The graveyard gays are back! It’s been almost six years since Aiden Thomas first introduced us to Yadriel and Julian (and my fave, Maritza, a real one). This fall, we’re headed back to the graveyard in Espíritu, which follows Julian as he navigates life post sacrificial ritual. Things are mostly pretty sweet—except for the part where he sees shadows in his eyes, glowing eyes in the dark, and these ominous dark spots on people that no one can explain. There’s also a mysterious new nonbinary bruje in the mix, one who Julian is drawn to but Yadriel is looking at with some side eye for their cutthroat approach to brujeria. Let’s gooooo. —Vanessa Diaz

If Sky Daddy was 2025’s unhinged take on Moby-Dick, Hell’s Heart is 2026’s. Given that Moby-Dick is my favorite book of all time, I am always eager to read anything that claims it as an influence. This spacefaring version follows the narrator I in pursuit of spermaceti, a hallucinogen produced by Leviathans swimming in Jupiter’s currents. With women cast in the roles of Ishmael, Ahab, and Queequeg, this book promises a story even more queer than the original, and that’s saying something. —Isabelle Popp

You know what’s even more exciting than “Cat Sebastian’s next book”? Cat Sebastian’s first contemporary. I love her historicals and breathe in every one as they release, but there’s something exciting about an author who is excellent at writing the past translating that to the present. Star Shipped is about two guys who definitely don’t like each other, thanks to having extremely opposite personalities and having to work closely together for the past several years. But there’s apparently a road trip! And knowing Cat, there are going to be so many Feelings I won’t be able to handle it. —Jessica Pryde

This queer fantasy debut sounds like a great time! Poor Sir Cameron. The Church has decided that the only way to defeat the evil sorcerer Merulo is by sacrificing Cameron. Now the knights who have fought alongside him are trying to kill him. So Cameron turns to the only person he has left on his side: Merulo. And as he remains imprisoned in the sorcerer’s dungeon, he discovers that Merulo may not be the monster everyone thinks he is. Even if he has turned Cameron into a vulture. —Liberty Hardy

Master of her craft, Charles returns with a queer historical following a scammer on the run from gangsters and his mark, a widowed shopkeeper who inherited a fortune from his wife. Pretending to be the son of a notorious diamond thief, Nicolas-Marc told Titus Pilcrow he just wants to improve his wronged mother’s reputation. In reality, he is running from dangerous men and needs Titus’s new inheritance to fund his flight. But when Nico falls for the very man he needs to swindle, he must take on the uncomfortable task of telling the truth if he wants to live happily with the man who stole his heart. —R. Nassor

The author of Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead is back! Emily Austin’s newest novel is about Darcy, a librarian who seems to be living the dream: she and her wife run a bookbinding business and have a beautiful house by a lake—not to mention their two cats. But when she finds out her ex-boyfriend has died, Darcy has a breakdown and takes a leave from the library. When she returns, she finds that the library has transformed into a battleground, where book banners and anti-DEI protestors threaten to tear it apart. —Danika Ellis

The sequel to Nampeshiweisit book one, To Shape a Dragon’s Breath, is finally here! If you haven’t picked up this bisexual, polyamorous, Indigenous dragon-riding fantasy series yet, start with book one. Book two takes place in the summer after Anequs’s first year at the academy. When she returns home, she finds an unwelcome surprise: thanks to the attention she and her dragon have been getting, there’s now an Anglish presence in Masquapaug for the first time. As she and the rest of Masquapaug fight for their right to self-governance, they risk starting a civil war. —Danika Ellis

I once read a horror story by L. D. Lewis that frightened me so much that I put the book down for a full year before picking it up again. This is a violent, dark sapphic extension of The Little Mermaid tale that will for sure keep you reading up past your bedtime. We know how Arielle got her fairytale ending, but Yemi, her granddaughter, is living a much different life. Yemi’s father, the king, was assassinated, and her mother is dying. A coup forces Yemi into exile, and the only place she can think of turning to is to Ursla, the sea-witch. Yemi wants vengeance and so, too, does Ursla. Will Yemi be tempted by her own rage and Ursla’s power? —Patricia Elzie-Tuttle