It’s really hard to make a list of 2015 releases I’m looking forward to because there are so many of them! Some books I’m really excited about reading—The Galaxy Game by Karen Lord, Golden Son by Pierce Brown, Half the World by Joe Abercrombie, Shadow Scale by Rachel Hartman, The Invisible Library by Genevieve Cogman, and A Crown for Cold Silver by Alex Marshall—have already been discussed on the site so I’ve decided to leave those off this list to make it easier to narrow it down to a more reasonable number of books.

There are also a few books I’m looking forward to that do not have book descriptions yet. I’ve heard that Blind Eye Books is publishing a new book by Lane Robins/Lyn Benedict, author of Maledicte, in 2015, but I don’t even know what the title is and just want to read it because I’ve enjoyed her other books. Karin Lowachee may have a fourth Warchild book, The Warboy, out as well (I guess I’d better read Cagebird and get caught up!). It sounds like The Thorn of Emberlain by Scott Lynch may also see a 2015 release since it was only a little behind schedule for a 2014 release, which would be wonderful!

Other than the previously mentioned books, here are 15 2015 releases I’m excited about (in no particular order other than those with covers first).

Uprooted by Naomi Novik

Uprooted by Naomi Novik

Release Date: May 19

I haven’t yet read Temeraire despite hearing many good things about it, but Uprooted sounds lovely since it’s described as an original fairy tale. Plus it features a dragon!

 

Naomi Novik, author of the bestselling and critically acclaimed Temeraire novels, introduces a bold new world rooted in folk stories and legends, as elemental as a Grimm fairy tale.

“Our Dragon doesn’t eat the girls he takes, no matter what stories they tell outside our valley. We hear them sometimes, from travelers passing through. They talk as though we were doing human sacrifice, and he were a real dragon. Of course that’s not true: he may be a wizard and immortal, but he’s still a man, and our fathers would band together and kill him if he wanted to eat one of us every ten years. He protects us against the Wood, and we’re grateful, but not that grateful.”

Agnieszka loves her valley home, her quiet village, the forests and the bright shining river. But the corrupted Wood stands on the border, full of malevolent power, and its shadow lies over her life.

Her people rely on the cold, driven wizard known only as the Dragon to keep its powers at bay. But he demands a terrible price for his help: one young woman handed over to serve him for ten years, a fate almost as terrible as falling to the Wood.

The next choosing is fast approaching, and Agnieszka is afraid. She knows—everyone knows—that the Dragon will take Kasia: beautiful, graceful, brave Kasia, all the things Agnieszka isn’t, and her dearest friend in the world. And there is no way to save her.

But Agnieszka fears the wrong things. For when the Dragon comes, it is not Kasia he will choose.

Court of Fives by Kate Elliott

Court of Fives (Court of Fives #1) by Kate Elliott

Release Date: August 18

I loved the world, characters, and dialogue in Kate Elliott’s Spiritwalker trilogy and want to read more of her books! I’m particularly excited to see what she does with this young adult trilogy.

 

In this imaginative escape into an enthralling new world, World Fantasy Award finalist Kate Elliott begins a new trilogy with her debut young adult novel, weaving an epic story of a girl struggling to do what she loves in a society suffocated by rules of class and privilege.

Jessamy’s life is a balance between acting like an upper class Patron and dreaming of the freedom of the Commoners. But at night she can be whomever she wants when she sneaks out to train for The Fives, an intricate, multi-level athletic competition that offers a chance for glory to the kingdom’s best competitors. Then Jes meets Kalliarkos, and an unlikely friendship between a girl of mixed race and a Patron boy causes heads to turn. When a scheming lord tears Jes’s family apart, she’ll have to test Kal’s loyalty and risk the vengeance of a powerful clan to save her mother and sisters from certain death.

The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin

The Fifth Season (The Broken Earth #1) by N.K. Jemisin

Release Date: August 4

This was actually on my list last year, but the release year was later pushed back to 2015 so there wouldn’t be a long wait between this book and the next. I loved the writing, characters, and worlds N. K. Jemisin created in her Inheritance and Dreamblood books and am excited to read about a new setting!

 

This is the way the world ends. Again.

Three terrible things happen in a single day. Essun, a woman living an ordinary life in a small town, comes home to find that her husband has brutally murdered their son and kidnapped their daughter. Meanwhile, mighty Sanze—the world-spanning empire whose innovations have been civilization’s bedrock for a thousand years—collapses as most of its citizens are murdered to serve a madman’s vengeance. And worst of all, across the heart of the vast continent known as the Stillness, a great red rift has been been torn into the heart of the earth, spewing ash enough to darken the sky for years. Or centuries.

Now Essun must pursue the wreckage of her family through a deadly, dying land. Without sunlight, clean water, or arable land, and with limited stockpiles of supplies, there will be war all across the Stillness: a battle royale of nations not for power or territory, but simply for the basic resources necessary to get through the long dark night. Essun does not care if the world falls apart around her. She’ll break it herself, if she must, to save her daughter.

The Labyrinth of Flame by Courtney Schafer

The Labyrinth of Flame (The Shattered Sigil #3) by Courtney Schafer

Release Date: TBA

The middle book in this trilogy, The Tainted City, was one of my favorite books I read in 2012. I can’t wait to read more, and I’m glad Courtney Schafer decided to do a Kickstarter for the book so we’ll get to find out what happens to Dev and Kiran!

 

Dev’s never been a man afraid of a challenge. Not only has he kept his vow to his dead mentor, rescuing a child in the face of impossible odds, but he’s freed his mage friend Kiran from both the sadistic master who seeks to enslave him and the foreign Council that wants to kill him.

But Kiran’s master Ruslan is planning a brutal revenge, one that will raze an entire country to blood and ashes. Kiran is the key to stopping Ruslan; yet Kiran is dying by inches, victim of the Alathian Council’s attempt to chain him. Worse yet, Dev and Kiran have drawn the attention of demons from the darkest of ancient legends. Demons whose power Dev knows is all too real, and that he has every reason to fear.

A fear that grows, as he and Kiran struggle to outmaneuver Ruslan and uncover the secrets locked in Kiran’s forgotten childhood. For the demons are playing their own deadly game – and the price of survival may be too terrible to bear.

Champion of the Scarlet Wolf by Ginn Hale

Champion of the Scarlet Wolf (Champion of the Scarlet Wolf #1) by Ginn Hale

Release Date: Fall 2015 (Ebook Available in 2014)

Technically, this book came out in 2014, but the print release is in 2015 and I almost always read print books. Champion of the Scarlet Wolf #1 and #2 are set in the same world as Lord of the White Hell. Ginn Hale writes wonderful characters, and I really enjoyed her other books in this setting.

 

Five years after abandoning the Sagrada Acedemy, Elezar Grunito has become infamous in the sanctified circles of noble dueling rings for his brutal temper and lethal blade. Men and women of all ranks gather to cheer and jeer, none of them knowing Elezar’s true purpose. But a violent death outside the ring marks Elezar as a wanted man and sends him into hiding in the far northern wilds of Labara.

There, creatures of myth and witchcraft—long since driven from Cadeleon—lurk in dark woods and prowl the winding streets. Soldiers and priests alike fear the return of witch-queens and even demons. Elezar soon learns that magic takes many forms, some too alluring to resist, others too terrible to endure. But just as he begins to find his place in this strange new country, the past he left behind along with his school days returns to challenge him once again.

The Grace of Kings by Ken Liu

The Grace of Kings (The Dandelion Dynasty #1) by Ken Liu

Release Date: April 7

I’m not a huge short fiction reader, but I enjoyed Ken Liu’s Hugo Award-winning “Mono no aware” and am quite interested in reading his upcoming first novel—which sounds excellent!

 

Wily, charming Kuni Garu, a bandit, and stern, fearless Mata Zyndu, the son of a deposed duke, seem like polar opposites. Yet, in the uprising against the emperor, the two quickly become the best of friends after a series of adventures fighting against vast conscripted armies, silk-draped airships, soaring battle kites, conspiring goddesses, underwater boats, magical books, as a streetfighter-cum-general who takes her place as the greatest tactitian of the age. Once the emperor has been overthrown, however, they each find themselves the leader of separate factions—two sides with very different ideas about how the world should be run and the meaning of justice.

Black Wolves by Kate Elliott

Black Wolves (The Black Wolves #1) by Kate Elliott

Release Date: October 6

One reason 2015 seems like a great year for books is that not just one but TWO novels by Kate Elliott are being released (plus the collection The Very Best of Kate Elliott)!

 

SOME CHOICES CAN NEVER BE UNDONE.
He lost his honor long ago.

Captain Kellas was lauded as the king’s most faithful servant until the day he failed in his duty. Dismissed from service, his elite regiment disbanded, he left the royal palace and took up another life.

Now a battle brews within the palace that threatens to reveal deadly secrets and spill over into open war. The king needs a loyal soldier to protect him.

Can a disgraced man ever be trusted?

Stories of the Raksura: Volume 2 by Martha Wells

Stories of the Raksura: Volume 2 by Martha Wells

Release Date: June 2

Admittedly, I have some catching up to do before reading this one since I haven’t yet read the first volume of Stories of the Raksura (although I am hoping to read it soon). I loved the setting and characters in the Books of the Raksura and am glad Martha Wells is writing more about them!

 

Moon, Jade, and other favorites from the Indigo Cloud Court return with two new novellas from Martha Wells.

Martha Wells continues to enthusiastically ignore genre conventions in her exploration of the fascinating world of the Raksura. Her novellas and short stories contain all the elements fans have come to love from the Raksura books: courtly intrigue and politics, unfolding mysteries that reveal an increasingly strange wider world, and threats both mundane and magical.

“The Dead City” is a tale of Moon before he came to the Indigo Court. As Moon is fleeing the ruins of Saraseil, a groundling city destroyed by the Fell, he flies right into another potential disaster when a friendly caravanserai finds itself under attack by a strange force. In “The Dark Earth Below,” Moon and Jade face their biggest adventure yet; their first clutch. But even as Moon tries to prepare for impending fatherhood, members of the Kek village in the colony tree’s roots go missing, and searching for them only leads to more mysteries as the court is stalked by an unknown enemy.

Stories of Moon and the shape changers of Raksura have delighted readers for years. This world is a dangerous place full of strange mysteries, where the future can never be taken for granted and must always be fought for with wits and ingenuity, and often tooth and claw. With these two new novellas, Martha Wells shows that the world of the Raksura has many more stories to tell…

The Dark Arts of Blood by Freda Warrington

The Dark Arts of Blood (Blood Wine #4) by Freda Warrington

Release Date: May 5

Freda Warrington’s Blood Wine books have been re-released and next year brings a brand new fourth book in the series! I still need to read books 2 and 3, but A Taste of Blood Wine was compulsively readable and one of my absolute favorite books I read in 2013 so I had to put this on the list even though I am behind on the series.

 

1927: In the turmoil and glamour of 1920s Europe, vampires Karl, Charlotte and Violette face threats to their very existence. Fiery, handsome dancer Emil achieves his dream to partner the legendary ballerina Violette Lenoir – until his forbidden desire for her becomes an obsession. Rejected, spiralling towards madness, he seeks solace with a mysterious beauty, Leyla. But she too is a vampire, with a hidden agenda…

Is Leyla more dangerous than the sinister activist, Goderich Mann? When Karl and Charlotte undertake an exotic, perilous journey to rescue Emil, they unearth secrets that threaten disaster for vampire-kind.

The Dark Arts of Blood is the long-awaited brand-new fourth novel in the Blood books series.

The Voyage of the Basilisk by Marie Brennan

The Voyage of the Basilisk (A Memoir by Lady Trent #3) by Marie Brennan

Release Date: March 31

This is yet another series I’m behind on, but I could not leave this book off my list since A Natural History of Dragons is one of my two favorite books read in 2014. Lady Trent’s narrative voice and adventures in studying dragons were quite charming.

 

Devoted readers of Lady Trent’s earlier memoirs, A Natural History of Dragons and The Tropic of Serpents, may believe themselves already acquainted with the particulars of her historic voyage aboard the Royal Survey Ship Basilisk, but the true story of that illuminating, harrowing, and scandalous journey has never been revealed—until now. Six years after her perilous exploits in Eriga, Isabella embarks on her most ambitious expedition yet: a two-year trip around the world to study all manner of dragons in every place they might be found. From feathered serpents sunning themselves in the ruins of a fallen civilization to the mighty sea serpents of the tropics, these creatures are a source of both endless fascination and frequent peril. Accompanying her is not only her young son, Jake, but a chivalrous foreign archaeologist whose interests converge with Isabella’s in ways both professional and personal.

Science is, of course, the primary objective of the voyage, but Isabella’s life is rarely so simple. She must cope with storms, shipwrecks, intrigue, and warfare, even as she makes a discovery that offers a revolutionary new insight into the ancient history of dragons.


A Sword Named Truth (New Trilogy #1) by Sherwood Smith

Release Date: August 4

I haven’t read the Inda series yet, but I did enjoy Banner of the Damned very much so I was quite interested to see that a new trilogy set in that world is being released.

 

Over the course of five books, Sherwood Smith has enthralled readers with the world of Sartorias-deles. First in the military action of the Inda series and then in the magic-based cultural drama of Banner of the Damned, Smith’s books are a tour-de-force of deadly high politics, incredibly engaging worldbuilding, and nuanced examinations of power, love, and betrayal. Readers of all stripes have praised her for the master fantasist she is.

Woven throughout these sagas is a dark mystery: the dangerous, shadowed threat of Norsunder. With incredible powers only hinted at and rare appearances of enigmatic characters, Norsunder has loomed as the ultimate villain, the very highest of stakes, and a foreboding battle to come: the great story readers have been eagerly awaiting.

A Sword Named Truth begins that story. The first installment of a trilogy, A Sword Named Truth launches readers into the non-stop action, politics, and magical threats leading to Norsunder’s return.

Our heroes span continents and cultures, ambitions and desires, but share one characteristic: they are young leaders. Many are rulers of unstable nations, growing into their power and themselves, but they are seeking ways to trust and bind themselves together – and find the strength to defend against a host that has crushed entire worlds.


Ash and Silver (The Sanctuary Duet #2) by Carol Berg

Release Date: August

Carol Berg wonderfully develops fantasy worlds and characters, and I always look forward to new books by her. I’m almost finished with the first book in this duology, Dust and Light, and I think it’s a fantasy book that deserved more discussion in 2014.

 

Ever since the Order of the Equites Cineré stole his memory, his name, and his heart, thinking about the past makes Greenshank’s head ache. After two years of rigorous training he is almost ready to embrace the mission of the Order – to use selfless magic to heal the troubles of Navronne. But on his first assignment alone, the past comes racing back, threatening to drown him in conspiracy, grief, and murder.

He is Lucian de Remeni – a sorcerer whose magical bents for portraiture and history threaten the safety of the earth and the future of the war-riven kingdom of Navronne. He just can’t remember how or why.

Fighting to unravel the mysteries of his power, Lucian must trace threads of corruption that reach from the Pureblood Registry and into the Order itself, the truth hidden two centuries in the past and beyond the boundaries of the world . . .


The House of Shattered Wings by Aliette de Bodard

Release Date: August 20

I’ve wanted to read more by Aliette de Bodard since reading her Hugo nominated works “Immersion” and On a Red Station, Drifting and was thrilled to learn that she has a new novel coming out in 2015!

 

It is the beginning of the 21st Century, and Paris is a city of witches and alchemists; of warlocks and Fallen angels; where the colonies still feed an irrepressible appetite for novelty and distractions. The Great Magicians’ War has come and gone, leaving a trail of devastation in its wake. The Grand Magasins are haunted ruins; Notre-Dame is a burnt-out shell, and the Seine has turned black with ashes and rubble and the remnants of the spells that tore the city apart.

There is not much magic left, and what little there is resides in the Fallen. They are magic; made of raw, unadulterated power that they can pass on with nothing more than a breath or a touch.

Madeleine was once a powerful witch; but she now works as an alchemist for the House of Silverspires, transferring magic from Fallen to humans. She bottles elixirs that distil the breath of the Fallen into devastating weapons; and grinds the bones of dead Fallen into ‘angel dust’, a drug that grants magical powers to those who inhale it.

But Silverspires has become a dangerous place to dwell. There is something unwelcome in the House; something dark and powerful, something that has killed and will kill again…


Cold Iron by Stina Leicht

Release Date: June 23

Stina Leicht is an author whose books I have wanted to read for awhile (I don’t think I heard anything but praise for her The Fey and the Fallen books!).

 

Fraternal twins Nels and Suvi move beyond their royal heritage and into military and magical dominion in this flintlock epic fantasy debut from a two-time Campbell Award finalist.

Prince Nels is the scholarly runt of the ancient Kainen royal family of Eledore, disregarded as flawed by the king and many others. Only Suvi, his fraternal twin sister, supports him. When Nels is ambushed by an Acrasian scouting party, he does the forbidden for a member of the ruling family: He picks up a fallen sword and defends himself.

Disowned and dismissed to the military, Nels establishes himself as a leader as Eledore begins to shatter under the attack of the Acrasians, who the Kainen had previously dismissed as barbarians. But Nels knows differently, and with the aid of Suvi, who has allied with pirates, he mounts a military offensive with sword, canon, and what little magic is left in the world.


Hidden Huntress (The Malediction Trilogy #2) by Danielle L. Jensen

Release Date: June 2 (US/CA/Ebook)/June 4 (UK print)

Danielle L. Jensen’s debut Stolen Songbird was quite enjoyable, and I’m glad that Angry Robot will be publishing the second book of the trilogy next year even though Strange Chemistry was sadly discontinued.

 

Beneath the mountain, the king’s reign of tyranny is absolute; the one troll with the capacity to challenge him is imprisoned for treason. Cécile has escaped the darkness of Trollus, but she learns all too quickly that she is not beyond the reach of the king’s power. Or his manipulation.

Recovered from her injuries, she now lives with her mother in Trianon and graces the opera stage every night. But by day she searches for the witch who has eluded the trolls for five hundred years. Whether she succeeds or fails, the costs to those she cares about will be high.

To find Anushka, she must delve into magic that is both dark and deadly. But the witch is a clever creature. And Cécile might not just be the hunter. She might also be the hunted…

 

Updated on 1/5: Changed the cover art and release date for Stories of the Raksura after seeing it had a new cover and date.