Archives de catégorie : London 2026 Fiction

I’M NOT HERE TO HUNT RABBITS de Josh Kendall

This debut is a raw, tantalizing love story wrapped in a thriller that contains as much psychological intrigue as there is action – from one of the most acclaimed editors of the genre.

I’M NOT HERE TO HUNT RABBITS: A Novel
by Josh Kendall
Putnam, Spring 2027
(via The Gernert Company)

Smith thought he had left it all behind: the intense, dangerous work in Afghanistan; the grueling training; the vast reach of his former employer – the mysterious organization Cornerstone; and most of all Helen – the woman he loved and who was now gone forever. Better to start new in a place where no one knows him – Addis Ababa in Ethiopia. Security for a local kingpin named Sabadi and his family. A job he could do in his sleep.

But something is off about the whole assignment. The previous security detail seems to know more than they are letting on about the nature of the job and what Sabadi is planning in Ethiopia. Smith is left in the dark, and for the first time in his life, he is not sure where the threats are coming from. The only things he is certain of are that Cornerstone knows he is here and he will have to confront his past with Helen to make it out of Addis Ababa alive.

A different kind of thriller, one in which the tension comes as much from what’s unsaid as what is left in, from an acclaimed editor of the genre, I’m Not Here to Hunt Rabbits is an existential suspense novel of a life on a knife’s edge.

Josh Kendall was VP and Executive Editor at Little, Brown, and Editorial Director of Mulholland Books where he worked with Walter Mosley, Attica Locke, Robert Galbraith, JJ Abrams, and Tana French among others. He’s worked in various editorial positions at Viking, Picador, and Scribner, and has also taught creative writing at Brooklyn College, University of Iowa, and The New School.

SUNRISE de Téa Obreht

Three lives, 100 years, one Western ghost town: an explosive novel about a mysterious place called Sunrise where the secrets of the past refuse to stay buried, from the New York Times bestselling author of The Tiger’s Wife.

SUNRISE: A Novel
by Téa Obreht
Random House, August 2026
(via The Gernert Company)

In 2024, Nina’s small-engine plane crashes into a lake in the Wyoming mountains. Her boyfriend Ben, who was flying it, is nowhere to be found. Lost and freezing on the shore, Nina is armed with only a few old energy bars, a phone with no service, and a vague hope of rescue. It is up to her to survive in the vast wilderness. But then she stumbles upon Sunrise—a town of the Old West that is strangely well-maintained, but seemingly abandoned. A place that holds the missing link to a ghost story 100 years in the making.

In 2003, Sunrise’s golden boy Coll begins to direct town’s annual historical reenactment when he is linked with a scandalous incident at a local bar. And when an upstart author comes to him with questions about one of Sunrise’s most beloved figures, it threatens to upend everything he thought he knew about the city—and himself.

In 1902, town founder, gunslinger, and legendary pulp hero Anton Vargas returns to Sunrise and quickly takes charge of a group searching for a missing boy. But who really is Vargas? What does he know about the boy’s disappearance? And why has he returned after such a long absence?

These three are strangers, separated by time. But Sunrise has secrets which lie in waiting like gunpowder: quiet, unassuming, until they encounter a spark. Magisterial and suspenseful, Téa Obreht’s novel challenges the myths we think we know: of heroes and villains, of the places we lay claim to, and most of all, of our own lives.

Rooted in one place, yet traveling across three time periods, Téa explores: the complicated concept of people becoming legends big enough to support ticket sales in their own time, and how they perpetuate their own myths, even as they diverge from reality. Our spooky fascination with ghost towns – imagining what once was in a place, or what could be again. What it means to be truly lost and faced with back-to-survival basics in today’s uber connected world. The novel comes together in a heart-in-mouth ending that I haven’t felt since watching Thelma & Louise, literary style. With its matryoshka doll structure and her signature command of language, this novel, brimming with wry humor, sharp observations and pure linguistic joy, is a triumph.

A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF THE YEAR: Esquire, Literary Hub, Today

“Téa Obreht never disappoints.”—Esquire

“As the novel goes on, Obreht weaves three timelines together . . . to unravel the mystery of Sunrise, the ghost town to end all ghost towns. Sorry to fangirl but: YAY.” —Literary Hub

Téa Obreht is the internationally bestselling author of The Tiger’s Wife, Inland and The Morningside. Her novels have won the Orange Prize for Fiction, been a finalist for the National Book Award, won the Southwest Book Award, and won the Dylan Thomas Prize. Her work has appeared in The Best American Short Stories, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Harper’s, and Zoetrope: All-Story, among many other publications. Originally from the former Yugoslavia, Obreht now resides in Wyoming.

KENNEDY JONES HAS A PROBLEM de Liz Kay

KENNEDY JONES HAS A PROBLEM
by Liz Kay
(via Writers House)

Kennedy Jones has a problem. She has a lot of problems actually. One, she has aphids in her garden again this year. Two, she has buried a lot of bodies under her garden, and after the last one, there is the distinct possibility that police are closing in. Three, the secluded property she lives on is being developed into an artists’ colony and the (admittedly hot) general contractor seems a little too interested in whether Kennedy had anything to do with his dead cousin.

Kennedy tries lying low and keeping tabs on the case by dating a sweet but dumb deputy, but when the police throw out the words “serial killer” and start connecting victims that aren’t even hers, Kennedy realizes she’s not the only murderer in town. Recruiting the help of one of the artists at the colony—a failing novelist turned true-crime writer, Kennedy races to uncover her competition before they can pin their crimes on her—or do something much worse.

The novel combines Liz’s trademark wit with a highly propulsive mystery and a darkly charismatic protagonist. It marries the hijinks of Finlay Donovan is Killing It and You’d Look Better As a Ghost with the darkly comic horror of Final Girl Support Group, This Girl’s a Killer, and My Sister, the Serial Killer.

Liz Kay holds an MFA from the University of Nebraska, where she was the recipient of both an Academy of American Poets Prize and the Wendy Fort Foundation Prize for exemplary work in poetry. Her poems have appeared in such journals as Beloit Poetry Journal, RHINO, Nimrod, Willow Springs, The New York Quarterly, Iron Horse Literary Review, Redactions, and Sugar House Review. She is the author of the Something to Help Me Sleep {dancing girl press}, The Witch Tells The Story And Makes It True (Quarter Press), Monsters: A Love Story (G. P. Putnam’s Sons), and Fallout (Red Hen Press, forthcoming). Liz teaches and directs the Creative Writing Program at Metropolitan Community College in Omaha, Nebraska.

DAISY de Katie Cotugno

A modern-day twist on The Great Gatsby that invites readers into Daisy Buchanan’s gilded but morally bankrupt world, in a psychological suspense perfect for fans of The Wife Upstairs and The Last Mrs. Parrish.

DAISY
by Katie Cotugno
St. Martin’s, Winter 2027
(via Sterling Lord Literistic)

Daisy Buchanan is the top society hostess on East Egg, Long Island, with a successful husband, two beautiful children, and a jaw-dropping house. No one knows that she needs a few Klonopin to get through the day, to forget the unforgettable—that the love of her life, Jay Gatsby, was killed two summers ago. But when Daisy’s best friend, Jordan Baker, is found dead in her pool the morning after Tom Buchanan’s opulent 40th birthday party, Daisy’s fragile peace is shattered. When people get close to her, they have the awful habit of dying, and she needs to find out why.

As the police investigate Jordan’s murder, Daisy spirals into her own toxic cocktail of revelations and confusion. Is someone watching her, or is that the gin talking? What was it that Jordan wanted to tell her right before she died, and did that secret lead to her demise? Is whoever killed Jordan coming for Daisy next…and has that person been here all along?

With its razor-sharp social commentary and zippy pace, Daisy is an unputdownable read that shines a (bright green) light on one of American literature’s most iconic romantic heroines. Lovers of the original will appreciate the many callbacks to The Great Gatsby—as well as the novel’s shocking reveal—but ultimately, much like Daisy herself, it stands on its own two feet.

Katie Cotugno is the New York Times bestselling author of Birds of California and Meet the Benedettos as well as eight novels for young adults. She is also the coauthor (with Candace Bushnell) of Rules for Being a Girl. She lives in Boston with her family.

THE LINEUP de Nicholas Timms

Set against the backdrop of the iconic Byron Bay, this debut thriller dives into the hostile and sometimes violent world of competitive surfing.

THE LINEUP
by Nicholas Timms
PRH Australia, July 2026
(via The Pilkington Agency)

A killer on the loose. A surfer out of his depth…

Bo Curren was once a champion surfer. Now, at twenty-eight, he’s all washed up – unable even to set foot near the ocean.

Instead, he spends his days alone in his apartment, drowning his sorrows in whiskey and watching surfers on his laptop via the 24-hour surf webcam.

Then one day he sees something he shouldn’t. A camera trained on a deserted Byron Bay beach picks up a murder right there on the sand.

The police dismiss his report, and no bodies are found. Yet Bo knows what he saw.

And he has a clue: the murderer’s distinctive surfboard. If he can track that down, he’ll catch the killer.

But is he ready to dive back into a world where the rules are unspoken, outsiders aren’t welcome, and where secrets can be as dangerous as the waves?

A word from the editor, Bev Cousins: « I’m thrilled to be publishing Nicholas Timms’ sensational debut thriller, THE LINEUP. As a publisher of crime fiction for over thirty years both in the UK and Australia, it takes a very special book now to catch my eye – but I fell for this one hook, line and sinker. With heart-stopping ocean set-pieces amid tense detective scenes, Nicholas Timms masterfully balances the thrills of surfing with the twists and turns of the best crime fiction.’

‘The Lineup reads like a riptide. Once you’re in it it won’t let you go.’ — Michael Brissenden, bestselling author of Dust

‘The Lineup crashes into the Australian crime scene with the force of a perfect wave — a tense debut that drags you under and doesn’t let you surface until it’s done. Highly recommend.’ — R.W.R. McDonald, author of The Nancys

‘The kind of book that grabs you and doesn’t let go, The Lineup will sweep you away in an adrenaline rush of action and intrigue, all the while exploring a poignant thread about trauma and grief.’ — Jess Kitching, author of The Life Experiment

Nicholas Timms is a writer and former competitive surfer based in Sydney. Now working as a copywriter for a globally recognised advertising agency, he has been the creative mind behind several award-winning campaigns.