To help your ever-growing TBR list, we’ll be highlighting fantasy novels coming out each month that you should put on your radar.
Our picks will be a mix of the latest installment in a beloved series, the beginning of a brand new series, or a standalone novel that you’ll want to sink your teeth into.
February’s picks feature a tea shop that caters to vampires, ghosts, a murder investigation, and more.
In order of release date, here are 5 fantasy novels we’re looking forward to reading in February:
1. The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett – February 6
Dinois Kol takes on a new job working for Ana Dolabra, a renowned investigator, who has a unique approach to her work. As the two investigate a murder, Dinois tries to make sense of his peculiar supervisor while also trying to keep her from uncovering his secrets. The Tainted Cup hits shelves on February 6.
Book Description:In Daretana’s most opulent mansion, a high Imperial officer lies dead — killed, to all appearances, when a tree spontaneously erupted from his body. Even in this canton at the borders of the Empire, where contagions abound and the blood of the Leviathans works strange magical changes, it’s a death at once terrifying and impossible.
Called in to investigate this mystery is Ana Dolabra, an investigator whose reputation for brilliance is matched only by her eccentricities.
At her side is her new assistant, Dinios Kol. Din is an engraver, magically altered to possess a perfect memory. His job is to observe and report, and act as his superior’s eyes and ears — quite literally, in this case, as among Ana’s quirks are her insistence on wearing a blindfold at all times, and her refusal to step outside the walls of her home.
Din is most perplexed by Ana’s ravenous appetite for information and her mind’s frenzied leaps — not to mention her cheerful disregard for propriety and the apparent joy she takes in scandalizing her young counterpart. Yet as the case unfolds and Ana makes one startling deduction after the next, he finds it hard to deny that she is, indeed, the Empire’s greatest detective.
As the two close in on a mastermind and uncover a scheme that threatens the safety of the Empire itself, Din realizes he’s barely begun to assemble the puzzle that is Ana Dolabra — and wonders how long he’ll be able to keep his own secrets safe from her piercing intellect.
2. The Eternal Ones by Namina Forna – February 13
After learning the truth about those she thought were her family, Deka searches for answers on how to kill the gods and save both herself and Otera. The Eternal Ones, the final book in The Gilded Ones series, releases on February 13.
Book Description: Mere weeks after confronting the Gilded Ones — the false beings she once believed to be her family — Deka is on the hunt. In order to kill the gods, whose ravenous competition for power is bleeding Otera dry, she must uncover the source of her divinity. But with her mortal body on the verge of ruin, Deka is running out of time — to save herself and an empire that’s tearing itself apart at its seams.
When Deka’s search leads her and her friends to the edge of the world as they know it, they discover an astonishing new realm, one which holds the key to Deka’s past. Yet it also illuminates a devastating decision she must soon make…
Choose to be reborn as a god, losing everyone she loves in the process. Or bring about the end of the world.
3. The Warm Hands of Ghosts by Katherine Arden – February 14
Katherine Arden’s latest novel follows Laura as she tries to piece together what happened to her brother, Freddie, on the front lines. The Warm Hands of Ghosts releases on February 14.
Book Description: January 1918. Laura Iven was a revered field nurse until she was wounded and discharged from the medical corps, leaving behind a brother still fighting in Flanders. Now home in Halifax, Canada, Laura receives word of Freddie’s death in combat, along with his personal effects — but something doesn’t make sense. Determined to uncover the truth, Laura returns to Belgium as a volunteer at a private hospital, where she soon hears whispers about haunted trenches and a strange hotelier whose wine gives soldiers the gift of oblivion. Could Freddie have escaped the battlefield, only to fall prey to something — or someone — else?
November 1917. Freddie Iven awakens after an explosion to find himself trapped in an overturned pillbox with a wounded enemy soldier, a German by the name of Hans Winter. Against all odds, the two form an alliance and succeed in clawing their way out. Unable to bear the thought of returning to the killing fields, especially on opposite sides, they take refuge with a mysterious man who seems to have the power to make the hellscape of the trenches disappear.
As shells rain down on Flanders and ghosts move among those yet living, Laura’s and Freddie’s deepest traumas are reawakened. Now they must decide whether their world is worth salvaging — or better left behind entirely.
4. A Tempest of Tea by Hafsah Faizal – February 20
Arthie Casimir is the proprietor of Spindrift, a tearoom that serves tea to upstanding citizens by day and blood to vampires by night. When Spindrift is threatened, Arthie has to put together a crew to pull off a heist inside the Athereum, which is a secretive vampire society. A Tempest of Tea hits shelves on February 20.
Book Description: On the streets of White Roaring, Arthie Casimir is a criminal mastermind and collector of secrets. Her prestigious tearoom transforms into an illegal bloodhouse by dark, catering to the vampires feared by society. But when her establishment is threatened, Arthie is forced to strike an unlikely deal with an alluring adversary to save it — and she can’t do the job alone.
Calling upon a band of misfits, Arthie formulates a plan to infiltrate the dark and glittering vampire society known as the Athereum. But not every member of her crew is on her side, and as the truth behind the heist unfolds, Arthie finds herself in the midst of a conspiracy that will threaten the world as she knows it.
5. Fate Breaker by Victoria Aveyard – February 27
The final book in the Realm Breaker trilogy follows Corayne as she tries to defeat Taristan and Queen Erida and prevent them from summoning What Waits into the world. Fate Breaker releases on February 27.
Book Description: Change your fate — or kneel to it. The Companions are scattered and hopeless, torn from each other. After Corayne barely escapes with her life, she must forge on alone, leaving her blade broken and her allies behind her. Her only consolation — Corayne now has Taristan’s sword, the only Spindleblade left in existence. Without it, he can’t rip open any more Spindles. Without it, he can’t end the world. But Taristan and Queen Erida will not be defeated so easily. Both will burn the world to bring down Corayne — and bring forth their demon god, What Waits, ready to claim the realm of Allward for his own. In a final clash between kingdoms and gods, all must rise to fight — or be destroyed. Everything has come to this.
—
What will you be reading in February? Share your picks in the comments below!
Follow us on X and Instagram!
Like us on Facebook!
Allison Nichols
Allison is in a love affair with books and television that doesn't seem to be letting up anytime soon. Slightly damaged fictional characters are her weakness. She loves to spend her free time curled up with a cat and a book to read or a show to watch. Allison is a Tomatometer-approved critic (Rotten Tomatoes).
