Look, it’s positively scorching outside pretty much everywhere in the United States right now—and has been for weeks—so absolutely no one can be blamed for taking any reason they can find to stay inside. Whether you’re holed up in your living room with all the curtains drawn or camped out at your local library, tis the season for finding the nearest air-conditioned location and staying put for as long as possible. That means there’s no better time to lose yourself in a good book. (Or to put it another way: Pizza Hut’s infamous BookIt program was a summer staple for most of our childhoods for a reason.) And fans of YA fiction have more diverse options than ever to dive into this month.
From highly anticipated sequels and new stories set in familiar universes to buzzy debuts and intriguing anthologies, the YA space is once again home to a wide variety of characters and stories for every kind of reader. Want an adorable romance? Check. A complicated fantasy? Also check. Disturbing horror? Yup, this genre has that this month too.
These are the best YA books hitting shelves this July.
Cursed Boys and Broken Hearts by Adam Sass
Release Date: July 16 from Viking Books for Young Readers
Why You’ll Love It: A charming second chance romance from the author of Your Lonely Nights Are Over, Cursed Boys and Broken Hearts brings back a secondary character from Sass’s The 99 Boyfriends of Micah Summers for his own shot at a fairytale love story as he joins forces with a middle school friend to save a run-down B&B.
Publisher’s Description: Grant Rossi is never getting a happily-ever-after.
Ever since he was a kid and made a wish on his family’s iconic Wishing Rose, his romantic relationships have been cursed to end. Following his most recent (and extremely public) dumping, Grant is languishing in a hot Chicago summer, abandoning his beloved design projects to sink back into depression. But when his family suggests spending the summer helping his aunt and uncle refurbish their beautiful but rundown B&B and vineyard—the home of the Wishing Rose that changed everything for him—Grant decides to accept. Maybe he can finally find a way to recover his creative spark…and break his curse.
But things at the vineyard are not what Grant expects. The place is in almost total disrepair, and—even worse—the person his relatives hired to help is his former childhood crush, Ben—the first boy who broke his heart.
As their chemistry sparks and the summer heats up, the wedge between them can’t be ignored. But while they race to restore the B&B in time for the beloved local rose festival, grumpy but lovable Ben starts to break through Grant’s carefully crafted defenses. Can Grant find a way to overcome his curse and open his heart, even when it’s broken?
The Second Son by Adrienne Tooley
Release Date: July 16 from Christy Ottaviano Books
Why You’ll Love It: Adrienne Tooley’s The Third Daughter was one of the Best YA Books of 2023, a complex story of faith, power, jealousy, and the weight of duty and expectation. Its sequel, The Second Son, follows the rise of the New Maiden’s dangerous theological adversary and the complicated betrayals and plot twists that follow. (Yes, this is purposefully vague, but it’s better if you find out for yourselves.)
Publisher’s Description: The centuries-old prophecy has been fulfilled at last: the New Maiden has returned to Velle. Unfortunately, so has a malicious demi-god, whose elusive prophet is intent on converting the New Maiden’s followers. The Second Son is a vengeful, angry deity, whose psalm resonates with the disenfranchised.
With Elodie on the throne and Sabine in her own unique position of power, it should be easy enough to track down the culprit. Yet even as they’re falling in love, both girls are keeping dangerous secrets from each other. While the cult of the Second Son threatens to overthrow not only the Church of the New Maiden but also Velle’s monarchy, Elodie and Sabine must navigate impossible odds to dismantle the root of his power, all while their lives hang in the balance.
Trespass Against Us by Leon Kemp
Release Date: July 16 from HarperTeen
Why You’ll Love It: A harrowing YA horror debut, Trespass Against Us is a dual-timeline story that follows a group of YouTubers who visit an abandoned Catholic reform school for troubled youth and lose one of their own in the process and the survivors’ return two years later to confront the supernatural evil they awoke there.
Publisher’s Description: Two years ago, Riley visited the abandoned and allegedly haunted religious reform school Dominic House with his boyfriend, Ethan, and his best friends, Colton and Vee.
Ethan never came out. Colton’s leg will never quite heal, Vee is branded as hysterical, and Riley has horrific scars as a reminder of that night.
Now, at eighteen, Riley hasn’t exactly moved on, but he’s kept away from all things paranormal.
Until legendary ghost chaser Jordan Jones shows up with an offer: return to Dominic House with her to film an episode of her Spirit Seekers TV show.
Riley may have vowed never to return, but he has unfinished business at Dominic House. With a reluctant Colton and Vee at his side, Riley is determined to find out what happened to Ethan once and for all.
But as the night wears on, Riley realizes he isn’t just revisiting the most terrifying night of his life— he’s reliving it.
With an eerily elegant voice, dual timelines that slowly unravel a chilling ghost story, themes of religious trauma, and secrets in every corner, Trespass Against Us is the kind of horror story that will keep you up long into the night.
The White Guy Dies First edited by Terry J. Benton-Walker
Release Date: July 16 from Tor Teen
Why You’ll Love It: A timely and entertaining anthology of horror stories from some of the YA genre’s most popular authors of color, The White Guy Dies First features 13 scary tales full of familiar and beloved tropes. Save one. This time, as the title says, it’s the white guy who dies first. Familiar names involved include Chloe Gong, Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé, H. E. Edgmon, Kalynn Bayron, Kendare Blake, Tiffany D. Jackson, more.
Publisher’s Description: Killer clowns, a hungry hedge maze, and rich kids who got bored. Friendly cannibals, impossible slashers, and the dead who don’t stay dead….
A museum curator who despises “diasporic inaccuracies.” A sweet girl and her diary of happy thoughts. An old house that just wants friends forever….
These stories are filled with ancient terrors and modern villains, but go ahead, go into the basement, step onto the old plantation, and open the magician’s mystery box because this time, the white guy dies first.
Time and Time Again by Chatham Greenfield
Release Date: July 23 from Bloomsbury YA
Why You’ll Love It: Two queer, disabled, Jewish teens find themselves stuck in a time loop in this incredibly charming YA romance. Adorable and honest, the deft, realistic way Greenfield depicts living with chronic illness and anxiety is a particular highlight.
Publisher’s Description: Phoebe Mendel’s day is never ending–literally.
On August 6th, she woke up to find herself stuck in a time loop. And for nearly a month of August 6ths since, Phoebe has relived the same day: pancakes with Mom in the morning, Scrabble with Dad in the afternoon, and constant research into how to reach tomorrow and make it to her appointment with a doctor who may actually take her IBS seriously. Everything is exactly, agonizingly the same.
That is, until the most mundane car crash ever sends Phoebe’s childhood crush Jess crashing into the time loop.
Now also stuck, Jess convinces Phoebe to break out of her routine and take advantage of their consequence-free days to have fun. From splurging on concert tickets, to enacting (mostly) harmless revenge, to all-night road trips, Jess pulls Phoebe further and further out of her comfort zone–and deeper in love with them. But the more Phoebe falls for Jess, the more she worries about what’s on the other side of the time loop. What if Jess is only giving her the time of day because they’re trapped with no other options? What if Phoebe’s new doctor dismisses her chronic pain? And perhaps worst of all: What if she never gets the chance to find out?
So Witches We Became by Jill Baguchinsky
Release Date: July 23 from Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Why We’re Excited: Described as a queer, feminist take on Stephen King’s The Mist, this revenge-tinged horror story is an ode to female rage that touches on the trauma of sexual assault and supports young women coming into their power.
Publisher’s Description: For high school senior Nell and her friends, a vacation house on a private Florida island sounds like the makings of a dream spring break. But Nell brings secrets with her—secrets that fuse with the island’s tragic history, trapping them all with a curse that surrounds the island in a toxic, vengeful mist and the surrounding waters with an unseen, devouring beast.
Getting out alive means risking her friendships, her sanity, and even her own life. In order to save herself and her friends, Nell will have to face memories she’d rather leave behind, reveal the horrific truth behind the encounter that changed her life one year ago, and face the shadow that’s haunted her since childhood.
Easier said than done.
But when Nell’s friends reveal that they each brought secrets of their own, a solution even more dangerous than the curse begins to take shape.
Such Charming Liars by Karen McManus
Release Date: July 30 from Penguin Books
Why We’re Excited: No one does YA thrillers like Karen McManus, so any new release from her is automatically going to be a must-read. But the premise of Such Charming Liars—about a mother-daughter team of grifters trying to pull off one last jewel heist during a glamorous party full of rich elites—feels like something entirely new (and all the more exciting) from her.
Publisher’s Description: For all of Kat’s life, it’s just been her and her mother, Jamie—except for the forty-eight hours when Jamie was married and Kat had a stepbrother, Liam. That all ended in an epic divorce, and Kat and Liam haven’t spoken since.
Now Jamie is a jewel thief trying to go straight, but she has one last job—at billionaire Ross Sutherland’s birthday party. And Kat has figured out a way to tag along. What Kat doesn’t know, though, is that there are two surprise guests at the dazzling Sutherland compound that weekend. The last two people she wants to run into. Liam and his father—a serial scammer who has his sights set on Ross Sutherland’s youngest daughter.
Kat and Liam are on a collision course to disaster, and when a Sutherland dies, they realize they might actually be in the killer’s crosshairs themselves. Somehow Kat and Liam are the new targets, and they can’t trust anyone—except each other.
Or can they? Because if there’s one thing both Kat and Liam know, it’s how to lie. They learned from the best.
The Grandest Game by Jennifer Lynn Barnes
Release Date: July 30 from Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Why We’re Excited: A new chapter in Jennifer Lynn Barnes’s popular Inheritance Games universe kicks off when Avery Grambs and the four Hawthorne brothers launch a new contest to give anyone a chance at fame and fortune—-but it’s one that comes with plenty of challenges and dangers of its own.
Publisher’s Description: Seven tickets. An island of dreams. The chance of a lifetime.
Welcome to the Grandest Game, an annual competition run by billionaire Avery Grambs and the four infamous Hawthorne brothers, whose family fortune she inherited. Designed to give anyone a shot at fame and fortune, this year’s game requires one of seven golden tickets to enter. With millions on the line, those seven players will do whatever it takes to win.
Some of the players are in it for the money. Some for power. Some for reasons all their own. Every single one of them has secrets. Amidst it all is Grayson Hawthorne, tasked with a vital role in this year’s game. But as tensions rise and the mind-bending challenges push the players to their limits—physically, mentally, and emotionally—it soon becomes clear that not everyone is playing by the rules.
The Blonde Dies First by Joelle Wellington
Release Date: July 30 from Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Why You’ll Love It: The latest novel from Joelle Wellington, author of buzzy 2023 YA debut These Vicious Games, The Blonde Dies First follows the story of a group of teen horror buffs who accidentally use an Ouija board to summon a demon intent on killing them all, slasher movie-style. What follows is deliciously unhinged mayhem that adds a fresh twist to the genre with its pointed exploration of gentrification and social class.
Publisher’s Description: Devon is always being left behind by her genius twin sister, Drew. At this point, it’s a fact of life. But Devon has one last plan before Drew leaves for college a whole year early—The Best Summer Ever. After committing to the bit a little too much, the twins and their chaotic circle of friends learn why you don’t ever mess with a Ouija board if you want to actually survive the Best Summer Ever, and soon find themselves being hunted down by…a demon?
But while there’s no mistaking the creeping, venomous figure is not from around here, their method doesn’t feel very demonic at all. In fact, it’s downright human—going after them in typical slasher movie kill order. And that means Devon, the blonde, is up first and her decade-long crush, Yaya, is the Final Girl who must kill or be killed to end the cycle.
Devon has never liked playing by anyone else’s rules though, not even a demon’s, and the longer this goes on, the more she feels Drew and Yaya slipping away from her even as she tries to help them all survive. Can they use their horror movie knowledge to flip the script and become the hunters instead of the hunted? Or will their best summer ever be their last?