My Most Anticipated 2018 Releases!

So 2018 is fast approaching, and it’s around this time of the year that many publishing companies acquire books for the following year. I thought it would be a good idea to shine a light on some of my most highly anticipated books of 2018, some of which don’t even have covers or an official blurb yet. Also, I thought it would be a great idea to introduce people to these books, seeing as many may have not heard of them yet!

Sixteen-year-old Zarin Wadia is many things: a bright and vivacious student, an orphan, a risk taker. She’s also the kind of girl that parents warn their kids to stay away from: a troublemaker whose many romances are the subject of endless gossip at school.  You don’t want to get involved with a girl like that, they say. So how is it that eighteen-year-old Porus Dumasia has only ever had eyes for her? And how did Zarin and Porus end up dead in a car together, crashed on the side of a highway in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia?

When the religious police arrive on the scene, everything everyone thought they knew about Zarin is questioned. And as her story is pieced together, told through multiple perspectives, it becomes clear that she was far more than just a girl like that.
Goodreads

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When Marvin Johnson’s twin, Tyler, goes to a party, Marvin decides to tag along to keep an eye on his brother. But what starts as harmless fun turns into a shooting, followed by a police raid.

The next day, Tyler has gone missing, and it’s up to Marvin to find him. But when Tyler is found dead, a video leaked online tells an even more chilling story: Tyler has been shot and killed by a police officer. Terrified as his mother unravels and mourning a brother who is now a hashtag, Marvin must learn what justice and freedom really mean.
Goodreads

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Sixteen-year-old Elena Mendoza is the product of a virgin birth.

This can be scientifically explained (it’s called parthenogenesis), but what can’t be explained is how Elena is able to heal Freddie, the girl she’s had a crush on for years, from a gunshot wound in a Starbucks parking lot. Or why the boy who shot Freddie, David Combs, disappeared from the same parking lot minutes later after getting sucked up into the clouds. What also can’t be explained are the talking girl on the front of a tampon box, or the reasons that David Combs shot Freddie in the first place.

As more unbelievable things occur, and Elena continues to perform miracles, the only remaining explanation is the least logical of all—that the world is actually coming to an end, and Elena is possibly the only one who can do something about it.
Goodreads

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Simeon Boudreaux, the New York Barons’ golden-armed quarterback, is blessed with irresistible New Orleans charm and a face to melt your mama’s heart. He’s universally adored by fans and the media. Coming out as gay in solidarity with his teammate hasn’t harmed his reputation in the least—except for some social media taunting from rival linebacker Adrián Bravo.

Though they were once teammates, Adrián views Simeon as a traitor and the number-one name on the New Jersey Predators’ shit list. When animosity between the two NFL players reaches a boiling point on the field, culminating in a dirty fist fight, they’re both benched for six games and sentenced to joint community service teaching sullen, Brooklyn teens how to play ball.

At first, they can barely stand to be in the same room, but running the camp forces them to shape up. With no choice but to work together, Simeon realizes Adrián is more than his alpha-jerk persona, and Adrián begins to question why he’s always had such strong feelings for the gorgeous QB…
Goodreads

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When Earth intercepts a message from a long-extinct alien race, it seems like the solution the planet has been waiting for. The Undying’s advanced technology has the potential to undo environmental damage and turn lives around, and Gaia, their former home planet, is a treasure trove waiting to be uncovered.

For Jules Addison and his fellow scholars, the discovery of an alien culture offers unprecedented opportunity for study… as long as scavengers like Amelia Radcliffe don’t loot everything first. Mia and Jules’ different reasons for smuggling themselves onto Gaia put them immediately at odds, but after escaping a dangerous confrontation with other scavvers, they form a fragile alliance.

In order to penetrate the Undying temple and reach the tech and information hidden within, the two must decode the ancient race’s secrets and survive their traps. But the more they learn about the Undying, the more their presence in the temple seems to be part of a grand design that could spell the end of the human race…
Goodreads

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In the house of Helios, god of the sun and mightiest of the Titans, a daughter is born. But Circe is a strange child–not powerful, like her father, nor viciously alluring like her mother. Turning to the world of mortals for companionship, she discovers that she does possess power–the power of witchcraft, which can transform rivals into monsters and menace the gods themselves.

Threatened, Zeus banishes her to a deserted island, where she hones her occult craft, tames wild beasts and crosses paths with many of the most famous figures in all of mythology, including the Minotaur, Daedalus and his doomed son Icarus, the murderous Medea, and, of course, wily Odysseus.

But there is danger, too, for a woman who stands alone, and Circe unwittingly draws the wrath of both men and gods, ultimately finding herself pitted against one of the most terrifying and vengeful of the Olympians. To protect what she loves most, Circe must summon all her strength and choose, once and for all, whether she belongs with the gods she is born from, or the mortals she has come to love.
Goodreads

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England, 1883. On the run with the grieving Sebastian Braddock, Evelyn wants two things: to be reunited with her friends, and to get revenge on the evil Captain Goode. Not only has he misused his and Sebastian’s powers to rack up a terrible death toll, but he’s also completely destroyed any hope of Evelyn or her friends regaining the life they once knew.

Evelyn is determined to make Captain Goode pay for what he’s done, but is her revenge worth risking the lives of Sebastian and her friends? Or is it better to flee the city and focus on staying alive? And with the Captain spreading lies about Sebastian in an attempt to flush them out of hiding and turn the populace against them, does she even have a choice at all?
Goodreads

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These Rebel Waves by Sara Raasch

Inspired by the Spanish Inquisition and the golden age of piracy, it follows three characters: a woman seeking justice, a tortured pirate looking for redemption, and an ambitious prince out for power. Publication is slated for summer 2018.

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Throw Your Arm Across Your Eyes and Scream by Christian McKay Heidicker

Pitched as Pleasantville meets Cloverfield, the novel follows 15-year-old Phoebe, daughter of the woman who was carried to the top of the Empire State Building by King Kong, in a world where the horrors of 1940s and 50s sci-fi movies are everyday occurrences.

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The Cerulean by Amy Ewing

The Cerulean tells the story of Sera, who lives in a Sapphic utopia where all women have three mothers and a young woman is chosen every 100 years to be abandoned on the planet below as a sacrifice. Publication is scheduled for 2018.

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Starworld by Paula Garner and Audrey Coulthurst

The novel follows two very different high school girls with painful home lives who fall into an intense text-message-based friendship built around an imaginary world, until their real lives unravel and one falls in love with the other. It’s slated for fall 2018.

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The Surface Breaks by Louise O’Neill

The book is set beneath the sea, off the Irish coast, featuring a young mermaid, Gaia, who dreams of being human but could face a heavy price for her aspirations.

A Scholastic spokesperson said: “Christian Andersen’s dark, original fairy tale is reimagined through a searing feminist lens, with the stunning, scalpel-sharp writing and world building that has won Louise her legions of devoted fans.”

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Rise As One by Ashok K. Banker

Delacorte has acquired author Ashok Banker’s The Rise Trilogy, pitched as Six of Crows meets An Ember in the Ashes, with a cast featuring LGBTQIA, PoC, and differently abled protagonists. The #ownvoices series follows a young thief and her gang as they battle to overthrow a brutal tyrant and stay a demon invasion. Publication of the first book is planned for fall 2018.

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My Plain Jane (The Lady Janies #2) by Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton and Jodi Meadows

This book will be about “Jane Eyre and Charlotte Bronte being saved from their fates.”

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Brightly Burning by Alexa Donne

Pitched as Jane Eyre in space, the debut follows a 17-year-old spaceship engineer who’s hired away to the Rochester, a mysterious private ship, as she tangos with the mercurial, handsome young captain and discovers a conspiracy that threatens the safety of the fleet, which has been orbiting Earth for more than 200 years.

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The Dark Beneath the Ice by Amelinda Bérubé

Black Swan meets Paranormal Activity in a literary ghost story about a former dancer whose grip on sanity starts to slip when she begins to think a dark entity is stalking her and craves her life.

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Queen of the Sea by Dylan Meconis

A hybrid graphic novel/historical fantasy inspired by the early life of Queen Elizabeth I, about a girl raised in a convent on a small island, whose happy life is shattered when she discovers the convent is actually a political prison… and she herself one of its most dangerous prisoners.

What are your most anticipated releases? Did you add any of these books to your TBR? Let me know!

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