Top 15 in Fiction
Week of August 31, 2026
by Oliver Bowden
Assassin's Creed: Revelations is the thrilling novelisation by Oliver Bowden based on the game series. Older, wiser and more deadly than ever, Master Assassin Ezio Auditore embarks on an epic journey to find the lost library of Altair - a library that may hold the key to defeating the Templars for ever. However, a shocking discovery awaits him. The library holds no only a hidden knowledge but also the most unsettling secret the world has ever known; a secret the Templars hope to use to control humankind's destiny. Five keys are needed to access the library - to find them, Ezio must travel to the troubled city of Constantinople, where a growing army of Templars threaten to estabalize the Ottoman Empire. Walking in the footsteps of his predecessor, Altair, Ezio must defeat the Templars for the final time. For the stakes have never been higher, and what started as a pilgrimage has become a race against time... Assassin's Creed: Revelations is based on the phenomenally successful gaming series. Fans of the game will love these stories. Other titles in the series include Assassin's Creed: Renaissance, Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, Assassin's Creed: The Secret Crusade, and Assassin's Creed: Forsaken. Oliver Bowden is the pen-name of an acclaimed novelist.
by Danny Lopez
After being laid off from his job as a newspaper reporter in a coastal Florida town, Dexter Vega meets a wealthy retiree who hires him to find his daughter who is supposed to be attending the local college. When Vega visits his client to inform him that his daughter is in Mexico, he discovers the man has been murdered. And Vega's prints are all over the murder weapon.As the police build a case against him, Vega flies to Mexico City to locate his client's daughter, hoping she will help him find the murderer and thus clear his name. But when he finds the woman, she tells him a very different story—nothing is as it seems. Beaten by thugs and ordered to leave Mexico, Vega returns home to find himself immersed in a web of blackmail, greed, and revenge. Still pursued by the cops, but now a target of evil predators.

by Rachel Reid
The epic enemies-to-lovers hockey romance from USA TODAY bestselling author Rachel Reid--book two in her fan-favorite Game Changers series. Nothing interferes with pro hockey star Shane Hollander's game. Now that he's captain of the Montreal Voyageurs, he won't let anything jeopardize that--definitely not the sexy rival he loves to hate. Boston Bears captain Ilya Rozanov is everything Shane's not. The self-proclaimed king of the ice, he's as cocky as he is talented. No one can beat him--except Shane. Publicly, they're enemies. Privately, they can't stop touching each other. The smart thing to do? Walk away, once a few secret hookups turn into a struggle to keep their relationship out of the press. The truth could ruin them both. But for Shane and Ilya, secrecy is soon no longer an option... Game Changers Book 1: Game Changer Book 2: Heated Rivalry Book 3: Tough Guy Book 4: Common Goal Book 5: Role Model Book 6: The Long Game

by Aaron Reynolds
From the team behind the New York Times bestselling and Caldecott Medal–winning Creepy Carrots! and its sequels comes the second entry in a spin-off chapter book series in which Jasper Rabbit tells the story of a badger who discovers broccoli can bite back! Jasper the Rabbit is back! A little older and wiser, he collects creepy stories to share as cautionary tales. If you’re ready for some chills and chuckles alike, tune in as Jasper weaves the yarn of Thadeus Badger and the sticky situation he found himself in. Now, Thadeus is a typical badger. He and his best friend, Oliver Possum, love burgers as much as they dislike exercise. And they hate eating veggies even more. But when they make a deal with Oliver’s parents to eat an entire salad…well let’s just say the chompers might soon become the chomped. This is a creepy tale after all and even the healthiest things can turn on you. Join Jasper and Thadeus in this second Creepy Tale chapter book and learn from Thadeus’s mistakes before it’s too late!

by Pierce Brown
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Pierce Brown’s relentlessly entertaining debut channels the excitement of The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins and Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card. “Red Rising ascends above a crowded dystopian field.”—USA Today ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR—Entertainment Weekly, BuzzFeed, Shelf Awareness “I live for the dream that my children will be born free,” she says. “That they will be what they like. That they will own the land their father gave them.” “I live for you,” I say sadly. Eo kisses my cheek. “Then you must live for more.” Darrow is a Red, a member of the lowest caste in the color-coded society of the future. Like his fellow Reds, he works all day, believing that he and his people are making the surface of Mars livable for future generations. Yet he toils willingly, trusting that his blood and sweat will one day result in a better world for his children. But Darrow and his kind have been betrayed. Soon he discovers that humanity reached the surface generations ago. Vast cities and lush wilds spread across the planet.

by Knut Hamsun
The first complete English translation of the Nobel Prize-winner’s literary masterpiece A Penguin Classic Mysteries is the story of Johan Nilsen Nagel, a mysterious stranger who suddenly turns up in a small Norwegian town one summer—and just as suddenly disappears. Nagel is a complete outsider, a sort of modern Christ treated in a spirit of near parody. He condemns the politics and thought of the age, brings comfort to the “insulted and injured,” and gains the love of two women suggestive of the biblical Mary and Martha. But there is a sinister side of him: in his vest he carries a vial of prussic acid... The novel creates a powerful sense of Nagel's stream of thought, as he increasingly withdraws into the torture chamber of his own subconscious psyche. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,800 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

by Sara Pennypacker
The acclaimed, New York Times bestselling author of Pax delivers an historical novel about an orphan during WWII who discovers unexpected courage within himself when he becomes involved with the Resistance. Petit éclair. That’s what the other boys at the orphanage call Lucas DuBois. Lucas is tired of his cowardly reputation, just as he’s tired of the war and the Nazi occupation of his French village. He longs to show how brave he can be. He gets the chance when he saves a litter of kittens from cruel boys and brings them to an abandoned stable to care for them. There he comes upon a stranger who is none too happy to see him: Alice, the daughter of a horse trainer, who is hiding her filly from German soldiers. Soon Lucas begins to realize they are not the only ones in the village with secrets. The housekeeper at the German maternity home and a priest at the orphanage pass coded messages; a young mother at the home makes dangerous plans to keep her baby from forced adoption; and a neighbor in town may be harboring a Jewish family. Emboldened by the unlikely heroes all around him, Lucas is forced to decide how much he is willing to risk to make the most courageous rescue of all. Perfect for fans of Alan Gratz, Ruta Sepetys, and Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, this accessible novel, told in short chapters, illuminates a little-known aspect of World War II history.

by Jack London
Jack London was an author author best known today for his thrilling adventure books. The fast-paced action of "White Fang" never lets up; danger is always waiting beyond the next pile of snow or beneath the claws of a snarling predator. This novel was an immediate success when it was first published in 1905, and it has been so ever since.

by Joris-Karl Huysmans
Joris-Karl Huysmans' shocking novel of an innocent's descent into a world of depraved, blasphemous rituals Durtal, a shy, censorious man, is writing a biography of Gilles de Rais, the monstrous fifteenth-century child-murderer thought to be the original for 'Bluebeard'. Bored and disgusted by the vulgarity of everyday life, Durtal seeks spiritual solace by immersing himself in another age. But when he starts asking questions about Gilles's involvement in satanic rituals and is introduced to the exquisitely evil madame Chantelouve, he is soon drawn into a twilight world of black magic and erotic devilry in fin-de- siècle Paris. Published in 1891, The Damned cemented Huysmans's reputation as a writer at the forefront of the avant-garde and as one of the most challenging and innovative figures in European literature. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

by Beth Ferry
An unlikely team of talkative plants, a curious spider, and a grumpy goldfish use their newfound magical abilities to defend their family from a greedy human in this charming middle grade novel from New York Times bestselling author Beth Ferry, with illustrations from the award-winning Fan brothers. Ivy is the beloved houseplant of young Jillian Tupper of Number 3 Ramshorn Drive, much to the constant dismay of Toasty the goldfish, who is technically the family pet—swimming in his special place of honor, the antique octagonal fish tank—and should be the most loved. It seems that’s how the cookie (or cheese puffs, in Toasty’s case) crumbles in the curious Tupper household, but soon a sequence of thrilling and magical events challenges that way of life forever. First, there’s the arrival of Arthur, a knowledgeable spider with a broken leg and a curious mind, hidden in an old typewriter. Then Jillian throws everyone for a loop when she brings home dear, sweet Ollie, a school houseplant who just wants to be friends and sing. When Toasty splashes the plants with his tank water out of frustration, the friends learn that they can do magical things—like lift heavy objects and turn things invisible! It turns out Toasty’s fishtank isn’t just for fish; it was made by a curious inventor who gave it special powers that, in the wrong hands, could disrupt everything forever. And a curious man with purple shoes just so happens to want that tank at any cost. Can Ivy, Toasty, Arthur, and Ollie grow to be friends in time to work together to save their beloved Tupper family from utter ruin?

by Caro Claire Burke
A GMA BOOK CLUB PICK • A traditional American woman, a “tradwife” influencer, suddenly awakens in the brutal reality of 1855—where she must unravel whether this living nightmare is an elaborate hoax, a twisted reality show, or something far more sinister in this sensational debut novel. "A bold and biting satire, Yesteryear…will have you cackling and gasping right to the final page." —Nita Prose, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Maid series My name was Natalie Heller Mills, and I was perfect at being alive. Natalie lives a traditional lifestyle. Her charming farmhouse is rustic, her husband a handsome cowboy, her six children each more delightful than the last. So what if there are nannies and producers behind the scenes, her kitchen hiding industrial-grade fridges and ovens, her husband the heir to a political dynasty? What Natalie’s followers—all 8 million of them—don’t know won’t hurt them. And The Angry Women? The privileged, Ivy League, coastal elite haters who call her an antifeminist iconoclast? They’re sick with jealousy. Because Natalie isn’t simply living the good life, she’s living the ideal—and just so happens to be building an empire from it. Until one morning she wakes up in a life that isn’t hers. Her home, her husband, her children—they’re all familiar, but something’s off. Her kitchen is warmed by a sputtering fire rather than electricity, her children are dirty and strange, and her soft-handed husband is suddenly a competent farmer. Just yesterday Natalie was curating photos of homemade jam for her Instagram, and now she’s expected to haul firewood and handwash clothes until her fingers bleed. Has she become the unwitting star of a ruthless reality show? Could it really be time travel?

by America's Test Kitchen Kids (COR), America's Test Kitchen
"100+ recipes that you'll love to cook and eat!"--Front cover.
by Chanel Miller
What's the deal with middle school, anyway? Newbery Honor-winning author and artist Chanel Miller explores the glorious mess that is middle school—and the way growing up, finding friends, and discovering who you are can be both awkward and empowering. At the beginning of seventh grade, Luna knows who she is: an observant, quiet girl who loves writing and making zines with her best friend, Scott. But when one of their zines takes off, somehow Luna is swept up into the popular group and learns just how much of herself she's going to have to compromise to stay there. Will she give up her writing? Her best friend? What about her own beliefs about who she is and what she stands for? In a contemporary novel that feels like today’s Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, Newbery Honor winner and bestselling author Chanel Miller explores what it means to lose and then find yourself again in the middle of middle school.

by Nikolái V. Gogol
Feroces, crueles, valientes y apasionados, los cosacos hacen temblar la estepa bajo los cascos de sus caballos. Y entre ellos se encuentra Taras Bulba, un anciano lleno aún de fuerza e inteligencia que junto a sus hijos, Ostap y Andrí, avanzará por tierras polacas con intención de vengar su fe ortodoxa burlada por los católicos. Ninguna guarnición, ciudad amurallada o iglesia podrán detenerlos, hasta que la desgracia se cierna sobre ellos y el apuesto y enamoradizo Andrí haga que su padre maldiga el día en que lo engendró. Taras Bulba, una anomalía entre la obra más conocida de Gogol, es una aventura trepidante, una sinfonía en perpetuo crescendo, en la que cada capítulo es más intenso y sorprendente que el anterior. un fresco tan afinadamente dibujado y tan vívido que resulta absolutamente intemporal.

by Maurice Charney
In Shakespeare on Love & Lust, Maurice Charney delves deeply into Shakespeare's rhetorical and thematic development of this largest of subjects to reveal what makes his plays and poems resonate with contemporary audiences."--BOOK JACKET.