The most anticipated books of 2026: 26 fiction and non-fiction must-reads

A new year always brings new books, but 2026 promises an especially rich feast of fiction and non-fiction.

From sweeping fantasy and historical epics to urgent political novels and intimate memoirs, the year ahead is packed with stories that entertain, challenge, and linger long after the final page.

Add these 26 titles to your to-be-read pile, and you'll have more than enough to keep you reading all year long:

The Swan's Daughter by Roshani Chokshi

This standalone novel has everything you need for an immersive and otherworldly fantasy: a curse, a competition, and a couple that will capture your heart.

Roshani Chokshi tells the sweeping story of Prince Arris, whose impending marriage will likely end in his murder, thanks to a poorly worded wish to a sea witch, and Demelza, a veritas swan whose song rings out the truth, and who is forced into hiding.

As the pair work together to survive a tournament of brides competing for Prince Arris' hand (literally), they find themselves growing closer.

Hodderscape, 8 January

Googoosh: A Sinful Voice by Googoosh with Tara Dehlavi

Googoosh's name may not be as well-known as singers like Madonna or Beyoncé, but for a time, she was one of the biggest pop stars of the 20th century. Rising to fame in pre-revolution Iran, Googoosh was ordered by her government to stop singing in the wake of the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

In this memoir, Googoosh tells the story of her upbringing and her stardom in the 1970s, and explores how she was forbidden to sing or speak out for 20 years before finding her voice again at the turn of the millennium.

Gallery Books, 15 January

A Guardian and a Thief by Megha Majumdar

Set in a near-future India over the course of one week, the Kolkata of A Guardian and a Thief is ravaged by climate change and food scarcity. As Ma, her toddler daughter and her elderly father prepare to leave the collapsing city to join Ma's husband in America, their immigration documents are stolen.

Megha Majumdar's tense and propulsive novel tells the stories of Ma, who hunts for the thief, and the thief, Boomba, whose desperation to keep his family safe leads him to commit a series of escalating crimes.

Scribner UK, 29 January

Good People by Patmeena Sabit

Zorah Sharaf's family arrived in America as refugees from Afghanistan, and is the picture of success.

But when Zorah, the apple of her father's eye, dies in an unthinkable tragedy, the family becomes the subject of public gossip, and the veneer of a perfect immigrant family and a perfect daughter begins to crumble.

Told through a chorus of voices surrounding the Sharaf family, Good People is a story of family, community and identity.

Virago, 3 February

Rebel English Academy by Mohammed Hanif

The author of A Case of Exploding Mangoes returns with a wry and timely novel about political power, religion, sexuality and dissent.

Rebel English Academy is set in OK Town, which erupts in protest after a major Pakistani political figure is hanged. A few miles away, a woman knocks on the door of the Rebel English Academy; Sabiha seeks refuge, but she has a gun, her parents are political prisoners, and her husband just died in a suspicious fire.

Meanwhile, disgraced intelligence officer Captain Gul, banished to OK Town, aims to silence protestors by any means necessary, but finds his duties and romantic desires begin to overlap.

Grove Press UK, 5 February

Turbulence by Hafsa Lodi

Hafsa Lodi's Turbulence follows aspiring documentary-maker Dunya Dawood. As she takes a 14-hour flight from the Middle East to the United States – sitting in business class away from her husband and son – Dunya, who is pregnant, is given the space and time to reflect on the choices she’s made in her life.

As she unravels the relationships, decisions and difficulties she has experienced, a shocking discovery sends Dunya into early labour in mid-air.

Turbulence takes a look at the many things women have to juggle, including culture, faith, family obligations, and feminism, and asks what happens when we encounter turbulence in our lives.

The Dreamwork Collective, 8 February

The Age of Calamities by Senaa Ahmad

Senaa Ahmad's collection of playful and inventive short stories lives on the boundaries of historical events. In one, Henry VIII wants Anne Boleyn dead, but she's alive again by morning, having tea at breakfast.

In another, a woman on the run strikes a sinister bargain with Joan of Arc, but might not be able to claim her body back by sunrise. Interrogating the past and its effect on the present, The Age of Calamities is a look at the tragicomic and surreal act of living.

Pushkin Press, 12 February

A Brief History of the Universe (and our place in it) by Sarah Alam Malik

In this spellbinding and accessible book, Dr Sarah Alam Malik takes readers on a journey through the discoveries that have propelled and overturned our perception of the cosmos.

Exploring moments including Aristotle's Earth-centred worldview, the Copernican revolution, and Isaac Newton's unifying the terrestrial and celestial under the law of gravity, A Brief History of the Universe (and our place in it) is a fascinating and beautiful celebration of the world we live in and the privileges life offers.

Simon & Schuster UK, 12 February

Fire in Every Direction by Tareq Baconi

Palestinian writer and scholar Tareq Baconi explores history, home and what it means to live in liminal spaces in this coming-of-age memoir.

Taking readers from the Middle East to London — from 1948, when Tareq's grandmother fled Haifa, through the late 1970s, when she left Beirut with her daughter, to Amman, where a young Baconi felt trapped — Fire in Every Direction is a portrait of how political consciousness is passed down through generations.

Living between the Middle East and London, Baconi tells the story of how he felt alienated in both places: queerness is policed back in Amman, just as his Palestinian-ness is abroad.

Sceptre, 12 February

The Last of Earth by Deepa Anappara

The Women's Prize-longlisted author of Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line is back with her second novel, a historical story about two outsiders in 1869 who venture into the Forbidden Kingdom of Tibet, both driven by a motive they are desperate to keep secret.

When Balram is recruited to guide an English captain on a foolhardy mission, he crosses paths with Katherine, who is fleeing a life of frustrated ambition, and wants to secure her legacy as the first European woman to reach Lhasa and the legendary Potala Palace. 

A story about the obsessions of the colonial enterprise and the legacies we leave, this is a sweeping and dramatic tale.

Oneworld, 12 February

Floodlines by Saleem Haddad

In the summer of 2014, three estranged sisters — Mediha, Zainab and Ishtar — are drawn back into each other's orbits by the discovery of their late father's lost paintings.

As the trio each lay claim to their father's legacy, Zainab's son Nizar, a traumatised war correspondent, returns to the family fold.

Floodlines, inspired by the author's own family history, grapples with legacy, memory and family secrets, and charts the emotional and political aftershocks of the US-led invasion of Iraq.

Europa Editions, 12 February

Weavingshaw by Heba Al-Wasity

Leena has a secret: she can see the dead. When her brother falls ill, she knows the only way to save him is to seek the Saint of Silence, who trades coins for every sordid divulgence uttered to him.

When Leena discovers what she can do is valuable to him, she makes a deal with the magnetic Saint, growing closer to him as they make their way to Weavingshaw, a cursed estate on the moors.

Heba Al-Wasity, inspired by her experiences of being born an Iraqi refugee in Libya, growing up in Canada, and attending medical school in the UK, has created a gothic-inspired fantasy that will sweep you off your feet.

Bantam, 26 February

Suckerfish by Ashani Lewis

Suckerfish follows Koila, who is in her 20s, caring for other people's children and looking for a way out of London's dead-end days.

But when she is pulled back into the orbit of her fiery, vulnerable mother, who wants to repair relations with her estranged daughter, Koila finds herself reckoning with her childhood and her present. This is perfect for fans of mother-daughter stories, such as Avni Doshi's Burnt Sugar.

Dialogue Books, 26 February

Cleopatra by Saara El-Arifi

Fantasy writer Saara El-Arifi turns her hand to ancient history, and one of its best-known figures, in her new standalone novel.

Told from Cleopatra's perspective, El-Arifi's novel is full of drama and tense moments, even if the ending is set in stone.

With a distinctive voice, Cleopatra is the emotional and awe-inspiring story of a woman who has long been misunderstood by history.

Borough Press, 26 February

Strange Girls by Sarvat Hasin

Aliya and Ava haven't spoken in a decade. Aliya has everything Ava wants: a publishing deal, a room of her own, and a sensible doctor husband. When the pair meet again at a mutual friend's hen party, Ava wants to unpack their shared history and what they meant to each other.

Moving between the past and the present, from a university campus to the city, Strange Girls is a relatable novel about the intense ties we form in our youth, and what happens when they break.

Dialogue Books, 12 March

A Mask the Colour of the Sky by Bassem Khanaqji, translated by Addie Leak

The winner of the International Prize for Arabic Fiction 2024, A Mask the Colour of the Sky, has been translated into English. The book tells the story of Nur, a young Palestinian refugee from a camp near Ramallah, who dreams of freedom.

When he discovers an Israeli ID card in the pocket of a secondhand coat, he assumes a false identity, but soon finds his borrowed identity deepening the rift within him. Basim Khandaqji was arrested by Israeli forces in 2004 and sentenced to three life sentences in prison. He was freed from jail in November this year. 

A Mask the Colour of the Sky is one of a number of novels and poems he has published from prison.

Europa Editions, 17 March

Aicha by Soraya Bouazzaoui

Aicha, set after the Portuguese have invaded Morocco, is the story of the daughter of a Moroccan freedom fighter. But this is no ordinary historical novel… Witnessing the death of her people, and their starvation and torture at the hands of the occupiers, has awakened an anger within Aicha, and only her secret lover Rachid, a rebellion leader, knows how to soothe her.

But as the fight for Morocco's freedom reaches its violent climax, the creature that simmers beneath Aicha's skin begs to be unleashed, and to help her punish those who have caused her pain.

Orbit, 23 March

Paradiso 17 by Hannah Lillith Assadi

Weaving in and out of time and space, and from Palestine on the precipice of 1948's Nakba to the oil-rich desert of Kuwait, the grittiness of New York and the desert of Arizona, Paradiso 17 is the tale of Sufien, told by him after his death.

When he's forced to leave the only home he's ever known, time stops making sense to Sufien, and he spends the rest of his life propelled forward, searching for a life well lived and a home to call his own.

4th Estate, 26 March

The Palestinian Wedding edited by A. M Elmessiri

The Palestinian Wedding is a bilingual anthology of poetry capturing works of celebration and struggle.

Among the 21 poets included are Tawfiq Zayyad, Walid al-Halis, Salma al-Jayyusi and Mahmoud Darwish.

Arranged around six themes — revolution, war, elegy, belonging, resistance and steadfastness — the collection is a testament to the enduring spirit of a people who once all called Palestine home.

Saqi Books, 26 March

Notes from a Lost Country by Sinan Antoon

In novelist and poet Sinan Antoon's Notes from a Lost Country, retired doctor Sami sinks deeper into dementia every day, haunted by old memories of life in Iraq before the war.

Omar arrives in the US with a fake identity, having run away from the Iraqi army, his ear cut off in punishment for being a deserter. When Sami and Omar's paths cross, they know they have met before, but neither can remember where.

Exploring the aftermath of war and how the past haunts new beginnings, Notes from a Lost Country is a portrait of a life in exile from the author who translated Ibtisam Azem's International Booker Prize-longlisted The Book of Disappearance.

Saqi Books, 2 April

The Jewel of Cairo by Muna Shehadi

The second book in Muna Shehadi's Women of Consequence series (following The Paris Affair) spans the 1900s, moving between Cairo, Paris, and Connecticut.

In 1915, an Egyptian jeweller commissions a Fabergé egg as a wedding anniversary gift to his "queen". In 1976, Lilianne is recruited by the CIA to keep tabs on a charming, corrupt jeweller in Cairo, but must leave for the US after a betrayal.

And in present-day Connecticut, Sophie has lost her husband, her house, and her picture-perfect life. The Jewel of Cairo is the story of priceless treasures, extraordinary women and powerful legacies, and can be read as a standalone.

Headline Review, 23 April

The Republic of Memory by Mahmud El Sayed

Described as a work of Arabfuturism, The Republic of Memory is the first in a science fiction duology set aboard the Safina.

This city ship is 200 years into its voyage from the ruins of Earth towards a new habitable world.

But while the ship's crew protects the final remnants of Earth's doomed Network Empire, people begin to ask questions: why should the crew continue to toil for people none of them remember?

What exactly gives Administration its authority over everyone else? And when blackouts begin on the Safina, everything changes.

Gollancz, 14 May

Dreams of Ayn Ara by Sara Abou Ghazal, translated by Katherine Halls

Dreams of Ayn Ara is about the Abu Sukkar family, refugees from a fictional village in the Galilee who end up in Shatila, Lebanon.

With each chapter told from the perspective of a different family member as they grapple with the existential inescapability of their Palestinian identity, the book explores the rupture experienced by victims of the Nakba.

Feminist Press, 18 August

The Sleep Thief  by Ibitisam Azem, translated by Sinan Antoon

This English translation of Ibtisam Azem's first novel, The Sleep Thief, is the story of Gharib ("the Stranger") Haifawi.

The book follows his coming-of-age and his relationships and political involvement as he dreams of a Palestinian identity that will transcend sorrow.

And Other Stories, 25 August

The One Who Broke You Can't Heal You by Najwa Zebian

Lebanese-Canadian activist Najwa Zebian began writing to connect with her first students, a group of refugees, and discovered she was also writing to heal herself.

In The One Who Broke You Can't Heal You, Zebian looks at the healthy bonds we deserve in all of our relationships — familial, romantic, and friendship — and how to break bonds that hurt and strengthen those that heal.

Yellow Kite, 26 August

Our Cut of Salt by Deena Helm

Our Cut of Salt is a sinister, unflinching take on the haunted-house novel by Palestinian author Deena Helm.

At the centre of the book is Nuhad's supposedly haunted childhood home in Haifa. When Nuhad, who has not returned to her home since the Nakba in 1948, passes away, her granddaughter, Marina, is determined to visit her grandmother's home after a lifetime of being kept in the dark about her culture and family history.

But something sinister happens, and three generations of women converge on the family home; they must reckon with the price of the past.

Orbit UK, 22 September

Sarah Shaffi is a freelance literary journalist and editor. She writes about books for Stylist Magazine online and is the Books Editor at Phoenix Magazine

Follow her here: @sarahshaffi