(BPT) - Love sinking your teeth into a gripping read that grabs you from page one and doesn't let you go until the final chapter ends? From mystery and thriller to romantasy and speculative fiction, these engrossing new additions to your "must-read" list will keep you turning pages all season long.
Relive someone else's death.
The Found Object Society, by Michelle Maryk
Greta Davenport has spent decades flirting with death, but nothing hits quite like the experience offered at the invite-only Found Object Society. This group's secret underground archive is a playground for the rich, for every object in their collection is a ticket into a stranger's final moments. The power is intoxicating. It's dangerous. And it's hiding answers Greta is not supposed to find.
Fans of The Midnight Library and The Book of Form and Emptiness will plunge into a time-bending, morally gray tale of grief, addiction, and obsession.
Become a nerdy criminal.
Dirty 20, by Bill Schweigart
Art school was supposed to be Tommy Fugue's escape from his crime-lord father, Big Al. But with his mother gone and tuition tied to the gangster's good graces, he's forced to help the Family figure out how to clean a dirty twenty grand online. (Is there anything worse than teaching your parents about computers?)
Scrubbing the money through a crowdfunding site seemed easy, but when the fake roleplaying game Tommy makes goes viral, Big Al smells money. Lending Tommy his killers, dealers, and pimps to make the fantasy game real and collect the pledge proves just as dangerous as life on the streets. And when fantasy and reality start to get confused? Time to level up that crime game.
Get a bachelor's in bloodlust.
Thrall, by Rebecca Mahoney
Lucy Easting is thrilled for her new beginning at Rollins University, a cozy school buried deep in the Appalachian Mountains. But after blacking out at a party, she wakes up with a memory block ... and a bite on her neck. With the help of an eccentric campus radio host and a beguiling archery champion, she realizes she is being hunted by a vampire.
Lucy and her new friends must go up against entitled classmates and a toxic campus administration that protects the university's reputation over its students ... who are ripe for the vampire's next meal.
Forget yourself in romantasy.
The Alchemary, by Rachel Vincent
Amber Fallbrook awakes in a castle tower with no memory of who she is or why she is at the realm's premier university for alchemy magic. Then a half-naked man stirs in the bed next to her, and another man bursts through her door. It only gets more confusing for Amber from there.
But the mystery of these two brothers she's apparently known all her life is soon but a secondary worry. Because in preparing for the deadly Alchemy Trials to complete her schooling, Amber must solve the riddle not just of her amnesia but of the Alchemary itself - an institution obsessed with creating the legendary Philosopher's Stone at any cost.
Rediscover a childhood that never was.
Mr. Yay, by Emily Jane
Do you remember that television show The Adventures of Mr. Yay? The one that taught you to explore new things and be true to yourself? You can find it online ... oh wait, it seems to have disappeared. How strange.
Now there's only this other Mr. Yay, the rap group climbing the charts and producing the song of the summer. The adults are going crazy for it ... and maybe a little crazy in general.
The Queen of Quirk, Emily Jane, pens a hilarious, genre-blending speculative novel that's all about love and marriage, rappers and dogs, private detectives, nostalgia, and embracing your true self. In a world where the past is different than what you remember, you can either accept change or have it thrust upon you.
Once you've ordered your copies of these fantastic reads, alert your book club and clear your calendar so you'll have time to sit back, relax and enjoy the ride.