New Science Fiction and Fantasy Books To Read In November 2026

If you love shorter works of science fiction, Chimera Skin should be on your radar. The author of The Spite House has an apocalyptic sci-fi novel out this month. Swanson lives in a world ruined by an alien. Mutated and hanging on by a thread, he’s civilization’s last hope, and he’s hatched a plan that will take him far from home.

You don’t often come across historical fantasy inspired by Taiwanese mythology and the enthusiasm around this debut novel is big. Yu’er’s story unfolds in the Eleventh century in a small village. First sold off for marriage in her youth at the advice of a jing, then estranged from the husband she’s come to love, Yu’er takes matters into her own hands. She strikes a bargain with a jing that sets her on a path to riches and agency but away from her humanity.

Tansy is a housemaid caring for her elderly charge in a prosaic seaside cottage. Merit is a knight and servant of a dark entity. The women’s worlds collide when Merit, wounded, tumbles into the Oubliette. As the bond between the two grows so too do Tansy’s questions. She can’t remember how she got to the cozy cottage or having ever left it. In search of who she is and what she wants, Tansy is on the precipice of unlocking the dark origins of her world.

Niamh McShane died at 13 years old, the day she learned she was a witch. On the same island more than three hundred years later, Neve McShane gets the gift of a revelation on her thirteenth birthday. She and her aunts are witches, their lives tied with Niamh’s, and Neve has to prepare herself to defeat an encroaching darkness.

Just in time for gifting season, the book that broke out into the broader world of pop culture is getting the deluxe treatment. Embark on a madcap thrill ride as Carl and his ex’s cat, Princess Donut, try to survive one sick intergalactic game show. This fancy edition comes with decorated endpapers, stenciled edges, an illustrated hardcover case with a solvable maze, and more.

Fling yourself into space and board the ship Archimedes where all hell is about to break loose. Faisal, a junior officer, is abducted outside one of the ship’s bars and is returned 24 hours later with no memory of what happened. Though the event is dismissed as the tale of a drunk, it causes turmoil aboard the ship that’s been bound for a bubble of humanity for centuries. Expect timely topics and big worldbuilding.

Sure to catch the attention of readers who loved The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches, this cozy fantasy follows a witch who has to find her soulmate to save the witches of Kamalu Lane. When Nneka accidentally gets her love potion into a batch of puff puffs, every man in the town except the one she wants falls for her. Her attraction to architect and human Dakoru might spell doom or might be the answer she’s seeking.