If you’re looking for something new to read over the coming days and weeks, we have you covered with our list of the most anticipated book releases coming in May 2024.
Check out our highlights below and then keep scrolling to check out the other book titles that we think are worthy of a mention.
Which books will you be reading this month? Let us know what’s going on your reading list by leaving us a comment.
Please note: Some of these books might miss their expected release date (or be released on a different date in certain countries), so bookmark your favourite online bookstore for up-to-date information.
TheReviewGeek Recommends
Expected Release Date: May 2
Synopsis:
Lou Manson is an outsider when she joins the final-year class at Highfield Manor, Dublin’s most exclusive private school. Beyond the granite pillars and the wrought-iron gates is a world of wealth, privilege and potential. But Highfield is also hiding a dark secret – and Lou is here to expose it.
When Lou befriends the beautiful and talented Shauna Power, her plans are thrown into turmoil. Speaking out against the school would mean betraying Shauna, and Lou soon discovers that the Highfield elite will go to any lengths to protect their own reputation…even when the consequences are fatal.
Thirty years later, Lou is called to testify in a new lawsuit against Highfield. But telling the truth means confronting her past – and there is one story she swore she’d never tell…
Expected Release Date: May 7
A teenager on the run from his past finds the family he never knew existed and the community he never knew he needed at an HBCU for the young, Black, and magical . Enroll in this fresh fantasy debut with the emotional power of Legendborn and the redefined ancestral magic of Lovecraft Country .
Ten years ago, Malik’s life changed forever the night his mother mysteriously vanished and he discovered he had uncontrollable powers. Since then, he has kept his abilities hidden, looking out for himself and his younger foster brother, Taye.
Now, at 17, Malik is finally ready to start a new life for both of them, far from the trauma of his past. However, a daring act to rescue Taye reveals an unexpected connection with his long-lost a legendary conjurer with ties to a hidden magical university that Malik’s mother attended.
At Caiman University, Malik’s eyes are opened to a future he never could have envisioned for himself— one that includes the reappearance of his first love, Alexis. His search for answers about his heritage, his powers, and what really happened to his mother exposes the cracks in their magical community as it faces a reawakened evil dating back to the Haitian Revolution.
Together with Alexis, Malik discovers a lot beneath the surface at feuding covens and magical politics, forbidden knowledge and buried mysteries.
Expected Release Date: May 7
Synopsis:
Noor Khan is the new girl at school. Moving to the tiny town of Bayberry with her mother and sister after their family life is upended, she’s determined to keep her head down and make it through her final year, unnoticed.
While hiding out in her school library, Noor notices that hundreds of books are being removed from the shelves and boxed up: a new school policy banning books that parents object to. Worse, almost all the books being targeted are by queer and BIPOC authors.
Outraged, Noor and her new friends decide to read some of the banned books out loud to their classmates, to protest this new policy at school. But in Bayberry, trouble is never far behind.
Can Noor effect change by speaking up, while navigating the politics of small-town life? And can she trust the son of the school board president, who she finds herself falling for?
Expected Release Date: May 7
Synopsis:
Someone has murdered the queen bee of Sierton High School. All the dead girl’s friends are suspects. And each one has a reason for wanting her to die.
Ella Moore was the most popular girl in school…and also the most hated. When she’s murdered at her own party, there are too many suspects to count. And too many people who think she deserved it.
The police’s prime suspect is the new girl, Dawn Foster. Dawn was the last to hand Ella a drink on the night she died. Plus, all of Ella’s friends with a motive for wanting Ella dead are more than willing to throw Dawn under the bus, if it means keeping the heat off themselves.
But Dawn refuses to go down without a fight. She’s determined to clear her name. As she delves deeper into the past, she discovers that Ella and her friends had major enemies, and someone is out for revenge. Dawn must uncover the truth before the police arrest the wrong suspect… and before the next person dies.
Expected Release Date: May 9
Synopsis:
It might be because she spends her time caring for people in their final days, working as a death doula in New York City.
Or it might be because she has a regret of her own – one she can’t bring herself to let go of.
But then she meets Claudia: a feisty old woman who has one last wish . . .
As Clover begins a new adventure, will she remember how to live her own big, beautiful life?
Expected Release Date: May 14
Synopsis:
An electrifying, gritty fantasy from debut author Hana Lee that takes a royal messenger on a high-speed chase across a climate-ravaged wasteland, featuring motorcycles, monsters, and magic.
Jin-Lu has the most dangerous job in the wasteland. She’s a magebike courier, one of the few who venture outside the domed cities on motorcycles powered by magic. Every day, she braves the wasteland’s dangers—deadly storms, roving marauders, and territorial beasts—to deliver her wares.
Her most valuable cargo? A prince’s love letters addressed to Yi-Nereen, a princess desperate to escape the clutches of her abusive family and soon-to-be husband. Jin, desperately in love with both her and the prince, can’t refuse Yi-Nereen’s plea for help. The two of them flee across the wastes, pursued by Yi-Nereen’s furious father, her scheming betrothed, and a bounty hunter with mysterious powers.
A storm to end all storms is brewing and dark secrets about the heritability of magic are coming to light. Jin’s heart has led her into peril before, but this time she may not find her way back.
Expected Release Date: May 21
Rufus Leung Gresham, future Earl of Greshamsbury and son of a former Hong Kong supermodel, is drowning in debt. The only solution, according to his mother, is for him to attend his sister’s wedding and seduce a woman with money.
Will it be the French hotel heiress with a royal bloodline? The venture capital genius who passes out billions like lollipops? Or will Rufus betray his family and confess his love for his best friend and ‘girl next door’ Eden? But when a volcanic eruption burns through the nuptials and a hot mic exposes a secret tryst, the Gresham family plans – and their reputation – go up in flames, making Rufus’ choice all the more impossible.
Taking us from the sand beaches of Hawaii to the skies of Marrakech, from the glitzy bachelor pads of Beverly Hills to the inner sanctums of England’s oldest family estates, Kevin Kwan has written a juicy, hilarious and sophisticated tale of love, money, murder, sex, and the lies we tell about them all.
Expected Release Date: May 21
‘Two Talented Bastids’ explores the long-hidden secret of how the eponymous gentlemen got their skills. In ‘Danny Coughlin’s Bad Dream’, a brief and unprecedented psychic flash upends dozens of lives, Danny’s most catastrophically.
In ‘Rattlesnakes’, a sequel to Cujo, a grieving widower travels to Florida for respite and instead receives an unexpected inheritance – with major strings attached.
In ‘The Dreamers’, a taciturn Vietnam vet answers a job ad and learns that there are some corners of the universe best left unexplored.
‘The Answer Man’ asks if prescience is good luck or bad and reminds us that a life marked by unbearable tragedy can still be meaningful.
Expected Release Date: May 28
Synopsis:
The crushing blow to the head. Hands yanking him from the vehicle. His girlfriend’s piercing scream.
For the past five years, Ryan Richardson has relived that terrible night. With no trace of Ali after she is abducted, a cloud of suspicion hangs over him, though he is never charged. Trying to put his past behind him, Ryan changes his name and enters law school.
It’s on a summer trip to Italy that he gets the call: his missing car has finally been found, submerged in a lake in his hometown. But inside the car are two dead men. The only trace of Ali is a cryptic note, the envelope in her handwriting stating If something happens to me…
Reeling from the news, Ryan sees the man who has haunted his nightmares since the night Ali was taken. But how could that be possible, so far from home? His search for answers leads him to England and France, but the truth may lie in the shape of two very different people back in the USA.
Notable New Book Releases in May 2024
May 7
Bad Men by Julie Mae Cohen
Lie Until It’s True by Jessie Weaver
The Ministry Of Time By Kaliane Bradley
This Summer Will Be Different By Carley Fortune
May 14
A Crane Among Wolves By June Hur
Rebel Girl: My Life as a Feminist Punk By Kathleen Hanna
The Dixon Rule By Elle Kennedy
The Honey Witch By Sydney J. Shields
The Hunter’s Daughter by Nicola Solvinic
The Paradise Problem By Christina Lauren
When Among Crows By Veronica Roth
May 21
Attached at the Hip by Christine Riccio
One Perfect Couple By Ruth Ware
The Last Murder At The End Of The World By Stuart Turton
May 28
The Summoner’s Circle #1: Evocation by S.T. Gibson
May 29
4-Ever by Ava Olsen
What books will you be reading in May 2024? Let us know in the comments below.