Each month the Ladies of Horror Fiction team posts all of the books we are aware of that will be releasing during that month. Please let us know if we missed any new releases so we can add it to the list!
Almost There and Almost Not by Linda Urban
From acclaimed author Linda Urban comes the funny, bittersweet story of a girl and her ghosts—and the welcoming home they find where they least expect it.
California Poppy has been dropped off, yet again, with an unsuspecting relative. This time it’s her eccentric Great-Aunt Monica, a woman she’s never even met. Aunt Monica has no idea what to do with an eleven-year-old, so she puts California to work researching their ancestor, the once-famous etiquette expert Eleanor Fontaine.
California soon discovers that Great-Great-Great Aunt Eleanor is…not exactly alive and well, but a ghost—and a super sensitive one at that. The grand dame bursts into clouds of dust whenever she loses her composure, which happens quite often. Still, an unexpected four-legged friend and some old-fashioned letter writing make this decidedly strange situation one that California can handle.
Just as California’s starting to feel like she’s found a place for herself, life turns upside-down yet again. Thankfully, this time she has some friends almost by her side…
Published April 6th 2021 by Atheneum Books for Young Readers | Amazon | Goodreads
The Drowning Kind by Jennifer McMahon
Be careful what you wish for.
When social worker Jax receives nine missed calls from her older sister, Lexie, she assumes that it’s just another one of her sister’s episodes. Manic and increasingly out of touch with reality, Lexie has pushed Jax away for over a year. But the next day, Lexie is dead: drowned in the pool at their grandmother’s estate. When Jax arrives at the house to go through her sister’s things, she learns that Lexie was researching the history of their family and the property. And as she dives deeper into the research herself, she discovers that the land holds a far darker past than she could have ever imagined.
In 1929, thirty-seven-year-old newlywed Ethel Monroe hopes desperately for a baby. In an effort to distract her, her husband whisks her away on a trip to Vermont, where a natural spring is showcased by the newest and most modern hotel in the Northeast. Once there, Ethel learns that the water is rumored to grant wishes, never suspecting that the spring takes in equal measure to what it gives.
Published April 6th 2021 by Gallery/Scout Press | Amazon | Goodreads
House of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland
Seventeen-year-old Iris Hollow has always been strange. Something happened to her and her two older sisters when they were children, something they can’t quite remember but that left each of them with an identical half-moon scar at the base of their throats.
Iris has spent most of her teenage years trying to avoid the weirdness that sticks to her like tar. But when her eldest sister, Grey, goes missing under suspicious circumstances, Iris learns just how weird her life can get: horned men start shadowing her, a corpse falls out of her sister’s ceiling, and ugly, impossible memories start to twist their way to the forefront of her mind.
As Iris retraces Grey’s last known footsteps and follows the increasingly bizarre trail of breadcrumbs she left behind, it becomes apparent that the only way to save her sister is to decipher the mystery of what happened to them as children.
The closer Iris gets to the truth, the closer she comes to understanding that the answer is dark and dangerous – and that Grey has been keeping a terrible secret from her for years.
Published April 6th 2021 by G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers | Amazon | Goodreads
The Mother We Share by Jennifer Soucy
She yearned for the mother she never knew, wishing for a whole family. Something heard and replied…
Evie Bonaventura is terrified when a strange girl breaks into her room, a creature with her dead mother’s eyes. Dad confesses Evie had a twin, but she died along with their mother who was unable to survive the devastating childbirth. Mom swore on her deathbed that her baby was kidnapped by fairies—a changeling, but that was impossible. Myths aren’t real.
Yet the otherworldly girl continues to stalk Evie before attacking their father and others. Beltane approaches, their 18th birthday and the night when fairy powers peak. Evie’s determined to protect her family, confident because heroes always win—don’t they?
Tragedy strikes, forcing Evie to act. She embarks on an adventurous rescue mission from Boston to Ireland, aided by an unlikely band of brave friends, legendary creatures, and a colorful coven of witches. Evie has a choice: destroy her twin sister or save her, in honor of the mother they once shared.
Published April 6th 2021 by RhetAskew Publishing | Amazon | Goodreads
Poison Priestess (Lady Slayers #2) by Lana Popović
Book 2 in the Lady Slayers series, about French murderess and fortune teller Catherine Monvoisin
In 17th-century Paris, 19-year-old Catherine Monvoisin is a well-heeled jeweler’s wife with a peculiar taste for the arcane. She lives a comfortable life, far removed from a childhood of abject destitution—until her kind spendthrift of a husband lands them both in debt. Hell-bent on avoiding a return to poverty, Catherine must rely on her prophetic visions and the grimoire gifted to her by a talented diviner to reinvent herself as a sorceress. With the help of the grifter Marie Bosse, Catherine divines fortunes in the IIle de la Citee—home to sorcerers and scoundrels.
There she encounters the Marquise de Montespan, a stunning noblewoman. When the Marquise becomes Louis XIV’s royal mistress with Catherine’s help, her ascension catapults Catherine to notoriety. Catherine takes easily to her glittering new life as the Sorceress La Voisin, pitting the depraved noblesse against one other to her advantage. The stakes soar ever higher when her path crosses with that of a young magician. A charged rivalry between sorceress and magician leads to Black Masses, tangled deceptions, and grisly murder—and sets Catherine on a collision course that threatens her own life.
Published April 6th 2021 by Harry N. Abrams | Amazon | Goodreads
You Love Me (You #3) by Caroline Kepnes
Joe is done with the cities. He’s done with the muck and the posers, done with Love. Now, he’s saying hello to nature, to simple pleasures on a cozy island in the Pacific Northwest. For the first time in a long time, he can just breathe.
He gets a job at the local library—he does know a thing or two about books—and that’s where he meets her: Mary Kay DiMarco. Librarian. Joe won’t meddle, he will not obsess. He’ll win her the old-fashioned way… by providing a shoulder to cry on, a helping hand. Over time, they’ll both heal their wounds and begin their happily ever after in this sleepy town.
The trouble is… Mary Kay already has a life. She’s a mother. She’s a friend. She’s… busy.
True love can only triumph if both people are willing to make room for the real thing. Joe cleared his decks. He’s ready. And hopefully, with his encouragement and undying support, Mary Kay will do the right thing and make room for him.
Published April 6th 2021 by Random House | Amazon | Goodreads
Cece Rios and the Desert of Souls by Kaela Rivera
Living in the remote town of Tierra del Sol is dangerous, especially in the criatura months, when powerful spirits roam the desert and threaten humankind. But Cecelia Rios has always believed there was more to the criaturas, much to her family’s disapproval. After all, only brujas—humans who capture and control criaturas—consort with the spirits, and brujeria is a terrible crime.
When her older sister, Juana, is kidnapped by El Sombrerón, a powerful dark criatura, Cece is determined to bring Juana back. To get into Devil’s Alley, though, she’ll have to become a bruja herself—while hiding her quest from her parents, her town, and the other brujas. Thankfully, the legendary criatura Coyote has a soft spot for humans and agrees to help her on her journey.
With him at her side, Cece sets out to reunite her family—and maybe even change what it means to be a bruja along the way.
Published April 13th 2021 by HarperCollins Children’s Books | Amazon | Goodreads
The Helm of Midnight (The Five Penalties #1) by Marina J. Lostetter
A legendary serial killer stalks the streets of a fantastical city in The Helm of Midnight, the stunning first novel in a new trilogy from acclaimed author Marina Lostetter.
In a daring and deadly heist, thieves have made away with an artifact of terrible power–the death mask of Louis Charbon. Made by a master craftsman, it is imbued with the spirit of a monster from history, a serial murderer who terrorized the city with a series of gruesome murders.
Now Charbon is loose once more, killing from beyond the grave. But these murders are different from before, not simply random but the work of a deliberate mind probing for answers to a sinister question.
It is up to Krona Hirvath and her fellow Regulators to enter the mind of madness to stop this insatiable killer while facing the terrible truths left in his wake.
Published April 13th 2021 by Tor Books | Amazon | Goodreads
Near the Bone by Christina Henry
A woman trapped on a mountain attempts to survive more than one kind of monster, in a dread-inducing horror novel from the national bestselling author Christina Henry.
Mattie can’t remember a time before she and William lived alone on a mountain together. She must never make him upset. But when Mattie discovers the mutilated body of a fox in the woods, she realizes that they’re not alone after all.
There’s something in the woods that wasn’t there before, something that makes strange cries in the night, something with sharp teeth and claws.
When three strangers appear on the mountaintop looking for the creature in the woods, Mattie knows their presence will anger William. Terrible things happen when William is angry.
Published April 13th 2021 by Berkley Books | Amazon | Goodreads
The Mary Shelley Club by Goldy Moldavsky
New York Times –bestselling author Goldy Moldavsky delivers a deliciously twisty YA thriller that’s Scream meets Karen McManus about a mysterious club with an obsession for horror.
New girl Rachel Chavez is eager to make a fresh start at Manchester Prep. But as one of the few scholarship kids, Rachel struggles to fit in, and when she gets caught up in a prank gone awry, she ends up with more enemies than friends.
To her surprise, however, the prank attracts the attention of the Mary Shelley Club, a secret club of students with one objective: come up with the scariest prank to orchestrate real fear. But as the pranks escalate, the competition turns cutthroat and takes on a life of its own.
When the tables are turned and someone targets the club itself, Rachel must track down the real-life monster in their midst . . . even if it means finally confronting the dark secrets from her past.
Published April 13th 2021 by Henry Holt & Company | Amazon | Goodreads
Smithy by Amanda Desiree
In 1972, renowned researcher Dr. Piers Preis-Herald brought together a group of collegiate researchers to study the inner lives of man’s closest relative–primates. His team would undertake their study by raising a young chimpanzee and teaching him American Sign Language. The primate selected was born chimpanzee #710642 at the Kohlberg Center for Primate Research. He would eventually be known to the world as Smithy.
Nearly fifty years after the Smithy Project ended in tragedy at Trevor Hall, the question remains: Was Smithy a hoax? A clever mimic? A Rorschach projection of humanity’s greatest hopes and fears? Or was he indeed what devotees of metaphysics have claimed for so long: a link between our world and the next?
Published April 13th 2021 by Inkshares | Amazon | Goodreads
Dispossessed by Piper Mejia
Nobody likes you when you’re the ugly new kid. A hoodie and a new foster home won’t hide the creeping dread that you are dangerous. So, when you’re offered the chance to meet a grandfather you never knew, you jump on a plane to the bush-covered mountains of New Zealand. Slate longs for a home when he finds himself living among an ancient race masquerading as travelling performers. Dispossessed and disillusioned, Slate fears being trapped in a life hiding from the world; one his own father had to run from. However, the decision to stay or leave is taken from him when he is held captive by hunters on the trail of the ultimate game trophy. Tortured and alone, Slate fears that the only way to escape is to become the monster he never wanted to be.
Published April 15th 2021 by IFWG Publishing International | Amazon | Goodreads
Earthly Bodies by Susan Earlam
It is 2058. Rebecca, a widow, receives an invitation to leave Earth and start over, but nature has evolved and is tagging along for the ride.
Earthly Bodies is a dystopian eco-horror story that spans the ages, where strangers reveal their contribution to an extraordinary act of survival.
An artist ahead of his time crafts a new way of painting portraits, causing outcry and claims of heresy.
A military man becomes obsessed with growing something he found on manoeuvres far from home.
A lonely geneticist helps her brother with his plan to save humanity; secretly selecting humans to join a mission and escape a ravaged Earth.
Rebecca seeks a fresh start, away from her devastating loss.
Harmony with Nature is everyone’s wish. It’s time to be careful what you wish for.
Readers of speculative fiction and feminist horror will enjoy this novel.
Earthly Bodies echoes the visionary environmental scope of The Overstory and Annihilation, with the horror of Naomi Booth’s Sealed, and a structure more like Station Eleven.
Published April 2021 by Speleorex Press | Amazon | Goodreads
The Banquet by Villimey Mist
Maria Lopez, a sexual assault survivor, receives an invitation to The Banquet, a secret annual event where women such as herself get the opportunity to exact vengeance on their attackers.
Published April 19th 2021 by Smashwords | Goodreads
The Forest of Stolen Girls by June Hur
After her father vanishes while investigating the disappearance of 13 young women, a teen returns to her secretive hometown to pick up the trail in this second YA historical mystery from the author of The Silence of Bones.
Hwani’s family has never been the same since she and her younger sister went missing and were later found unconscious in the forest, near a gruesome crime scene. The only thing they remember: Their captor wore a painted-white mask.
To escape the haunting memories of this incident, the family flees their hometown. Years later, Detective Min—Hwani’s father—learns that thirteen girls have recently disappeared under similar circumstances, and so he returns to their hometown to investigate… only to vanish as well.
Determined to find her father and solve the case that tore their family apart, Hwani returns home to pick up the trail. As she digs into the secrets of the small village—and reconnects with her now estranged sister—Hwani comes to realize that the answer lies within her own buried memories of what happened in the forest all those years ago.
Expected publication: April 20th 2021 by Feiwel & Friends | Amazon | Goodreads
Witches Steeped in Gold (Witches Steeped in Gold #1) by Ciannon Smart
Divided by their order. United by their vengeance.
Iraya has spent her life in a cell, but every day brings her closer to freedom – and vengeance.
Jazmyne is the Queen’s daughter, but unlike her sister before her, she has no intention of dying to strengthen her mother’s power.
Sworn enemies, these two witches enter a precarious alliance to take down a mutual threat. But power is intoxicating, revenge is a bloody pursuit, and nothing is certain – except the lengths they will go to win this game.
This Jamaican-inspired fantasy debut about two enemy witches who must enter into a deadly alliance to take down a common enemy has the twisted cat-and-mouse of Killing Eve with the richly imagined fantasy world of Furyborn and Ember in the Ashes.
Expected publication: April 20th 2021 by HarperTeen | Amazon | Goodreads
Jen is one of our LOHF admins. Jen manages the technical side of the Ladies of Horror Fiction website. She also keeps a spotlight on middle grade and young adult horror each month.
You can also find Jen on her blog Book Den, Twitter as @bookden, Instagram as @bookdenjen, on Goodreads, and Letterboxd.
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