Release Week: 23 June 2026

Release Week: 23 June 2026

Posted on 2026-06-23 at 12:00 by Samuel Montgomery-Blinn

My pre-order this week is is a non-fiction title:

* The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI: How to Think About Artificial Intelligence—Before It's Too Late by Cory Doctorow, read by the author for Macmillan -- "A short, provocative guide to what's good, bad, and stupid about AI and the discourse around AI, by the author of Enshittification." (Note: not available at Audible due to their DRM requirements.)

More PICKS:

* The Sixth Nik by Daniel Kraus, read by Kimberly Woods for Simon and Schuster -- "Perfectly aligned for readers of Iain M. Banks’s The Culture series and Ursula K. Le Guin’s “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas”, The Sixth Nik is a galaxy spanning adventure from the New York Times bestselling and Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Angel Down and Whalefall."

* Retro: A Novel by Jessica M. Goldstein, read by Allyson Ryan for Random House -- "An out-of-work actress gets a job as a tour guide for an ultra-luxury time travel company—only to discover her trips to the past could upend her present—in this rollicking, speculative debut novel."

* Green City Wars by Adrian Tchaikovsky, read by John Pirhalla for Macmillan -- "Philip Marlowe meets Redwall in this superior adult noir tale, where all the characters are animals, fighting for survival in the city underneath the humans."

* The Tinder Box by M. R. Carey, read by Richard Trinder for Orbit -- "Wounded in his county's endless wars, former soldier Mag Tresti finds work in the home of a reclusive widow, Jannae Mirchella. But Jannae is more than she seems. A witch of great skill and might, she hides her powers and her deep-laid plans behind a mask of harmless respectability. When a dead demon falls out of the sky, the fates of the soldier and the witch are irrevocably intertwined. On the demon's body Mag finds a tinderbox—an artefact of terrifying magical power that can not only grant his every wish, but also change the fate of nations."

* Tales of a Monstrous Heart: A Novel by Jennifer Delaney, read by Hollie Hales for Recorded Books -- "An instant Sunday Times bestseller and love letter to the Brontë sisters, Tales of a Monstrous Heart is a delicious gothic fantasy, filled with forbidden romance, magic, and monsters."

* Little Wild: A Novel by Laura Evans, read by Tamaryn Payne for Macmillan -- "Weyward meets Atonement in a shimmering debut novel of first love, betrayal, and revenge set on a crumbling British estate."

* A Treason of Magic by Melissa Marr, read by Gail Shalan for Brilliance -- "In a world where magic, desire, and duty collide, it is beauty who is fated to kill the beast in a lush historical fantasy of secrets and star-crossed love."

SERIES WATCH:

* The Fall: The Bound and The Broken, Book 0.5 by Ryan Cahill, read by Derek Perkins -- A novella-length prequel: "The City of Ilnaen is on fire. Dragons fill the skies. Traitors fill the streets."

* Chaos Blade: Crucible by A.P. Beswick, read by Aaron Smith and Raya Kane for Simon Maverick -- "New skills required: teamwork, balance…and surviving the arena."

INDIE WATCH:

* American Paladin, Book 1 by Larry Correia, read by Nick Searcy for Ark Press -- "Welcome to the dark places of the modern American west—a west where mythic worlds roam the landscape like so many weather fronts. And when those fronts collide, horror often spills out. Blood-soaked ground. Vanished neighbors. Towns gutted by monstrous horrors no one dares name. The so-called authorities won’t touch this stuff. Most won’t even admit it’s real. But when the last shred of hope is nearly spent, there’s one man who will step into that darkness—and deal with it."

More FICTION titles on my watch list this week:

* Tillinghast: A Novel by Clare Cavenagh, read by Timothy Andrés Pabon for Penguin -- "A dark and utterly original literary horror debut, following a priest whose bloodthirsty life has extended far longer than any mere human's—and is upended when a stranger comes to town."

* Asperfell by Jamie Thomas, read by Nicola Barber for Orbit -- "A noblewoman with hidden magic. An exiled prince with dark secrets. Only together can they escape their magical prison and save their realm, in this romantic fantasy novel."

* Nothing to My Name: A Novel by Kangkang Li Kovacs, read by Jen Zhao for Penguin -- "Inspired by the author’s own family history, and spanning the past hundred years of Chinese history, this multi-generational family saga explores how women survive the tsunamis of history."

* Names Have Been Changed: A Novel by Yu-Mei Balasingamchow, read by Mirai for Penguin -- "Catch Me If You Can meets Counterfeit in this thrilling debut novel about Ophir—not her real name—who starts a confessional podcast about her years on the run around the globe, in an unforgettable story about the costs of freedom and the inescapable pull of home."

* The Future Perfect: A Novel by Cay Kim, read by Greta Jung for Penguin -- "A radiant, exquisitely told portrait of a young woman growing up between cultures, in search of her future self."

* The Spoil: A Novel by Maile Chapman, read by Jennifer Pickens for Brilliance -- "In a rambling split-level house on the outskirts of Tacoma in the 1970s, a young girl is preoccupied by the anomalous phenomena she reads about in magazines: alien visitations, ESP, pyramid power, the Bermuda Triangle. Meanwhile, she and her stepbrother, thrown uneasily together by disaster and divorce, grow increasingly convinced that a malevolent presence resides in their house, and they develop elaborate strategies to live with it."

* The Broken Hearts Agency: A Novel by Clarence A. Haynes, read by a full cast for Legacy Lit -- "In a spicy, contemporary fantasy novel, private investigator Linda Villanueva runs a detective agency for troubled souls using her mystical powers—all while wrestling with her own heart."

* The Door in Penrose Forest: A Novel by Sean David Robinson, read by Nan McNamara for Tantor -- "As a boy, Nico once accompanied his mother on a research trip to investigate a stalled migration of monarch butterflies. One night, upon hearing her sneak out of their rented cabin, he followed her to a clearing in the forest where a famed mansion once stood. Paralyzed with fear, he watched his mother climb a staircase and vanish, along with the stairs and the strange glowing door at its peak. No one believed his story, and as he grew older, he too stopped believing it was real."

* Hunt the Ever Wild by S. E. Kiser, read by Graham Halstead for Tantor -- "A gothic standalone combining the gaslamp fantasy of C. L. Polk's Witchmark with the slow-burn rivals-to-lovers romance of Isa Agajanian's Modern Divination and the whimsy of Howl's Moving Castle."

* Acceleration Clause: Ransom's Law, Book 1 by Robert Kroese, read by Stacy Carolan for Podium -- " He used to weaponize contracts from a desk. Now he enforces them at gunpoint in deep space."

More NON-FICTION titles on my watch list this week:

* The God Test: Artificial Intelligence and Our Coming Cosmic Reckoning by Robert Wright, read by Chris Henry Coffey for Simon and Schuster -- "A sweeping new view of artificial intelligence—as an evolutionary force that will pose deep political and spiritual challenges and could, in the process, give our species a unifying sense of purpose."

* Obstinate Daughters: The Rebels, Writers, and Renegade Women Who Ignited the American Revolution by Denise Kiernan, read by the author for Penguin

* Fires in the Night: The Earth Liberation Front, the FBI, and a Secret History of Eco-Sabotage by Matthew Wolfe, read by Dan John Miller and the author for Penguin

Posted in Release Week