Winter is here, as the famous Jon Snow once warned us, and there’s no way we could start this season without a list of the best new books releasing in June. I mean, what better way is there to hide from the cold than under your covers with your nose buried between some pages?
So boil the kettle and turn that electric blanket on because, between the swashbuckling fantasy novels, chaotic thrillers and emotional memoirs coming out this month, we’ve got the cosiest, most spine-tingly reads to get you through this frigid season.
Best fiction new releases debuting in June
Yellowface by R.F. Kuang
About the book:
R.F. Kuang is back with this wild satirical-thriller about the publishing industry, and it pulls no punches. An incredible example of the “unreliable narrator” trope, the layers of criticism around racism and cultural appropriation will blow your mind. June Hayward, the narrator, is so awful it’s delicious. Pop this one on your list of most anticipated reads of the year because trust me, it’ll be one of your top picks.
Authors June Hayward and Athena Liu were supposed to be twin rising stars: same year at Yale, same debut year in publishing. But Athena’s a cross-genre literary darling, and June didn’t even get a paperback release. Nobody wants stories about basic white girls, June thinks.
So when June witnesses Athena’s death in a freak accident, she acts on impulse: she steals Athena’s just-finished masterpiece, an experimental novel about Chinese labourers in war efforts during World War I, and lets her new publisher rebrand her as “Juniper Song”. As June races to protect her secret, she discovers exactly how far she will go to keep what she thinks she deserves.
Release date: June 7
Where to buy
Sad Girl Novel by Pip Finkemeyer
About the book:
If you like clever writing about sad, yet charming women in their 20s making poor decisions and having messy love-lives (at this point, this should be a genre of its own), then Sad Girl Novel is for you. Even better that in this novel, the women are Australian!
Over the course of a year in Berlin, an aspiring novelist, Kim, and her historian best friend, Bel, confront their twin acts of creation. Kim is becoming a writer, and is determined to write a bestseller. She’s been convinced of this idea by Matthew, an American literary agent who is as emotionally unavailable as he is handsome (very). Kim lives in her own carefully constructed reality, and she attempts to buoy herself using other people for external motivation.
Meanwhile Bel is becoming a mother, and gives birth to a baby, certain it will fulfil her in ways her career does not seem to. Kim and Bel support and deceive each other as only the best of friends can.
Release date: June 7
Where to buy
After She Wrote Him by Sulari Gentill
About the book:
Sulari Gentill, author of The Woman in the Library, is back with another refreshing spin on the cosy crime fiction genre. This time, she weaves an entertaining metafiction that blurs the lines on the page and in reality. HSC English teachers be shaking.
Madeleine d’Leon doesn’t know where Edward came from. He is simply a character in her next book. But as she writes, he becomes all she can think about. His charm, his dark hair, his pen scratching out his latest literary novel.
Edward McGinnity can’t get Madeleine out of his mind—softly smiling, infectiously enthusiastic, and perfectly damaged. She will be the ideal heroine for his next book. But who is the author and who is the creation? And as the lines start to blur, who is affected when a killer finally takes flesh?
Release date: June 7
Where to buy
The First Bright Thing by J.R. Dawson
About the book:
This heart-wrenching yet hopeful read set between WWI and WWII is all about the power of art to uplift and shine a light on the good — and the way it can also be used to sow fear and darkness, too. The novel (CW because of its themes of war) centres a bisexual, Jewish lead and her queer found family. Don’t be scared off by its heavy themes — it’ll hurt, but it’ll be worth it.
Ringmaster — Rin, to those who know her best — can jump to different moments in time as easily as her wife, Odette, soars from bar to bar on the trapeze. And the circus they lead is a rare home and safe haven for magical misfits and outcasts, known as Sparks. With the world still reeling from World War I, Rin and her troupe — the Circus of the Fantasticals — travel the midwest, offering a single night of enchantment and respite to all who step into their Big Top.
But threats come at Rin from all sides, and Rin’s past creeps closer every day, a malevolent shadow she can’t fully escape. It takes the form of another circus, with tents as black as midnight and a ringmaster who rules over his troupe with a dangerous power. Rin’s circus has something he wants, and he won’t stop until it’s his.
Release date: June 27
Where to buy
Best new cookbooks releasing in June
Danny Loves Pasta by Danny Freeman
About the book:
If you’re like us and spend about one million hours on TikTok, you’ve probably stumbled across old mate Danny Loves Pasta at some point. With Danny boy’s colourful pasta making recipes, from his “Pen-guini” to his videos where he boils a Pikachu-shaped ravioli, it’s hard not to stop and drool at his content. Now you can recreate some of Danny’s artistic creations at home with his first-ever cookbook. Delicioso if we do say so ourselves.
Tired of eating the same old pasta from a box? Danny Freeman, the pasta maker of TikTok, has the solution for you. Danny Loves Pasta will teach you how to make colourful and creative fresh pasta, unlike anything you can find at the store.
Release date: June 27
Where to buy
Best new romance books coming out in June
Love, Theoretically by Ali Hazlewood
About the book:
If you can’t get enough of Ali Hazlewood‘s STEMinist romcoms, then boy, do we have the read for you.
The many lives of theoretical physicist Elsie Hannaway have finally caught up with her. By day, she’s an adjunct professor and on other days, Elsie makes up for her non-existent paycheck by offering her services as a fake girlfriend.
Honestly, it’s a pretty sweet gig – until her carefully constructed Elsie-verse comes crashing down. Because Jack Smith, the annoyingly attractive and arrogant older brother of her favourite client, turns out to be the cold-hearted experimental physicist who ruined her mentor’s career and undermined the reputation of theorists everywhere.
Elsie is prepared for an all-out war of scholarly sabotage but those long, penetrating looks? Not having to be anything other than her true self when she’s with him? Will falling into an experimentalist’s orbit finally tempt her to put her most guarded theories on love into practice?
Release date: June 13
Where to buy
Best new fantasy books releasing in June
Psyche and Eros by Luna McNamara
About the book:
Feminist re-tellings of ancient Greek mythology are here and they are here to stay. Luna McNamara‘s classic tale of star-crossed lovers has been praised as “witty”, “spell-binding” and “lyrically spun”, and compared to the work of Madeline Miller — the author of the gorgeous, heartbreaking novels, The Song of Achilles and Circe.
Born into an era of heroes, a prophecy claims that Psyche — Princess of Mycenae — will defeat a monster feared even by the gods themselves. Rebelling against society’s traditions, she spends her youth mastering blade and bow, preparing to fulfil her destiny. But she is soon caught up in powers beyond her control, when the jealous Aphrodite sends the God of Desire, Eros, to deliver a fatal love-curse. Eros is pricked by the very arrow intended for Psyche, doomed to love a woman who will be torn from him the moment their eyes meet.
Thrown together by fate, headstrong Psyche and world-weary Eros will face challenges greater than they could have ever imagined. And as the Trojan War begins and the whole of the heavens try to keep them apart, will they find their way back to each other before it’s too late?
Release date: May 25
Where to buy
Best YA new releases debuting in June
A Curse of Salt by Sarah Street
About the book:
Do you remember the golden era of fairytale retellings? From Sarah J. Maas‘ A Court of Thorns and Roses to Brigid Kemmerer‘s A Curse So Dark and Only, you would’ve caught us devouring anything and everything Brothers Grimm. With princes, pirates and a curse to break, what more could you want in this much-anticipated YA fantasy?
In a kingdom that fears the sea, Ria Lucroy longs to be brave. Bodies are washing ashore and everyone knows who’s to blame. Legends of the Heartless King shroud the continent in fear; they call him a pirate, a monster, a god. When his mercenaries raid her father’s merchant ship, Ria’s family is faced with a horrifying demand. They will spare his life, in exchange for one of his daughters.
Determined to save her sisters, Ria launches herself into the world of pirates. Face-to-face with the Heartless King, she finds he is far more than the stories told. He is a man, with a human name and blood-stained hands, bound to the seas by a centuries-old curse. As their chemistry blooms into something more, Ria finds herself caught in an ancient web of secrets.
Release date: May 28
Where to buy
Sing Me To Sleep by Gabi Burton
About the book:
Morally grey characters? Check. Sirens? Check. And a murder mystery? Triple check. Featuring a black female lead and a vivid, deeply immersible world and you’ve got the formula for a bloody great read.
Saoirse Sorkova survives on secrets. As the last siren in her kingdom, she can sing any man to an early grave – but her very existence is illegal, and if her true identity were ever discovered, it would be her life on the line.
When a blackmailer threatens her sister, Saoirse’s investigation leads her to the royal palace, and her most dangerous job yet: personal bodyguard to the Crown Prince.
Saoirse expects to despise Prince Hayes. But he is kind, thoughtful, and charming, and she finds herself increasingly drawn to him, until he tasks her with investigating a killer plaguing the kingdom. The problem? The killer is Saoirse.
Release date: June 27
Where to buy
Best new non-fiction books coming out in June
Pageboy: A Memoir by Elliot Page
About the book:
Elliot Page‘s much-anticipated memoir Pageboy is “a love letter to the power of being seen” and follows his journey of being catapulted into fame for his performance in Juno, battling Hollywood’s binary thinking, and navigating the complexities of queer love and identity. If you’ve been a fan of Page for as long as we have, this one’s going to be a tear-jerker.
‘Can I kiss you?’ It was two months before the world premiere of Juno, and Elliot Page was in his first ever queer bar. The hot summer air hung heavy around him as he looked at her. And then it happened. In front of everyone. The unthinkable.
With Juno’s massive success, Elliot became one of the world’s most beloved actors, but the pressure to perform suffocated him. He was forced to play the part of the glossy young starlet, a role that made his skin crawl, on and off set. The career that had been an escape out of his reality and into a world of imagination was suddenly a nightmare. As he navigated criticism and abuse from some of the most powerful people in Hollywood, a past that snapped at his heels and a society dead set on forcing him into a binary, Elliot often stayed silent, unsure of what to do. Until enough was enough.
Release date: June 6
Where to buy
Image credit: Ultimo Press / Penguin Books Australia / HarperCollins
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