MLC

From some of the most anticipated romances (hello, Colleen Hoover) to unputdownable mysteries, October has a mixed bag for everyone out there. Scroll through for a look at some of the best releases this month.

Fiction

Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng

From the bestselling author of Little Fires Everywhere, this novel is a story of a mother’s love in a world consumed by fear. Twelve-year-old Bird Gardner lives a quiet life with his father, a former linguist who now works in a university library. Bird had grown up disliking his mother, Margaret, a Chinese American poet who left the family when he was nine years old. When he receives a mysterious letter containing only a cryptic drawing, he is pulled into a quest to find her.
Buy the book

Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver

Set in the mountains of southern Appalachia, the book narrates the story of a boy born to a teenage single mother in a single-wide trailer. The plot takes the reader through his struggles in foster care, his experiences with child labour, derelict schools, athletic success, addiction, disastrous loves, and crushing losses. Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield is the inspiration for this novel, where the Victorian era is translated to the contemporary American South.
Buy the book

Mad Honey by Jodi Picoult

Olivia McAfee’s picture-perfect life—living in Boston, married to a cardiothoracic surgeon, raising a beautiful son, Asher—comes to an abrupt end, and she ends up in her sleepy hometown, living in the house she grew up in, and taking over her father’s beekeeping business. Asher meets Lily Campanello, who has relocated to the town with her mother, hoping for a fresh start, and they both fall for each other. Life changes when one day Olivia receives a phone call; Lily is dead, and the police are questioning Asher.
Buy the book

Signal Fires by Dani Shapiro

The book opens on a summer night in 1985. Three teenagers have been drinking. One of them gets behind the wheel of a car. And in an instant, their lives, along with Ben Wilf, who arrives on the scene, changes.
Buy the book

Children

Outside Nowhere by Adam Borba

Parker Kelbrook can wriggle out of anything he doesn’t want to do. So when he is forced to take a job at the local pool, he comes up with a perfect plan to get himself fired. However, he didn’t anticipate getting caught by his father. He is sent halfway across the country to work alongside five other kids on a farm.
Buy the book

The Last Hope in Hopetown by Maria Tureaud

Hopetown is the perfect place where vampires and humans co-exist peacefully. Sophie Dawes, who lives with her adoptive vampire moms, leads the perfect life until her own mother goes rogue. She decides to take matters into her own hands, but she didn’t anticipate dealing with a secret council of vampires, executing epic heists, and facing the true bad guys head-on.
Buy the book

Nikhil Out Loud by Maulik Pancholy

Thirteen-year-old Nikhil Shah is the beloved voice actor for Raj Reddy on the hit animated series Raj Reddy in Outer Space, but stardom doesn’t mean life is easy. When his mom temporarily moves them to a small town in Ohio, Nikhil’s fame leads to protests by a group of conservative parents who are unhappy with an openly gay TV star being around.
Buy the book

Mystery & Thriller

The Boys from Biloxi by John Grisham

Biloxi, known for its beaches, resorts and seafood industry, has a darker side—corruption, gambling, prostitution, bottled liquor, drugs and contract killers, all controlled by mobsters. The novel follows the lives of estranged childhood friends Keith Rudy, a lawyer and Hugh Malco, who works with his father, who was a part of the mob, and a courtroom showdown.
Buy the book

Jackal by Erin E. Adams

Liz Rocher is going back home… reluctantly. As a Black woman, Liz doesn’t exactly have fond memories of her hometown, Johnstown, Pennsylvania, a predominantly white town. But her best friend is getting married, so she braces herself for the unwanted reunion. However, on the wedding day, the bride’s daughter goes missing, and the only thing left behind is a piece of white fabric covered in blood. During the search, Liz uncovers a chilling secret—children have been going missing in the woods for years. All of them are girls. And all of them are black.
Buy the book

Blackmail and Bibingka by Mia P. Manansala

Life is going well for Lila Macapagal, but the return of her cousin Ronnie means trouble. Soon enough, Ronnie is accused of murder and secrets and rumours surrounding her cousin start piling up. Lila has to put away years of resentment and distrust to prove her cousin’s innocence.
Buy the book

Romance

It Starts with Us by Colleen Hoover

Collen Hoover tells us the other side of the fan favourite story. Lily and her ex-husband, Ryle, have just settled into a co-parenting rhythm when she bumps into her first love, Atlas, again. She is excited that time is on their side this time, and she says yes to a date. Her excitement is short-lived when she realises that her ex-husband Ryle will always hate having Atlas in their daughter’s life. Switching between the perspectives of Lily and Atlas, It Starts with Us picks up right from the epilogue for It Ends with Us.
Buy the book

Partners in Crime by Alisha Rai

At thirty-five, with a stable job as an accountant, Mira Chaudhary wants nothing more than a ‘boring’ man to spend the rest of her life with. She turns to a matching app to find someone to settle down with. Enter Naveen Desai, an English professor leading an uneventful, normal, and boring life. He seems perfect. As things settle, Mira receives news that her aunt has died. A trip to Las Vegas to settle her aunt’s affairs turns into a crazy dash to escape kidnappers, evade art thieves and consort with hackers to understand what Mira’s aunt was involved with.
Buy the book

Our editors independently select all products featured here. However, we may earn an affiliate commission when you buy something through some of our retail links.

List curated via GoodReads | Lead image by Element5 Digital via Pexels