Anticipated May 2025 Releases

   

I just want to add a quick note before I get to this post that I apologize for not having any reviews up this week! Life ended up getting much busier than I anticipated these past two weeks and I'm slightly behind on... everything, but I should have a new one up for you all soon. :)

May is absolutely packed with new releases and I am already overwhelmed but also incredibly excited to read them all! I have ARCs of a number of these, some I've already read (The Devils, which was so fun), and many I haven't (Written on the Dark, Letter from the Lonesome Shore, Overgrowth, The Incandescent, The Starving Saints etc...)--and I'm really hoping I can get to all of them because they all sound amazing.

What May releases are you most looking forward? Let me know below, and be sure to let me know if I missed any of your most anticipated releases on this list as well.
Happy reading!

A Letter from the Lonesome Shore by Sylvie Cathrall || May 6th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Anji Kills a King by Evan Leikam || May 13th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

The Sword Triumphant by Gareth Hanrahan || May 27th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

The Devils by Joe Abercrombie || May 13th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Harmattan Season by Tochi Onyebuchi || May 27th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Esperance by Adam Oyebanji || May 20th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

The Incandescent by Emily Tesh || May 13th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Written on the Dark by Guy Gavriel Kay || May 27th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

The Night Birds by Christopher Golden || May 6th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

We Live Here Now by Sarah Pinborough || May 20th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

The Starving Saints by Caitlin Starling || May 20th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Mark Twain by Ron Chernow || May 13th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Warhol's Muses by Laurence Leamer || May 6th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Freedom Ship by Marcus Rediker || May 13th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

The Lost Queen by Aime Phan || May 6th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

The Enemy's Daughter by Melissa Poett || May 6th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

His Face is the Sun by Michelle Jabes Corpora || May 6th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Murder Land by Carlyn Greenwald || May 6th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

The Floating World by Axie Oh || May 29th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Out of Air by Rachel Reiss || May 13th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

And the Trees Stare Back by Gigi Griffis || May 27th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Costumes for Time Travellers by A.R. Capetta || May 27th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Rules for Ruin by Mimi Matthews || May 20th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

The Knight and the Moth by Rachel Gillig || May 20th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Manor of Dreams by Christina Li || May 6th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

When Devils Sing by Xan Kaur || May 27th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

My Name is Emilia del Valle by Isabel Allende || May 6th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Whistle by Linwood Barclay || May 20th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Death on the Island by Eliza Reid || May 13th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Silver Elite by Dani Francis || May 6th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Immaculate Conception by Ling Ling Huang || May 13th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Overgrowth by Mira Grant || May 6th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

The Devil Three Times by Rickey Fayne || May 13th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Sike by Fred Lunzer || May 20th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Shopgirls by Jessica Anya Blau || May 6th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

Awake in the Floating City by Susanna Kwan || May 13th -- Amazon | Bookshop.org

What are your anticipated May releases?

Can't-Wait Wednesday: The Devil Three Times by Rickey Fayne & The Incandescent by Emily Tesh

 

 Can't-Wait is a weekly meme hosted by Wishful Endings that spotlights exciting upcoming releases that we can't wait to be released!

The Devil Three Times by Rickey Fayne
Publication: May 13th, 2025
Little, Brown and Company
Hardcover. 416 pages.
Pre-order: Bookshop.org | Amazon

From Goodreads:
"'A debut of enormous ambition' spanning eight generations of a Black family in West Tennessee as they are repeatedly visited by the Devil (Nathan Harris, New York Times bestselling author of The Sweetness of Water)

Yetunde awakens aboard a slave ship en route to the United States with the spirit of her dead sister as her only companion. Desperate to survive the hell that awaits her at their destination, Yetunde finds help in an unexpected form—the Devil himself. The Devil, seeking a way to reenter the pearly gates of heaven, decides to prove himself to an indifferent God by protecting Yetunde and granting her a piece of his supernatural power. In return, Yetunde makes an incredible sacrifice.

Their bargain extends far beyond Yetunde's mortal lifespan. Over the next 175 years, the Devil visits Yetunde's descendants in their darkest hour of need: Lucille, a conjure woman; Asa, who passes for white; Louis and Virgil, who risk becoming a twentieth-century Cain and Abel; Cassandra, who speaks to the dead; James, who struggles to make sense of the past while fighting to keep his family together; and many others. The Devil offers each of them his own version of salvation, all the while wondering: can he save himself, too?

Steeped in the spiritual traditions and oral history of the Black diaspora, The Devil Three Times is a baptism by fire and water, heralding a new voice in American fiction."

I'm so intrigued by this premise, and I'm always excited for debut authors who really seem to be going big with their first book--can't wait to check this one out. 

The Incandescent by Emily Tesh
Publication: May 13th, 2025
Tor Books
Hardcover. 432 pages.
Pre-order: Bookshop.org | Amazon

From Goodreads:
"'Look at you, eating magic like you're one of us.'

Doctor Walden is the Director of Magic at Chetwood Academy and one of the most powerful magicians in England. Her days consist of meetings, teaching A-Level Invocation to four talented, chaotic sixth formers, more meetings, and securing the school's boundaries from demonic incursions.

Walden is good at her job―no, Walden is great at her job. But demons are masters of manipulation. It’s her responsibility to keep her school with its six hundred students and centuries-old legacy safe. And it’s possible the entity Walden most needs to keep her school safe from―is herself."

I liked Silver in the Wood, but didn't care for Some Desperate, so I'm hoping that means it's time for me to like a new Emily Tesh book and I'm really excited for this one. Of course I'm always up for an academic setting!

Review: When the Wolf Comes Home by Nat Cassidy

When the Wolf Comes Home by Nat Cassidy

Publisher: Tor Nightfire

Publication Date: April 22nd, 2025
Paperback. 304 pages.

About When the Wolf Comes Home (from the publisher):

"One night, Jess, a struggling actress, finds a five-year-old runaway hiding in the bushes outside her apartment. After a violent, bloody encounter with the boy's father, she and the boy find themselves running for their lives.

As they attempt to evade the boy's increasingly desperate father, Jess slowly comes to a horrifying understanding of the butchery that follows them―the boy can turn his every fear into reality.

And when the wolf finally comes home, no one will be spared.

'Get your claws into this one, horror fiends. It's terrific. . . . Sink your teeth into a classic.'―Stephen King

'A crazy-good, balls-to-the-wall horror novel . . . it’s full throttle from the first pages.' ―Joe Hill

'This is the kind of great, big, epic horror novel we got back in the '80s that came out swinging for the fences and left everything on the field. Welcome back, you shaggy, bloody monster of a book!' ―Grady Hendrix The 25 Best and Most Anticipated Horror Books of 2025―Men's Health Most Anticipated Horror of 2025―Paste Magazine, LitHub"

I've been really enjoying Nat Cassidy's work over the last couple years, so I was excited to hear about his latest release, When the Wolf Comes Home, which sounded like it would bring something to Cassidy's work--and it did just that! Nat Cassidy truly is one of the best horror writers on the scene right now due to his ability to craft stories that have both terrifying elements and thought-provoking, multi-faceted aspects that provide incredible depth to each story. I was immediately drawn into this story and was really captivated by the premise.

We begin by following a fairly typical story in LA featuring Jess, a young actress who is trying to book auditions and make her way, but hasn't quite had that big break yet. She currently works at a diner, which isn't really providing her all that much in the way of excitement or fulfillment. One night, she happens to come across a young boy just outside her apartment. With no idea who the boy is where his parents are, she decides to try to help him out--and quickly discovers that there is more to his story than just being lost than she thought. I don’t want to give too much away, so I’ll just say that once Jess and the boy realize they can’t stay in her apartment for a number of reasons, the two set off on a journey of their own. Along the way, Jess uncovers some truly shocking truths about the boy and how he ended up in his current situation.

I found Jess to be someone that I could easily connect with and relate to, and it was easy for me to become invested in her rather chaotic and unexpected journey in this book. Her reactions to the bizarre events happening around her felt pretty understandable given the truly extreme and just plain weird nature of them. I also appreciated that she had a bit of 'just go with it' vibe that felt entirely warranted, which I thought also showed that, as her core, she is someone with a pretty good heart who just wants to take care of herself and help those who need it.

I also really appreciated the book’s focus on fear as a theme, especially in how it affects the boy. But not only does When the Wolf Comes Home explore how fear literally affects the characters, it also dives deep into fear itself: what is it, what shapes our fears, what goes into fear, and what fear can drive us to do. The power of fear is real, and it's very present in this story. This book also goes to some pretty dark places and tackles some tough topics, which I thought Cassidy--as usual--tackled with nuance and care and did so wonderfully well.

People don't always expect horror books to be very emotionally moving or to explore deeper themes (which is odd, considering how often horror deals with grief, anger, trauma, etc...but I digress), but When the Wolf Comes home is genuinely a bit of a gut punch of a story. There's a lot of tragedy woven throughout the story, and the ending is also sure to bring out some emotions in readers as well. I thought it was the perfect conclusion to this story, even though it’s a difficult one, and I think it really drove home everything that had been explored in this book. 

When the Wolf Comes Home is a hefty story packed into a focused and concise narrative, if that makes any sense. The topics explored are fairly ambitious, but they're handled in a very streamlined and complete way. I thought the pacing was excellently executed and it felt fast-paced at times, but not too rushed, and still plenty of time exploring the inner mind of our protagonist and everything going on around her. I don't think I found my interest wavering at all while reading this, and in fact I went through it pretty quickly because I just couldn't seem to put it down.

I listened to the audiobook version of this and thought the narrator did an excellent job! She captured the tone of the story and Jess' experiences perfectly. I also enjoyed Nat Cassidy's own appearance, and I highly recommend sticking around to hear (or read) his author's note at the end, as I felt it added a lot to the story and provided a wonderful glimpse into some of his inspirations. 

When the Wolf Comes Home is quite a chaotic and tumultuous journey, but it's one that I was hooked on the entire time. I can't recommend it or Nat Cassidy's work enough!

*I received a copy of When the Wolf Comes Home in exchange for an honest review. This has no affect on my opinions.*

Buy the book: Amazon | Bookshop.org

Can't-Wait Wednesday: Harmattan Season by Tochi Onyebuchi, Written on the Dark by Guy Gavriel Kay, & A Letter from the Lonesome Shore by Sylvia Cathrall

   

 Can't-Wait is a weekly meme hosted by Wishful Endings that spotlights exciting upcoming releases that we can't wait to be released!

Harmattan Season by Tochi Onyebuchi
Publication: May 27th, 2025
Tor Books
Hardcover. 240 pages.
Pre-order: Bookshop.org | Amazon

From Goodreads:
"Award-winning author Tochi Onyebuchi’s new standalone novel is hardboiled fantasy Raymond Chandler meets P. Djèlí Clark in a postcolonial West Africa

Fortune always left whatever room I walked into, which is why I don’t leave my place much these days.

Veteran and private eye Boubacar doesn’t need much—least of all trouble—but trouble always seems to find him. Work has dried up, and he’d rather be left alone to deal with his bills as the Harmattan rolls in to coat the city in dust, but Bouba is a down on his luck deux fois, suspended between two cultures and two worlds.

When a bleeding woman stumbles onto his doorway, only to vanish just as quickly, Bouba reluctantly finds himself enmeshed in the secrets of a city boiling on the brink of violence. The French occupiers are keen to keep the peace at any cost, and the indigenous dugulen have long been shattered into restless factions vying for a chance to reclaim their lost heritage and abilities. As each hardwon clue reveals horrifying new truths, Bouba may have to carve out parts of himself he’s long kept hidden, and decide what he’s willing to offer next.

From the visionary author of Riot Baby and Goliath, Harmattan Season is a gripping fantasy noir in the tradition of Chandler, Hammond, and Christie that will have you by the throat—both dryly funny and unforgettably evocative."

I've just finished an ARC of this and found it to be such a unique and thought-provoking read! I thought this setting was fascinating and can't wait for it be out in May.

Written on the Dark by Guy Gavriel Kay
Publication: May 27th, 2025
Ace
Hardcover. 320 pages.
Pre-order: Bookshop.org | Amazon

From Goodreads:
"From the internationally bestselling author of Tigana, All the Seas of the World, and A Brightness Long Ago comes a majestic new novel of love and war that brilliantly evokes the drama and turbulence of medieval France.

Thierry Villar is a well-known--even notorious-- tavern poet, familiar with the rogues and shadows of that world, but not at all with courts and power. He is an unlikely person, despite his quickness, to be caught up in the deadly contests of ambitious royals, assassins, and invading armies.

But he is indeed drawn into all these things on a savagely cold night in his beloved city of Orane. And so Thierry must use all the intelligence and charm he can muster as political struggles merge with a decades-long war to bring his country to the brink of destruction.

As he does, he meets his poetic equal in an aristocratic woman and is drawn to more than one unsettling person with a connection to the world beyond this one. He also crosses paths with an extraordinary young woman driven by voices within to try to heal the ailing king--and help his forces in war. A wide and varied set of people from all walks of life take their places in the rich tapestry of this story.

A new masterwork from the internationally bestselling author of All the Seas of the World, A Brightness Long Ago, and Tigana, Written on the Dark is an elegant tour de force about power and ambition playing out amid the intense human need for art and beauty, and memories to be left behind."

You can't really go wrong with Guy Gavriel Kay to my knowledge, and I'm really intrigued by this new release! Now I just need to catch up on his backlist...

A Letter from the Lonesome Shore (The Sunken Archives #2) by Sylvie Cathrall
Publication: May 6th, 2025
Orbit
Hardcover. 384 pages.
Pre-order: Bookshop.org | Amazon

From Goodreads:
"The charming conclusion to the Sunken Archive duology, a heart-warming magical academia fantasy filled with underwater cities, romance of manners and found family, perfect for fans of Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries.

Former correspondents E. and Henerey, accustomed to loving each other from afar, did not anticipate continuing their courtship in an enigmatic underwater city. When their journey through the Structure in E.'s garden strands them in a peculiar society preoccupied with the pleasures and perils of knowledge, E. and Henerey come to accept--and, more surprisingly still, embrace--the fact that they may never return home.

A year and a half later, Sophy and Vyerin finally discover one of the elusive Entries that will help them seek their siblings. As the group's efforts bring them closer to E. and Henerey, an ancient, cosmic threat also draws near. . ."

I completely adored the first book and have been anxiously awaiting the sequel, and it's finally almost here! The epistolary format of the first book was excellently done and I'm really looking forward to diving back into this world and hopefully exploring more of it. 

Blog Tour + Excerpt: Midnight in Soap Lake by Matthew Sullivan

   

And the blog tours continue! This is my third of four blog tours this season, and I've been having a great time sharing all these books with you all. Today I'm sharing my blog tour stop for Midnight in Soap Lake by Matthew Sullivan! When Abigail is left alone in the seemingly haunted town of Soap Lake while her husband is off on a research trip, she soon finds herself entangled in a mystery she never could have expected--or how it involves the lake the town is named after. You can find an excerpt below that is sure to make you want to keep reading, as well as some additional information about the book and author. Happy reading!

ABOUT THE BOOK:
Title: MIDNIGHT IN SOAP LAKE
Author:  Matthew Sullivan
Pub. Date: April 15th, 2025
Publisher: Harlequin Trade Publishing / Hanover Square Press
Pages: 416
Find it: HarperCollins | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Bookshop.org

SYNOPSIS:

"A lake with mysterious properties. A town haunted by urban legend. Two women whose lives intersect in terrifying ways. Welcome to Soap Lake, a town to rival Twin Peaks and Stephen King’s Castle Rock.

When Abigail agreed to move to Soap Lake, Washington for her husband’s research she expected old growth forests and craft beer, folksy neighbors and the World’s Largest Lava Lamp. Instead, after her husband jets off to Poland for a research trip, she finds herself alone, in a town surrounded by desert, and haunted by its own urban legends.

But when a young boy runs through the desert into Abigail’s arms, her life becomes entwined with his and the questions surrounding his mother Esme’s death. In Abigail’s search for answers she enlists the help of a recovering addict-turned-librarian, a grieving brother, a broken motel owner, and a mentally-shattered conspiracy theorist to unearth Esme’s tragic past, the town’s violent history, and the secret magic locked in the lake her husband was sent there to study.

As she gets closer to the answers, past and present crimes begin to collide, and Abigail finds herself gaining the unwelcome attention of the town’s unofficial mascot, the rubber-suited orchard stalker known as TreeTop, a specter who seems to be lurking in every dark shadow and around every shady corner.

A sweeping, decade-spanning mystery brimming with quirky characters, and puzzle hunt scenarios, Midnight in Soap Lake is a modern day Twin Peaks—a rich, expansive universe that readers will enter and never forget."

Excerpt:

1
Abigail

        Something was there.
An animal, Abigail was certain, loping in the sagebrush: a twist of fuzz moving through the desert at the edge of her sight. The morning had already broken a hundred. Her glasses steamed and sunscreen stung her eyes—
        Or maybe she hadn’t seen anything.
        Yesterday, while walking along this desolate irrigation road, she’d spotted a cow skull between tumbleweeds, straight out of a tattoo parlor, but when she ran toward it, bracing to take a picture to send to Eli across the planet—proof, perhaps, that she ever left the house—she discovered it was just a white plastic grocery bag snagged on a curl of sage bark.
        Somehow. Way out here.
        The desert was scabby with dark basalt, bristled with the husks of flowers, and nothing was ever there.
        When Eli first told her he’d landed a grant to research a rare lake in the Pacific Northwest, Abigail thought ferns and rain, ale and slugs, Sasquatch and wool.
        And then they got here, to this desert where no one lived. Not a fern or slug in sight.
        This had been the most turbulent year of her life.
        Eleven months ago, they met.
        Seven months ago, they married.
        Six months ago, they moved from her carpeted condo in Denver to this sunbaked town on the shores of Soap Lake, a place where neither knew a soul.
        Their honeymoon had lasted almost three months—Eli whistling in his downstairs lab, Abigail unpacking and painting upstairs—and then he kissed her at the airport, piled onto a plane, and moved across the world to work in a different lab, on a different project, at a different lake.
        In Poland.
        When she remembered him lately, she remembered photographs of him.
        The plan had been to text all the time, daily calls, romantic flights to Warsaw, but the reality was that Eli had become too busy to chat and seemed more frazzled than ever. This week had been particularly bad because he’d been off the grid on a research trip, so every call went to voicemail, every text into the Polish abyss. And then at five o’clock this morning, her phone pinged and Abigail shot right out of a drowning sleep to grab it, as if he’d tossed her a life preserver from six thousand miles away.
        And this is what he’d had to say:

sorry missed you. so much work & my research all fd up. i’ll call this weekend. xo e

        As she was composing a response—her phone the only glow in their dark, empty home—he added a postscript that stabbed her in the heart like an icicle.

P.S. maybe it time since remember using time to figure out self life?

        What kind of a sentence was that? And what was a “self life” anyway?
        Abigail had called him right away. When he didn’t pick up she went down to the lab he’d set up in their daylight basement. She opened a few of his binders with their charts of Soap Lake, their colorful DNA diagrams, their photos of phosphorescent microbes, as cosmic as images from deep space. She breathed the papery dust of his absence and tried to imagine he’d just stepped out for a minute and would be back in a flash, her clueless brilliant husband, pen between his teeth, hair a smoky eruption, mustard stains on the plaid flannel bathrobe he wore in place of a lab coat.
        From one of his gleaming refrigerators, Abigail retrieved a rack of capped glass tubes that contained the Miracle Water and the Miracle Microbes collected from the mineral lake down the hill— she sometimes wondered if her limnologist husband would be more at home on the shores of Loch Ness—and held one until a memory arose, like a visit from a friend: Eli, lifting a water sample up to the window as if he were gazing through a telescope, shaking it so it fizzed and foamed. And then he was gone again.
        She hated that she did this. Came down here and caressed his equipment like a creep. Next she’d be smelling his bathrobe, collecting hairs from his brush. It was as if she felt compelled to remind herself that Eli was doing important work and, as the months of distance piled up, that he was even real.
        Back when they’d first started dating, Abigail had been the busy one, the one who said yes to her boss too much and had to skim her calendar each time Eli wanted to go to dinner or a movie. Of course her job as an administrative assistant in a title insurance office had never felt like enough, but when she mentioned this restlessness to Eli, finding her path—figure out self life—had suddenly become a centerpiece of their move to Soap Lake. But they got here and nothing had happened. It wasn’t just a switch you flipped.
        Abigail slid the tall tube of lake water back into its rack. Only when she let go, the tube somehow missed its slot and plunged to the floor like a bomb.
        Kapow!
        On the tile between her feet, a blossom of cloudy water and shattered glass.
        She stood over the mess, clicking her fingernails against her teeth and imagining microbes squealing on the floor, flopping in the air like miniscule goldfish. She told herself, without conviction, it had been an accident.
        And then she stepped over the spill, put the rack back in the fridge and, surprised at the immediacy of her shame, went for a walk in this scorching desert.
        It stunned her, how harsh and gorgeous it was.
        Loneliness: it felt sometimes like it possessed you.
        She hadn’t spoken to anyone in over a month, outside of a few people in the Soap Lake service industry. There was the guy who made her a watery latte at the gas station the other morning, then penised the back of her hand with his finger when he passed it over. And the newspaper carrier, an old woman with white braids and a pink cowgirl hat, who raced through town in a windowless minivan. She told Abigail she was one DUI away from unemployment, but the weekly paper was never late. And the cute pizza delivery dude who was so high he sat in her driveway on his phone for half an hour before coming to the door with her cold cheese pizza, saying, Yes, ma’am. Thanks, ma’am, which was sweet but totally freaked her out. And the lady with the painted boomerang eyebrows in the tampon aisle at the grocery store who gave her unwanted advice on the best lube around for spicing up menopause, to which Abigail guffawed and responded too loudly, “Thanks, but I’m not even goddamned forty!”
        At least she’d discovered these maintenance roads: miles and miles of gravel and dirt, no vehicles allowed, running alongside the massive irrigation canals that brought Canadian snowmelt from the Columbia River through the Grand Coulee Dam to the farms spread all over this desert. The water gushed through the main canals, thirty feet wide and twenty feet deep, and soon branched off to other, smaller canals that branched off to orchards and fields and ranches and dairies and soil and seeds and sprouts and leaves and, eventually, yummy vital food: grocery store shelves brimming with apples and milk and pizza-flavored Pringles.
        Good soil. Blazing sun. Just add water and food was born.
        Almost a trillion gallons a year moved through these canals. T: trillion.
        All that water way out here, pouring through land so dry it crackled underfoot.
        She halted on the road. Pressed her lank, brown hair behind her ear. Definitely heard something, a faint yip or caw.
        She scanned the horizon for the source of the sound and there it was again, a smudge of movement in the wavering heat. Something running away.
        A few times out here she’d seen coyote. Lots of quail, the occasional pheasant. Once, in a fallow field close to town, a buck with a missing antler that looked from a distance like a unicorn.
        Not running away, the smudge out there. Running toward. She was nowhere near a signal yet her instinct was to touch her phone. She craned around to glimpse the vanishing point of the road behind, gauging how far she’d walked and, if things got bad, how far she’d have to run.
        Three miles, minimum. Six miles, tops.
        Definitely approaching.
        Not something. Someone.
        A human. Alone.
        Running. A boy.
        A little boy. Sprinting.
        Abigail froze as their eyes met, and suddenly the boy exploded out of the desert, slamming into her thighs with an oof! He wore yellow pajamas and Cookie Monster slippers covered in prickly burrs.
        He clung to her legs so tightly that she almost tipped over. When she registered the crusty blood on his chin and cheeks and encasing his hands like gloves, she felt herself begin to cry, scared-to-sobbing in one second flat.
        Deep breath. Shirt wipe.
        “Hey! Are you hurt? Look at me. Are you hurt?”
        The boy wasn’t crying, but his skin was damp and he was panting hot and wouldn’t let go of her legs. She felt a hummingbird inside of his chest.
        She knelt in the gravel and unfolded his arms, turning them over at the wrist. She lifted his shirt and spun him around as best she could. He had some welts and scratches from running through the brush, and the knees of his pj’s were badly scuffed, but he wasn’t cut, not anywhere serious, which meant— The blood belonged to someone else.

Excerpted from MIDNIGHT IN SOAP LAKE by Matthew Sullivan. Copyright © 2025 by Matthew Sullivan. Published by Hanover Square Press, an imprint of HTP/HarperCollins.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Matthew Sullivan is the beloved author of Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore, an Indie Next Pick, B&N Discover pick, a GoodReads Choice Award finalist and winner of the Colorado Book Award. He received his MFA from the University of Idaho and has been a resident writer at Yaddo, Centrum, and the Vermont Studio Center. His short stories have been awarded the Robert Olen Butler Fiction Prize and the Florida Review Editors’ Award for Fiction. His writing has been featured in the New York Times Modern Love column, The Daily Beast, and Shelf Awareness amongst others.

Find Matthew Sullivan online: Author Website | Goodreads | Instagram | Facebook