There’s been plenty to keep bookworms busy in 2026, with buzzy debuts, bestselling authors returning with new work and plenty of unexpected page-turners joining the shelves. Whether you’re after a gripping family drama, a swoony romance, a fantastical escape or a thought-provoking work of non-fiction, you’re in the right place to find your next read.
Polly Barton’s What Am I, a Deer? is an offbeat, obsessive debut about reinvention, romance and karaoke, while Hannah Mathewson’s The Age of Blood and Magic brings together billionaires, vampires and a vicious succession battle. Madeline Cash’s Lost Lambs follows three sisters whose fascination with a corrupt billionaire takes them somewhere increasingly dark, while Madeleine Dunnigan’s debut, Jean, is a queer coming-of-age story set in a boys’ boarding school in the 1970s. If you loved Asako Yuzuki’s viral read, Butter, you’ll be thrilled to learn that the author has returned this year with Hooked, an unsettling exploration of friendship and obsession.
There’s plenty of compelling non-fiction among this year’s releases, too. Belle Burden’s memoir Strangers chronicles the breakdown of her marriage after her husband’s affair; Patrick Radden Keefe – author of Empire of Pain – turns his attention to the mysterious death of a 19-year-old boy in London in London Falling. Plus, who could forget Caro Claire Burke’s Yesteryear, which takes a sharp look at the trad wife phenomenon.
Of course, 2026 isn’t finished yet. Barbara Kingsolver’s Partita, her first novel since Demon Copperhead, is still to come, while fans of Sarah J Maas’s A Court of Thorns and Roses have even more to look forward to, with two new books in the series announced for October this year and January 2027.
Alongside the IndyBest team, we’ve read dozens of this year’s new releases to separate the books worth making time for from those you can safely leave on the shelf. Keep scrolling for all the details.
The best new books to read are:
- Best overall – Yesteryear by Claire Caro Burke, published by Fourth Estate: £8.49, Amazon.co.uk
- Best debut – The Age of Blood and Magic by Hannah Mathewson, published by HarperCollins: £13.99, Amazon.co.uk
- Best historical fiction – ‘The Shock of The Light’ by Lori Inglis Hall, published by The Borough Press: £14.90, Amazon.co.uk
- Best family saga – ‘Lost Lambs’ by Madeline Cash, published by Doubleday: £14.90, Amazon.co.uk
Read more: I’ve already read some of 2026’s biggest book releases – these are the four to look out for