Here Are the Biggest Fantasy & Science Fiction Books Releasing This Week (September 27–October 3)

Ryan Cahill returns to The Bound and The Broken with The Truth, T. Kingfisher takes Astarion back to the years before Baldur’s Gate 3, and Rebecca Yarros revisits the Empyrean’s riders and dragons in Threshing Day. All three arrive on September 29, alongside new books from Madeline Miller, Django Wexler, and Seanan McGuire.

This week’s releases also include a childhood in Oz, a healer trying to survive Earth’s introduction to magic, and a Dartmouth freshman drawn into a dangerous secret society. Here are ten fantasy and science fiction books releasing this week.

You can also catch up on last week’s fantasy and science fiction releases for September 20–26.

The Truth by Ryan Cahill

Release Date: September 29, 2026

Everyone in Epheria knows the Order fell. The reasons for its destruction are harder to pin down. The Truth returns to the night that changed the continent, examining the stories people have carried forward and the different experiences behind them. For readers following The Bound and The Broken, that means another look at the history beneath the series’ present-day conflicts.

This is the fourth and final novella in Cahill’s series, with a place after Of Empires and Dust in his reading order. The main sequence still has Of Gods and Ashes ahead of it. The regular paperback is listed for September 29; The Broken Binding’s separate signed, lined, and dated hardcover has an October preorder window.

Baldur’s Gate 3: Astarion by T. Kingfisher

Release Date: September 29, 2026

Before the events of Baldur’s Gate 3, Astarion is still trapped under Cazador Szarr’s control. A competition among the vampire lord’s spawn sends him beneath the city in search of a dead god’s blood. An alliance with the aasimar paladin Hahn den Suriel offers a possible way through the danger, and perhaps a chance at the freedom Astarion has been denied.

T. Kingfisher writes this official prequel, giving the game’s vampire companion a story set during his captivity. The novel releases in hardcover, ebook, and audio this week, with Neil Newbon narrating the audiobook.

Threshing Day by Rebecca Yarros

Release Date: September 29, 2026

Rebecca Yarros returns to the Empyrean with thirteen stories about its characters and their dragons. Threshing Day is a companion collection for readers already invested in those relationships.

The US and Canadian deluxe first edition includes sixteen original full-color illustrations by Joe Requeza, available while supplies last.

The Only Way Out Is Up by Django Wexler

Release Date: September 29, 2026

Taj keeps his family fed by salvaging scrap from a junkheap, where monsters are another hazard of the job. He has also built Star, a construct with a mouth on it, and hopes their fighting-circuit winnings might finally get them somewhere. With debts closing in, an offer to enter the Ascent tournament gives him a much larger prize to chase and a new set of enemies to survive.

The Only Way Out Is Up opens Wexler’s new Sigilist series. Its progression-fantasy setup combines a climb out of poverty with construct battles and science-fiction elements. Orbit releases the trade paperback and ebook alongside an audiobook narrated by Heath Miller.

Mestra by Madeline Miller

Release Date: September 29, 2026

Mestra’s father has been cursed by Demeter with a hunger he cannot satisfy. His daughter has a divine gift of her own: Poseidon has given her the ability to change shape. As she uses that power to help her father, the demands placed on her force a question about how much of her own life she owes him.

Madeline Miller’s new Greek-myth retelling is a short story, published by Ecco as an eighty-page hardcover. It follows Mestra’s struggle for freedom through the obligations of family and the interventions of the gods.

A Divided Duty by Seanan McGuire

Release Date: September 29, 2026

October Daye has a newborn daughter at home and responsibilities to Faerie that keep finding their way to her door. Raysel’s time in Toby’s household is nearing its end when Luna Torquill decides to take her daughter back. Luna then brings Raysel into Blind Michael’s lands, leaving Toby with a rescue to undertake in a place she has every reason to fear.

A Divided Duty is the twentieth October Daye novel, continuing the family conflicts and obligations accumulated across McGuire’s urban-fantasy series. Toby’s new responsibilities as a mother now sit alongside her longstanding duty to protect the people around her.

Galinda: A Charmed Childhood by Gregory Maguire

Release Date: September 29, 2026

Long before Shiz and Elphaba, Galinda is the youngest of four children in a prominent family whose money is running short. She grows up amid both indulgence and neglect, with dance competitions occupying her attention while resentment of her father’s business dealings builds around the family. Maguire follows the girl who will become Glinda before her future reputation takes shape.

This new Wicked prequel is a companion to Elphie, turning to the other half of the pair’s early lives. William Morrow’s deluxe limited hardcover arrives this week with stenciled edges and designed endpapers; the large-print edition follows later.

Lifeweaver by Oskar Soderberg

Release Date: September 29, 2026

Luke Quinn left medical school and now works a burger job, carrying guilt over the sister he could not cure. When a worldwide broadcast announces Earth’s integration into a larger system, mysterious orbs offer people access to magic. Luke takes the chance and becomes a healer, a rare role that demands careful, painful work as he learns what his abilities can do.

Lifeweaver begins a new LitRPG series, following Luke through a tutorial and difficult team relationships while society tries to adjust around him. Aethon releases the ebook and audiobook together, with Gary Tiedemann narrating the audio edition.

The Siren by Tomi Adeyemi

Release Date: September 29, 2026

Emery arrives at Dartmouth determined to protect her scholarship and keep her past private. Her plans become harder to hold together when she meets Roux, Roux’s stepbrother Eli, and the Sirens, a group whose exclusive parties come with a dangerous promise of power and belonging. Getting close to them could cost Emery far more than her place at the university.

The Children of Blood and Bone author turns to a new story with this YA speculative thriller. The US deluxe hardcover includes printed edges, matching endpapers, and full-color interior artwork, accompanying a campus story built around secrecy, ambition, and supernatural danger.

Forged in FIYAH edited by DaVaun Sanders

Release Date: September 29, 2026

FIYAH Magazine marks its tenth anniversary with eighteen stories spanning fantasy, science fiction, and horror. Edited by DaVaun Sanders, Forged in FIYAH includes work by C. L. Clark, Suyi Davies Okungbowa, Tade Thompson, and other Black speculative-fiction writers, with stories involving everything from healing silks to a vampire wrestling with conscience.

The collection moves through funeral homes between worlds, unsettling dolls, and machines capable of unexpected kindness. Tordotcom publishes Forged in FIYAH: Celebrating Ten Years of Black Speculative Fiction in trade paperback this week.

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