New Books of 2025: 5 New Releases to be Excited About in 2025

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A new year means new books.

While there are so many new books coming out in 2025, I selected a few to share with you that I am really excited about. If you’ve read any of my other book recommendation articles (Books Baldur’s Gate 3 Fans Should be Reading, 5 Chilling Books to Read During the Last Dregs of Fall), you might have noticed that I am a big fan of fantasy. Most of the books I will be recommending this time will have some sort of fantastical element to them, but the genres range from historical fiction to fictional Japanese short stories. Hopefully, there will be a little bit for everyone today.

I hope you have a happy new year and enjoy these five new books of 2025.

The Lines We Cross by Rachel Tork

Publication Date: January 14, 2025 (available on Kindle Unlimited)

Genre: Romance

The Lines We Cross follows Rowan Evans and Julian Lynch, two strangers who had a chance encounter one night under a sunset, crossing paths again three years later. This time, they must forget the tenderness and vulnerability they felt with each other on that night, because Julian has replaced Rowan’s graduate program advisor at Grandview University’s School of Music, and they must not cross the line of professionalism. Neither of them can deny the attraction between them, but are they willing to break the rules and embark on a forbidden romance that could change everything?

I, for one, love a well executed student-professor romance. This checks all the boxes for me. They’re adults (set in a graduate program), the forbidden romance, the undeniable chemistry, a grumpy MMC and sunshine FMC. I hope this has as much yearning as all good forbidden romances do, but I am looking forward to checking this book out when it releases in January. It’ll be the perfect palate cleanser between all the high fantasy and sci-fi books I’ve been reading lately.

Brighter Than Scale, Swifter Than Flame by Neon Yang

Publication Date: May 6, 2025

Genres: Fantasy, Queer, Novella

Yeva is a hero by right and dragon hunter by blood. Sent as an emissary to the mysterious and reclusive nation of Quanbao to learn of their secrets regarding their love and worship of dragons, Yeva is faced with her most difficult task yet. She must hide her face and woo Lady Sookhee, Quanbao’s queen, who is reasonably suspicious of this outsider, a strange knight who never takes off their armor. The two must grow closer if they are to accomplish their goals, but what they discover about the other is something neither of them would ever expect.

First of all, let’s look at that cover. Absolutely stunning. Second, this novella has dragons, lady knights, and lesbians. What more could anyone ask for? This will be an immediate purchase for me.

Anima Rising by Christopher Moore

Publication Date: May 13, 2025

Genre: Historical Fiction

In Vienna, 1911, a famous painter spots a woman’s nude body in a canal and sketches her. Gustav Klimt should call the police, but he cannot resist the artistic urge to capture such a moving scene. But it turns out she wasn’t dead anyways. The feral, half-dead girl cannot remember who she is or where she came from, so Klimt enlists the help of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung to uncover the girl’s secrets. But these secrets are something Klimt would never expect. Memories begin resurface. Memories of being stranded in the arctic, locked in a crate by Victor Frankenstein, and visiting the Underworld, all over a hundred years ago. Who is this woman? And more importantly, who is after her?

Anima Rising sounds like an absolute fever dream and I am so ready to be confused, shocked, and gagged while reading this. Advertised as Poor Things meets Bride of Frankenstein, this book has such an interesting, wild concept that I am so excited to explore when it comes out in May.

Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V.E. Schwab

Publication Date: June 10, 2025

Genres: Fantasy, Queer, Adult

Very little is known about Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil except three dates:

Santo Domingo de la Calzada, 1532.

London, 1827.

Boston, 2019.

We have three dates for three undead women, all who are buried and grow teeth.

Vampires. It’s vampires, guys. V.E. Schwab has written a book about toxic, lesbian vampires and I could not be happier. Schwab, one of my favorite authors of all time, meets vampires, one of my favorite genres of all time (yes, “vampire” is a whole genre of its own in my mind, you cannot argue with me). I will buy this, devour it, and yap about it to anyone who will listen. June 25th cannot come fast enough.

The Dilemmas of Working Women by Fumio Yamamoto

Publication Date: July 3, 2025

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Japanese Literature

The Dilemmas of Working Women is a collection of five stories following five women in Japan. These five women are from all different walks of life, all of whom are working and struggling, in one way or another, in modern day Japan. Their struggles are a collection of personal, social, and professional dilemmas, ranging from the complexities of gender roles, family expectations, discrimination in the workplace, to simply finding a way to keep forging a path forward one day at a time.

It feels like a morbid fascination to learn and read about how other women struggle in their day to day lives in the deep-rooted patriarchy of the society we live in, but nonetheless, The Dilemmas of Working Women is something I am very interested to read. Also, that cover. If that isn’t the epitome of exactly how I feel after coming home from a long day at work, I don’t know what is. I know they say don’t judge a book by it’s cover but, yeah, this book is definitely going to hit all the feelings it’s aiming to.