Can't-Wait is a weekly meme hosted by Wishful Endings that spotlights exciting upcoming releases that we can't wait to be released!
Primeval and Other Times by Olga Tokarczuk, trans. Antonia Lloyd-Jones
Publication: November 1st, 2026
Riverhead Books
Hardcover. 288 pages.
Pre-order: Bookshop.org | Amazon
From Goodreads:
"The Nobel Prize winner at her earthiest and most ethereal, in a fictional journey through three generations in the life of a mythical Polish village.
For the denizens of Primeval, the world beyond its fields and forests is but a dream. The outcast Cornspike raises her daughter among the creatures and spirits of the forest. The squire Popielski loses his faith and becomes obsessed with a game where progress is attained only by dreaming the right kind of dream. Nonhuman beings—trees and mushrooms and archangels—have their Times too, as do inanimate objects, which may be “more important for the world than people.” Yet their stories—or Times—are buffeted by the feral history of the twentieth century, after war carries Michał the miller away from his family in 1914. Bloodshed, betrayal, and the dramas of daily life mark the birth, life, and decline of Primeval’s little world and Times, making us consider afresh the stories by which we comprehend our own.
Rich with the capaciousness and imagination that have brought Tokarczuk to sustained international fame, Primeval and Other Times is yet another treasure for fans and new converts alike."
I've been really wanting to check out more of Olga Tokarczuk's work, and I am really fascinated by the sound of this one.
Ravenous by Mark D. Freeman
Publication: December 29th, 2026
Grand Central Publishing
Hardcover. 336 pages.
Pre-order: Bookshop.org | Amazon
From Goodreads:
"In this chilling horror eco-thriller, a Canadian town has built its tourism around migrating polar bears―but when late-forming ice maroons the bears, a wildlife specialist realizes the entire community is trapped within the perfect hunting ground.
The ice is forming late this year. Very late. And the polar bears are growing hungry. Very hungry. Ravenous.
Kat Girard is in her second year as manager of the Polar Bear Alert Program in Borea, Manitoba, the polar bear eco-tourism capital of the world. Every fall, over a thousand bears migrate through the town on their way to the frozen Hudson Bay, drawing crowds of tourists hoping to glimpse the north’s deadliest predators up close.
But the bay shows no sign of freezing this year, leaving a horde of hungry polar bears isolated on land. Kat has her hands full managing the impatient wildlife, alongside arrogant and ignorant business owners more interested in tourist money than the growing danger all around them. What none of them know is that one bear has grown tired of waiting for the ice―and others soon follow suit. A sudden storm threatens to trap the entire town with land’s biggest living carnivores as an unprecedented hunger grips them.
Kat and the scientists and wildlife experts she works with respect these deadly apex predators. But those who don’t are about to see nature take its ultimate revenge.”
Now this is the type of revenge story I might be able to get behind! Maybe this will be more like what I was hoping Blacktail would've been, haha.
