I’ve been slowly winding down the year with cosy classics and comforting middle grade and YA books, but looking at 2021’s releases makes me want to shake off the languor of winter and fly through all. the. books. I’ve had the honour of reading one of these 21 anticipated releases in advance, and I can’t wait for the rest of them to come out.
Add them to your Goodreads TBR to get notifications if a publisher runs a promotional Goodreads giveaway, get on those library wait lists early, suggest purchases for your library if need be, or go ahead and pre-order a copy!
Black Buck by Mateo Askaripour
Goodreads // Pub date: Jan 05
Contemporary fiction. For fans of Sorry to Bother You and The Wolf of Wall Street—a crackling, satirical debut novel about a young man given a shot at stardom as the lone Black salesman at a mysterious, cult-like, and wildly successful tech startup where nothing is as it seems.
One of the Good Ones by Maika Moulite and Maritza Moulite
Goodreads // Pub date: Jan 05
YA fiction. The Hate U Give meets Get Out—Why are only certain people deemed worthy to be missed? When teen social activist and history buff Kezi Smith is killed under mysterious circumstances after attending a social justice rally, her devastated sister Happi and their family are left reeling in the aftermath. As Kezi becomes another immortalised victim in the fight against police brutality, Happi begins to question the idealised way her sister is remembered. Perfect. Angelic. One of the good ones.
You Have a Match by Emma Lord
Goodreads // Pub date: Jan 12
YA romance. For fans of The Parent Trap—When Abby signs up for a DNA service, it’s mainly to give her friend and secret love interest, Leo, a nudge. After all, she knows who she is already. But she didn’t know she’s a younger sister. When the DNA service reveals Abby has a secret sister, shimmery-haired Instagram star Savannah Tully, it’s hard to believe they’re from the same planet, never mind the same parents. The logical course of action? Meet up at summer camp (obviously) and figure out why Abby’s parents gave Savvy up for adoption.
People Like Her by Ellery Lloyd
Goodreads // Pub date: Jan 12
Commercial thriller. An ambitious influencer mom and a dangerously obsessive follower. Probing the dark side of influencer culture and the perils of parenting online, People Like Her explores our desperate need to be seen and the lengths we’ll go to be liked by strangers, asking what—and who—we sacrifice when make our private lives public, and ultimately lose control of who we let in…
The Ex Talk by Rachel Lynn Solomon
Goodreads // Pub date: Jan 26
Contemporary romance, enemies to lovers. In an effort to save the struggling radio station, Shay proposes a show that her boss green-lights with excitement. On The Ex Talk, two exes will deliver relationship advice live, on air. Their boss decides Shay and her new colleague Dominic are the perfect co-hosts, given how much they already despise each other. Neither loves the idea of lying to listeners, but it’s this or unemployment.
A Taste for Love by Jennifer Yen
Goodreads // Pub date: Feb 02
YA romance. Pride and Prejudice retelling for fans of The Great British Bake Off—With college just around the corner, Liza agrees to help her mom with her bakery’s annual junior competition to prove to her mom that she’s more than her rebellious tendencies once and for all. But when Liza arrives on the first day of the bake-off, she realises there’s a catch: all of the contestants are young Asian American men her mother has handpicked for Liza to date. (There’s boba on the cover! Are you convinced yet?)
This Close to Okay by Leesa Cross-Smith
Goodreads // Pub date: Feb 02
Contemporary fiction. A cathartic novel about the life-changing weekend shared between two strangers: a therapist and the man she prevents from ending his life. Alternating between Tallie and Emmett’s perspectives as they inch closer to the truth of what brought Emmett to the bridge’s edge—as well as the hard truths Tallie has been grappling with in her own life—This Close to Okay is a vibrant, powerful story of two strangers brought together by wild chance at the moment they needed each other most.
My Year Abroad by Chang-rae Lee
Goodreads // Pub date: Feb 02
Contemporary fiction. Tiller is an average American college student with a good heart but minimal aspirations. Pong Lou is a larger-than-life, wildly creative Chinese American entrepreneur who sees something intriguing in Tiller beyond his bored exterior and takes him under his wing. When Pong brings him along on a boisterous trip across Asia, Tiller is catapulted from ordinary young man to talented protégé, and pulled into a series of ever more extreme and eye-opening experiences that transform his view of the world, of Pong, and of himself.
Infinite Country by Patricia Engel
Goodreads // Pub date: Feb 23
Contemporary fiction. A multigenerational story steeped in Andean myth and Colombian urban life about a family fractured by deportation.
Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley
Goodreads // Pub date: Mar 16
YA crime fiction. As a biracial, unenrolled tribal member and the product of a scandal, 18-year-old Daunis Fontaine has never quite fit in, both in her hometown and on the nearby Ojibwe reservation. The only bright spot is meeting Jamie, the charming new recruit on her brother Levi’s hockey team. Yet even as Daunis falls for Jamie, certain details don’t add up and she senses the dashing hockey star is hiding something. Everything comes to light when Daunis witnesses a shocking murder, thrusting her into the heart of a criminal investigation.
Open Water by Caleb Azumah Nelson
Goodreads // Pub date: Apr 13
Contemporary fiction. In a crowded London pub, two young people meet. Both are Black British, both won scholarships to private schools where they struggled to belong, both are now artists—he a photographer, she a dancer—and both are trying to make their mark in a world that by turns celebrates and rejects them. Tentatively, tenderly, they fall in love. But two people who seem destined to be together can still be torn apart by fear and violence, and over the course of a year they find their relationship tested by forces beyond their control.
Goodbye, Again by Jonny Sun
Goodreads // (Gifted) // Pub date: Apr 20
Memoir. For fans of Reasons to Stay Alive—A heartfelt and wholesome mixed format collection of reflections and illustrations on anxiety, loneliness, productivity, happiness, and houseplants.
Dial A for Aunties by Jesse Q Sutano
Goodreads // Pub date: Apr 27
Contemporary romance, murder mystery. When Meddelin Chan ends up accidentally killing her blind date, her meddlesome mother calls for her even more meddlesome aunties to help get rid of the body. Unfortunately, a dead body proves to be a lot more challenging to dispose of than one might anticipate, especially when it is accidentally shipped in a cake cooler to the over-the-top billionaire wedding her Ma and aunties are working, at an island resort on the California coastline. But things go from inconvenient to downright torturous when Meddy’s great college love—and biggest heartbreak—makes a surprise appearance amid the wedding chaos. Is it possible to escape murder charges, charm her ex back into her life, and pull off a stunning wedding all in one weekend?
Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir
Goodreads // Pub date: May 04
Sci-fi. Ryland Grace is the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission—and if he fails, humanity and the earth itself will perish. Except that right now, he doesn’t know that. He can’t even remember his own name, let alone the nature of his assignment or how to complete it. All he knows is that he’s been asleep for a very, very long time. And he’s just been awakened to find himself millions of miles from home, with nothing but two corpses for company.
People We Meet On Vacation by Emily Henry
Goodreads // Pub date: May 11
Contemporary romance, friends to enemies to friends to lovers? Poppy and Alex have nothing in common. And somehow, ever since a fateful car share home from college many years ago, they are the very best of friends. For most of the year they live far apart—she’s in New York City, and he’s in their small hometown—but every summer, for a decade, they have taken one glorious week of vacation together. Until two years ago, when they ruined everything. They haven’t spoken since. Poppy has everything she should want, but she’s stuck in a rut. When someone asks when she was last truly happy, she knows, without a doubt, it was on that ill-fated, final trip with Alex. And so, she decides to convince her best friend to take one more vacation together—lay everything on the table, make it all right. Miraculously, he agrees.
Jay’s Gay Agenda by Jason June
Goodreads // Pub date: Jun 01
YA romance. That title tho! There’s one thing Jay Collier knows for sure—he’s a statistical anomaly as the only out gay kid in his small rural Washington town. While all his friends can’t stop talking about their heterosexual hookups and relationships, Jay can only dream of his own firsts, compiling a romance to-do list of all the things he hopes to one day experience—his Gay Agenda. Then, against all odds, Jay’s family moves to Seattle and he starts his senior year at a new high school with a thriving LGBTQIA+ community. For the first time ever, Jay feels like he’s found where he truly belongs, where he can flirt with Very Sexy Boys and search for love. But as Jay begins crossing items off his list, he’ll soon be torn between his heart and his hormones, his old friends and his new ones… because after all, life and love don’t always go according to plan.
The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi Vo
Goodreads // Pub date: Jun 01
Historical fantasy. A Great Gatsby retelling—Immigrant. Socialite. Magician. Jordan Baker grows up in the most rarefied circles of 1920s American society—she has money, education, a killer golf handicap, and invitations to some of the most exclusive parties of the Jazz Age. She’s also queer, Asian, adopted, and treated as an exotic attraction by her peers, while the most important doors remain closed to her. But the world is full of wonders: infernal pacts and dazzling illusions, lost ghosts and elemental mysteries. In all paper is fire, and Jordan can burn the cut paper heart out of a man. She just has to learn how.
XOXO by Axie Oh
Goodreads // Pub date: Jul 13
YA romance, forbidden love. For K-pop fans—Cello prodigy Jenny has one unforgettable night of adventure with a mysterious boy she meets at her uncle’s Los Angeles karaoke bar… Then he disappears without a word. Three months later, when Jenny and her mother arrive in South Korea to take care of her ailing grandmother, she’s shocked to discover that the mysterious boy is a student at the same elite arts academy where she’s enrolled for the semester. And he’s not just any student. He’s a member of one of the biggest K-pop bands in the world—and he’s strictly forbidden from dating.
Magma by Thóra Hjörleifsdóttir
Goodreads // Pub date: Jul 13
Contemporary fiction. 20-year-old Lilja is in love. As a young university student, she is quickly smitten with the intelligent, beautiful young man from school who quotes Derrida and reads Latin and cooks balanced vegetarian meals. Before she even realises, she’s moved in with him. In an era of pornification, his acts of nearly imperceptible abuse and manipulation continue to mount as their relationship develops. Lilja wants to hold onto him, take care of him, and be the perfect lover. But in order to do so, she gradually lets go of her boundaries and concurrently starts to lose her sense of self.
No Gods, No Monsters by Cadwell Turnbull
Goodreads // Pub date: Sep 07
Urban fantasy. One October morning, Laina gets the news that her brother was shot and killed by Boston cops. But what looks like a case of police brutality soon reveals something much stranger. Monsters are real. And they want everyone to know it.
You’ve Reached Sam by Dustin Thao
Goodreads // Pub date: Fall
YA romance. If I Stay meets Your Name—Heartbroken after her boyfriend’s death, Julie calls him to hear his voicemail—but he picks up. It’s their second chance at goodbye, but the connection’s temporary. The longer they talk, the more impossible it is to let him go.
What books are you looking forward to reading in 2021?
(You’ve Reached Sam by Dustin Thao not included above, cover to be revealed)