Release Week: 5 August 2025
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Release Week: 5 August 2025
Posted on 2025-08-05 at 12:00 by Samuel Montgomery-Blinn
PICKS:
People Like Us: A Novel by Jason Mott, read by the author with Ronald Peet and JD Jackson for Penguin -- "Two Black writers are trying to find peace and belonging in a world that is riven with gun violence. One is on a global book tour after a big prize win; the other is set to give a speech at a school that has suffered a shooting. And as their two storylines merge, truths and antics abound in equal measure: characters drink booze out of an award trophy; menaces lurk in the shadows; tiny French cars putter around the countryside; handguns seem to hover in the air; and dreams endure against all odds."
Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz, read by Em Grosland for Macmillan -- "You don't have to eat food to know the way to a city's heart is through its stomach. So when a group of deactivated robots come back online in an abandoned ghost kitchen, they decide to make their own way doing what they know: making food—the tastiest hand-pulled noodles around—for the humans of San Francisco, who are recovering from a devastating war. But when their robot-run business starts causing a stir, a targeted wave of one-star reviews threatens to boil over into a crisis. To keep their doors open, they'll have to call on their customers, their community, and each other—and find a way to survive and thrive in a world that wasn't built for them."
Hungerstone By: Kat Dunn, read by Perdita Weeks for Penguin -- "A compulsive feminist reworking of Carmilla, the queer novella that inspired Dracula."
The Magician of Tiger Castle By: Louis Sachar, read by Edoardo Ballerini and Louis Sachar for Penguin -- "Long ago and far away (and somewhere south of France) lies the kingdom of Esquaveta. There, Princess Tullia is in nearly as much peril as her struggling kingdom. Esquaveta desperately needs to forge an alliance, and to that end, Tullia's father has arranged a marriage between her and an odious prince. However, one month before the "wedding of the century," Tullia falls in love with a lowly apprentice scribe. The king turns to Anatole, his much-maligned magician. Seventeen years earlier, when Anatole first came to the castle, he was regarded as something of a prodigy. But after a long series of failures—the latest being an attempt to transform sand into gold—he has become the object of contempt and ridicule. The only one who still believes in him is the princess. When the king orders Anatole to brew a potion that will ensure Tullia agrees to the wedding, Anatole is faced with an impossible choice. With one chance to save the marriage, the kingdom, and, of most importance to him, his reputation, will he betray the princess—or risk ruin?"
Dwelling: A Novel By: Emily Hunt Kivel, read by Christine Lakin for Macmillan -- "A dazzling, surrealist fairy tale of a young woman's quest for house and home—from New York to the Texas hinterlands and, maybe, back again."
Lord Guan: Warrior, Hero, God; A Historical Novel By: Charles N. Li, read by Ewan Chung for Blackstone -- "In the spirit of Shōgun comes an iconic story inspired by the real-life hero Lord Guan, also known as Guan Yu, an honorable warrior who fought to restore the Han dynasty in second-century China."
Ride or Die by Delilah S. Dawson, read by Dominique Salvacion for Listening Library -- "Tonight is Brie’s chance to finally be accepted by the Ems—the most popular girls at school. If she can just keep one potentially reputation-ending secret under wraps, she’ll have the best night of her life, screaming on scary rides and running the Wildwoods amusement park with her new friends. But when the Ems take a game of truth or dare too far, Brie ends up alone in a creepy abandoned section of the park. There, she meets a group of cool older teens that invite her to join them. They seem friendly enough. Little does Brie know she’s about to come face to face with a reawakened evil that wants to take her on the ride of her life...make that her death."
BACKLIST WATCH:
Mindscape By: Andrea Hairston (2006), read by Jasmin Walker for Recorded Books -- "Hairston's extraordinary debut novel, nominated for the Philip K. Dick Award and short-listed for the Otherwise Award. The world has been divided by the Barrier. For 115 years this extraterrestrial, epi-dimensional entity has divided the earth into warring zones. Power-hungry politicians, gangsters, and spiritual fundamentalists are determined to thwart a potential treaty to end the internal wars. When the treaty's architect is assassinated, her protégée, Elleni, a talented renegade and one of the few able to negotiate the Barrier, is forced to take up her mantle. Now Elleni and a motley crew of allies risk their lives to make the treaty work."
The Toynbee Convector: Stories By: Ray Bradbury (1984), read by Ali Andre Ali, Corey Brill, Danielle Cohen, Gary Furlong, and Suehyla El-Attar Young for Simon and Schuster -- "A collection of twenty-two stories, including the continuing saga of H.G. Well’s time traveler and his Toynbee Convector, a ghost on the Orient Express, and a bored man who creates his own genuine Egyptian mummy."
NEW EDITION WATCH:
- Ubik By: Philip K. Dick (1964), read by Edoardo Ballerini for Recorded Books -- "A mind-bending, classic Philip K. Dick novel about the perception of reality, named as one of Time's 100 best books. Glen Runciter runs a lucrative business—deploying his teams of anti-psychics to corporate clients who want privacy and security from psychic spies. But when he and his top team are ambushed by a rival, he is gravely injured and placed in "half-life," a dreamlike state of suspended animation. Soon, though, the surviving members of the team begin experiencing some strange phenomena, such as Runciter's face appearing on coins and the world seeming to move backward in time. As consumables deteriorate and technology gets ever more primitive, the group needs to find out what is causing the shifts and what a mysterious product called Ubik has to do with it all."
SERIES WATCH:
- Accomplice to the Villain: Assistant to the Villain, Book 3 by Hannah Nicole Maehrer, read by Em Eldridge for Tantor -- "Evie Sage didn't mean to become the right-hand woman to the kingdom's most terrifying villain. One minute, she was applying for an entry-level position that promised "light paperwork and occasional beheadings," and the next, she was knee-deep in magical mayhem, murder plots, and an entirely inappropriate crush on her brooding, sharp-jawed, walking disaster of a boss. Now, with a magical prophecy unraveling, assassins showing up in the break room, and a suspicious amount of frogs wearing crowns, Evie has to figure out how to survive her job without setting the kingdom on fire―or her dignity, which is hanging by a very sarcastic thread."
TIE-IN WATCH:
Star Wars: Sanctuary: A Bad Batch Novel By: Lamar Giles, read by Marc Thompson for Random House -- "Hunter, Wrecker, Tech, and Omega gamble on a mission to help rebuild Pabu in this thrilling adventure for The Bad Batch."
Era of the Eclipse: A Starfinder Novel By: Tim Pratt, read by Mike Dent for Paizo -- "When two novice Starfinders, the energetic Dae and somber Chk Chk, make a startling discovery, they unlock a link to one of the galaxy’s most momentous events: the Gap, and the disappearance of the now lost world of Golarion. Shrouded in mystery, the Gap ended with mortals across the cosmos suddenly finding themselves with memories stripped from their minds without warning or explanation."
RuneScape: The Gift of Guthix By: Erin M. Evans, read by Stewart Crank for Tantor -- "A thrilling epic of betrayal and magic set during the founding of Falador and the doomed Fremennik Great Invasion."
MORE SCI-FI and FANTASY:
House of the Beast: A Novel By: Michelle Wong, read by Jeanne Syquia for Harper -- "Step into the House of the Beast in this dark fantasy debut from The Legend of Korra graphic novel illustrator Michelle Wong, about a young woman who strikes a deal with a mysterious and alluring god to seek revenge on her aristocratic family."
The Deathless One: The Gravesinger Series, Book 1 By: Emma Hamm, read by Kelsey Navarro Foster for Simon and Schuster -- "A princess murdered at the altar makes a deal with the god of death for vengeance and to save her people."
Zomromcom By: Olivia Dade, read by Joy Nash for Penguin -- "Teaming up with your neighbor during a zombie outbreak is a no-brainer, but if it turns out he’s a vampire . . . the stakes couldn’t be higher."
Awakened By: Laura Elliott, read by Antonia Beamish for Dreamscape Lore -- "Civilisation has ended. In a bid to make us more productive, to give us more time, science took sleep from humanity. But sleeplessness turned people into feral monsters, and now a small group of scientists are trapped in the Tower of London, consumed by guilt at what they have done and desperately searching for a cure. And then one day, as the last ravens circle, two miraculous survivors walk into the Tower. Are they the answer, or a terrible question?"
Ethos: Link, Book 1 By: Nathan Hystad, read by Jonathan Davis for Audible -- "On the 300th anniversary of Earth’s first expedition to another solar system, the original colony ship miraculously appears near Saturn. But the crew of Excursion One is nowhere to be found. All that’s left is a broken android, and a string of clues."
INDIE WATCH:
- Manzakar: The Slave-Soldier Series, Book 1 By: R. Laham, read by Edmund Bloxam for Oliver Heber Books -- "The Gohari are a race of nomadic, pansexual people with inherent magic who are suffering at the hands of the Kingdom of Anzor’s angry god, Cenk. By harnessing the nomads’ skills in horsemanship and archery, Anzor has built a powerful, elite class of slave-soldiers who are above and beyond any other kingdom’s army: the Manzakars. Sold into slavery to save his nomad family from starving, Tikran becomes a Manzakar believing that they are warriors of justice. However, as he campaigns in Gohar, the land of his birth, he realizes that not only is Anzor using the Manzakars to persecute the nomads, but it’s also exploiting the Gohari by enslaving them and stealing their magic—the Essence—to be the most powerful kingdom on the Continent. As the most celebrated Manzakar in Anzor and the king’s personal bodyguard, Tikran must decide if he’s willing to forfeit his dreams of glory—as well as his own life and the lives of those he loves—to stand up for what he believes in and fight for the oppressed people of Gohar."
MOST MISSING:
The Outspoken and the Incendiary: Interviews with Radical Speculative Fiction Writers by Terry Bisson (PM Press) -- "For more than a decade, radical science fiction author and activist journalist Terry Bisson interviewed some of the most provocative and outspoken authors of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Anarchism, sexuality, creativity, and the future of humanity itself—no topic was taboo. Bisson's prankster spirit also shone through as he quizzed his subjects about what cars they drove, played free association games, and created an atmosphere of two old friends having intimate late-night chats. Foreword by Jonathan Lethem; Introduction by Nisi Shawl; Afterword by Nalo Hopkinson; Elegies by Rudy Rucker and Peter Coyote."
Lost in the Dark and Other Excursions by John Langan (Word Horde) -- "A garishly painted figurine contains a terrible curse; the ten-year anniversary of a sensational horror film shot in an abandoned mine reveals stunning secrets; endnotes for a book review uncover a strange high-tech pathogen; a man witnesses something uncanny and unexplained as his friend succumbs to a watery death; a seasick woman aboard a ferry is pursued by a barnacle-covered specter; a professor reveals the mysterious connection between Joseph Conrad and Peter Pan; a man encounters the ghost of his lost sister in a liminal space between the land and sea; an academic meets a mythical creature on a mysterious island."
Hideki Smith and the Omukade: Hideki Smith, Demon Queller, Book 2 by A.J. Hartley with Hisako Osako and Kuma Hartley (Falstaff Books) -- "Hideki—the apprentice superhero formerly known as Caleb—and his shape shifting fox sister Emily, have barely had time to recover from saving their North Carolina mountain town from an invasion by creatures from Japanese folklore, but now it looks like that invasion might be back on. Unfamiliar bugs are appearing all over Portersville and at least one of them is very strange and, it appears, getting bigger by the day. And that's not the only strange thing in town. A glamorous and persuasive stranger has captivated the locals and brought some very peculiar plans for the area. And there are secrets closer to home too, some of which might be enough to tear Hideki’s family apart. Assuming the bugs don’t get them first…"
(in progress)
7/31 Muckle Flugga By: Michael Pedersen Narrated by: Jack Lowden for Faber and Faber
7/31 The Last Voyage By: Brian D. McLaren Narrated by: Davis Brooks
8/1 While the Dark Remains The Winter Dark, Book 1 By: Joanna Ruth Meyer Narrated by: Kimberly Woods
8/5 Escaping Denver By: Teague Bohlen