6 of the Best New Book Releases Out September 23, 2025

Are you into pandemic novels that are as trippy as they are silly? What about characters who constantly hear the hook to ’90s Eurodance hits in their head? In Lockwood’s latest, one young woman’s mind disentangles itself so much from her past experiences that she begins to question if maybe she’s been given a new chance at life. This look at the descent—or ascension?—brought about by a deteriorating mental illness is both new and surreal. And that cover is fire.

Awad’s Bunny is a modern cult classic, and this is its follow-up (so warnings for what might be spoilers ahead). In it, Sam has published a popular first novel, but is soon abducted by her frenemies—and the namesakes of the first novel—the Bunnies. They’re not feeling how she portrayed them in her book, and now they want to tell their side of things. At axe-point, of course. As each one takes their turn, we turn back to the monstrous creations and darkly sweet world of the Bunnies.

Listen to Liberty talk about this title on today’s episode of All The Books!

Living under the shadow of Oscar Wilde’s trial for gross indecency, Shahriar has to believe he was born in the wrong time. But when he’s granted the opportunity to live in a different time, will it offer him the happiness and love he’s always hoped he could find? In 1920s Boston, Oliver knows he’s lucky to have the acceptance of the secret queer community at Harvard. But still, he’s not exactly free to live fully as himself. Finding out he loves boys would break his mother’s heart. Will there ever be a time when he can be true to himself, too? — Rachel Brittain

This book-within-a-book features the meta love story of The Shopkeeper, a Philly bookseller, who helps people find their love match through books. But finding her own match is giving her trouble. She is sweet on one guy, though, who took her most valued book and who she can’t stop thinking about. Just as she begins to give up on her own story, she realizes the magic of her bookstore may be the key to happiness for her, too. The quirky and fabulist elements are giving middle-aged Amélie meets A Love Song for Ricki Wilde teas. I’m always here for an adult coming-of-age story.

At 1,000+ pages, I already know this dark romantasy/war-torn story is going to be a moment. In it, Helena Marino is an alchemist and healer who is awakened once the Resistance she was a part of gives way to new and cruel rulers. Despite the Resistance’s records describing her as a minor member, her memory loss has the current rulers wondering if there is more the rebels have in store for them. To unlock her memories, she’s sent to one of the most powerful and twisted necromancers in the world. It’s there that she meets her opposite, and there that she tries to hold on to her life—and her memories—amidst a crumbling and grotesque estate.

Let’s start with rival Gothic novelists, alright? Ladies in Hating is Vasti’s upcoming sapphic Regency romance about rival novelists who get trapped inside an eerie manor they’re researching for their next book.

You know what happens when there is some forced proximity between people who can’t stand each other, though…Something is bound to happen! Not only is forced proximity at play here, but these rivals also have a history together when they were younger. — Silvana Reyes Lopez