Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish, and is now hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. It’s all about books, lists and sharing the love we have of both with our bookish friends. Today we’re getting excited about books are coming our way in the second half of the year!

I almost feel scared saying “let’s see what 2020 still has in store for us” because let’s face it, 2020 has been A LOT so far. But let’s set our sights firmly on the view of upcoming book releases, which should be safe enough territory. I hope. Release dates are slippery things in 2020, so if nothing else, it’s safe to assume any of these may slip (significantly, in some cases – those waiting eagerly for A Desolation Called Peace will now be hanging on until March next year).

With that in mind, I’ll skip July releases as I talked about the ones I’m most excited about just last week and get my long-distance goggles on. Consider this a highly-curated selection – there’s loads of exciting releases expected in the second half of the year, so I’ll focus on ones that I didn’t mention earlier this year.

Well, almost. Previously-mentioned or not, I have to kick off with smash the space patriarchy opera collaboration Seven Devils from Elizabeth May and Laura Lam (look at that cover), but we can consider that a bonus mention, right? Special guest mention. Lovely.

August squeeing keeps right on going with Driftwood, introducing a new post-apocalyptic universe – ‘where worlds go to die’ – from Marie Brennan. Karen Osborne’s space opera debut Architects of Memory has the right ingredients for a spicy dish of intrigue: a dying salvage pilot on a mission to cure herself, a genocidal weapon and a corporate conspiracy. I’ve also got my eye on The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson, a debut thriller in which you can travel to other realities so long as you’re already dead in them. You may want to check what killed you, of course…

September sees the release of the first full-length Birdverse story by Rose Lemberg, which I’m very excited about: The Four Profound Weaves is a desert-set fairytale of identity, death and (obviously) weaving. There’s also a new book from Andrea Hairston, whose work I’ve been meaning to explore for a while. Master of Poisons brings together African folklore and climate change in an epic fantasy of resisting denial. And while I’ve said previously that there are quite enough London-based urban fantasies, Garth Nix has gone all out to prove there’s always room for one more with The Left-Handed Booksellers of London, which frankly sold itself to me on the name alone.

There’s enough coming out in the last three months of the year to fill a top ten of its own! With The Midnight Bargain – an alt Georgian fantasy of women who give up their magic in order to marry and have children – CL Polk proves that it’s actually not that hard to sell me on the time-old trope of ‘woman must choose between her heart’s desire and her, um, heart’.

Claire and Brevity are back and at loggerheads in The Archive of the Forgotten by AJ Hackwith (it is my mission to make you all read this series of undead librarians, unwritten books and terrifying arcane objects). When the damaged unwritten books start leaking an ink that can rewrite the afterlife, the race is on to be the one holding the pen.

Kate Elliott should need no introduction, but somehow I’m yet to read one of her books. That’s set to change this autumn with Unconquerable Sun aka Alexander the Great in space (which is all the pitch this former archaeology student was ever going to need).

I’ll close out with a novella I’m pretty sure is going to break my heart: Paul Cornell is bringing one of my favourite series to a close this autumn with Last Stand in Lychford and there’s so much on the line I can’t foresee any ending that doesn’t include buckets of tears. All the feelings forecast.

What reads are you looking forward to in the second half of the year?