heralding the end of days-the Great Silence.
It falls to Renata Rainer, a low-ranking ambassador to an enigmatic and vicious race of mermen, to seek answers from those who still practice the arcane arts. But with the road south beset by war and the Empire on the brink of supernatural catastrophe, soon there may not be a world left to save . . .
Grave Empire (The Great Silence #1) by Richard Swan. Releases in February 2025 from Orbit Books. I’m sorry I haven’t read Swan’s Empire of the Wolf series, which I’ve heard so many good things about. I’m glad this is the start to a new series, and do I see pirate motifs on the cover??
In this hauntingly twisted tale, an author reconnects with an old boarding school friend, forcing her to reckon with their shared past and the imaginary creature she thought they left behind.
Touch a line, you break your spine.
Stacey is the dusty air, the cracked soil, the drought. To fourteen-year-old Bethany Sloane, she’s everything.
Abandoned by her mother at a remote African boarding school, Bethany will do anything to stay in Stacey’s good graces. And that means learning the rules of each twisted game.
Touch a crack, you break your back.
Seventeen years later, Bethany is a bestselling author. Disabled now, she can’t remember what happened back in the bush. But there’s no mistaking Stacey Preston’s name in her inbox.
Glassy, glassy, cut my arsey.
That email brings Bethany’s childhood rushing back. The Glass Man was just a story the Thorns invented, a game of wits. But every game has its rules—and consequences for breaking them. To stay alive this round, Bethany needs to play right into Stacey’s hands.
Dark and disturbing, The Thorns explores the horrifying world of adolescent abuse, controlling friendships, and blinding obsession.
The Thorns by Dawn Kurtagich. Releases in March 2025 from Thomas & Mercer. Oooh this sounds so good! I have never read anything by Kurtagich before, but I’m not going to miss this one:-)
All three of them sound intriguing!! I read the first book in the other series by Swan and… I didn’t enjoy it so much but this one sounds promising all the same!! And I am intrigued by the first one, too! Thanks for sharing!
I love the sound of Grave Empire although I may try to read the authors other series first as it’s set within the same world and I’d rather avoid any spoilers that being said I saw a comment saying its set 200 years later so maybe I could get away with it. I haven’t read anything by the last author either but I have several of her books on my TBR & that one sounds intriguing too.
Eek, The Thorns sounds a little too creepy for me! Sounds like it’d make a good movie.