Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.
I always like doing these new-to-me authors lists, and seeing others. It’s fun to look over my TBRs and see what books await me, and I’m always excited to try something completely new! Maybe there will be new favourite authors for me among these books.
Top Ten Books I Want to Read by New to Me Authors
Honey & Spice
Bolu Babalola
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Age: Adult
Published: 5th July, 2022
Sweet like plantain, hot like pepper. They taste the best when together…
Sharp-tongued (and secretly soft-hearted) Kiki Banjo has just made a huge mistake. As an expert in relationship-evasion and the host of the popular student radio show Brown Sugar, she’s made it her mission to make sure the women of the African-Caribbean Society at Whitewell University do not fall into the mess of “situationships”, players, and heartbreak. But when the Queen of the Unbothered kisses Malakai Korede, the guy she just publicly denounced as “The Wastemen of Whitewell,” in front of every Blackwellian on campus, she finds her show on the brink.
They’re soon embroiled in a fake relationship to try and salvage their reputations and save their futures. Kiki has never surrendered her heart before, and a player like Malakai won’t be the one to change that, no matter how charming he is or how electric their connection feels. But surprisingly entertaining study sessions and intimate, late-night talks at old-fashioned diners force Kiki to look beyond her own presumptions. Is she ready to open herself up to something deeper?
A gloriously funny and sparkling debut novel, Honey and Spice is full of delicious tension and romantic intrigue that will make you weak at the knees.
The First Days
Rhiannon Frater
Genre: Horror – Sci-Fi
Age: Adult
Published: 14th August, 2008
Katie is driving to work one beautiful day when a dead man jumps into her car and tries to eat her. That same morning, Jenni opens a bedroom door to find her husband devouring their toddler son.
Fate puts Jenni and Katie—total strangers—together in a pickup, fleeing the suddenly zombie-filled streets of the Texas city in which they live. Before the sun has set, they have become more than just friends and allies—they are bonded as tightly as any two people who have been to war together.
During their cross-Texas odyssey to find and rescue Jenni’s oldest son, Jenni discovers the joy of watching a zombie’s head explode when she shoots its brains out. Katie learns that she’s a terrific tactician—and a pretty good shot.
A chance encounter puts them on the road to an isolated, fortified town, besieged by zombies, where fewer than one hundred people cling to the shreds of civilization.
It looks like the end of the world. But Katie and Jenni and many others will do whatever they have to to stay alive. Run, fight, pick each other up when they stumble, fall in love … anything is possible at the end of the world.
The Kennedy Rule
K.C. Carmichael
Genre: Contemporary Sports Romance
Age: Adult
Published: 5th November, 2025
Captain of his team, the privileged son of a hockey legend, Connor Kennedy is the league’s golden boy. And the one player who can always get under my skin. Our rivalry has been building for years, and when we’re forced to room together as Olympic teammates, I can feel the tension between us reach boiling point.
The world might see me as hockey’s most feared enforcer, Alaska’s angriest export, but in our room each night after practice, I can’t maintain my facade.
Now, I can’t get Connor out of my mind for another reason, and this obsession could ruin us both.
But one thing I know for some rules are made to be broken.
Conflict of Interest
Zarah Detand
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Age: Adult
Published: 16th July, 2026
Fresh out of a breakup and new to New York, Finn Hayes does something impulsive: when a guy at a bar mistakes him for an escort, he plays along. The stranger who takes the bait? Gorgeous, in control, and exactly the kind of distraction Finn needs. One unforgettable night, a hundred bucks on the nightstand, and they’ll never see each other again.
Except Jesse Maddox is a senior surgeon at Devon Memorial Hospital—and Finn’s new boss. Now they’re stuck navigating morning rounds, life-and-death surgery and a searing attraction that no amount of clinical detachment can cure. With careers on the line, the smart move is to walk away. But when it comes to each other, Finn and Jesse are finding that the heart doesn’t follow hospital protocol…
The Omen
David Seltzer
Genre: Horror
Age: Adult
Published: 1st January, 1976
Jeremy Thorn and his wife, Katherine, have just welcomed the newest member of their family to the their beautiful son Damien. But as the boy grows, so does the terror surrounding him. Fatal accidents, suicides, and unexplained violence seem to follow the Thorns wherever they go—but why? And how can Damien have anything to do with the carnage and bloodshed? He is only a child. But Damien Thorn is like no child on Earth. He bears the mark of the beast. And his time is at hand.
Station Eleven
Emily St. John Mandel
Genre: Sci-Fi
Age: Adult
Published: 26th August, 2014
Kirsten Raymonde will never forget the night Arthur Leander, the famous Hollywood actor, had a heart attack on stage during a production of King Lear. That was the night when a devastating flu pandemic arrived in the city, and within weeks, civilization as we know it came to an end.
Twenty years later, Kirsten moves between the settlements of the altered world with a small troupe of actors and musicians. They call themselves The Traveling Symphony, and they have dedicated themselves to keeping the remnants of art and humanity alive. But when they arrive in St. Deborah by the Water, they encounter a violent prophet who will threaten the tiny band’s existence. And as the story takes off, moving back and forth in time, and vividly depicting life before and after the pandemic, the strange twist of fate that connects them all will be revealed.
On Silver Shores
V.T. Hoang
Genre: Fantasy Romance
Age: Adult
Published: 1st November, 2024
Sirens are known for their beauty and grace. Everything from their lithe figures to their perfectly symmetrical faces to the cadence of their voices is designed to charm. Pleasure of the flesh is how they sustain themselves. So, of course, Detective Carver would be the one siren lucky enough to hate sex.
Ever since his husband died, Carver has resented the defining feature of his race, but when his boss calls in someone to assist with his investigation, he finds himself confronted with a problem he never expected—attraction. Jian is supposed to be just an analyst, buttoned-up and stiff and unassuming. Nothing could be further from the truth. Sure, he can put on a nice smile and act polite enough, but there’s something behind his eyes that’s decidedly not professional. That hunger for carnal satisfaction Carver thought long dead starts to come back to life as they work together.
And he has to wonder if he’s just starving or if this is a craving.
She Haunts Me Still
De Elizabeth
Genre: Horror Fantasy
Age: Adult
Expected Publication: 11th August, 2026
These violent delights have violent ends.
After surviving a shadowed childhood, Mallory Webb is ready to start fresh as a theater major at her mother’s alma mater, a sanitarium turned liberal arts university in Rhode Island. Landing the lead role in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet feels like a dream—until the blood-soaked wraith that caused her mother’s death resurfaces after years of quiet. With nothing to go on but cryptic symbols in an old college notebook, Mallory hopes the reason behind her mother’s haunting lies somewhere on campus, and resolves to find answers before she meets the same fate.
She’s surprised to make an unexpected ally in Ezra Pierce, the magnetic fourth year directing the play, and takes solace in their undeniable chemistry. But Ezra is a master secret keeper, and it’s clear he knows more than he’s letting on about Saskia Garin, Mallory’s elusive understudy whose past eerily mirrors her own.
When an ancient, bloodthirsty evil calls to collect a bargain that dates back to the New England vampire panic, Mallory, Ezra, and Saskia will have to untangle the tragic ways in which their histories are linked—and face the devastating consequences of their own star-crossed love story.
Tangled Webs
Callie Coles
Genre: Romance
Age: Adult
Expected Publication: 4th August, 2026
When Sage flees, she takes her young son to the only place that has ever felt like her grandparents’ estate in Newmarket, the beating heart of the racing world. Surrounded by ivy-clad walls, the kindness of her family and the thunder of hooves on the heath, Sage reconnects with the place, people and creatures she loves most.
Riding beneath the wide Suffolk skies, Sage encounters Rafe Dunbarton – an ambitious, intriguing trainer with a gentle soul. What begins as friendship soon becomes an irresistible pull between two people who never expected to find each other.
But just as Sage rediscovers her freedom, her past returns in a tangle of destruction and lies and she is forced to decide how much she is willing to risk for her future . . .
Witch Season
Julia Bianco
Genre: Fantasy Romance
Age: Adult
Published: 30th June, 2026
Katherine Barnes is an enforcer, charged with upholding the rules of the notorious Los Angeles-based Aestas coven. It’s her job to maintain order and bring unsettled witches – people who aren’t aware they have magic until it explodes out of them in a catastrophic burst – into the coven’s fold. As a former unsettled witch, Katherine owes her life to Sylvia Page, coven leader and silver-haired rebel who founded Aestas years ago.
When Silas Khatri, heir to Noctis, the most powerful coven in the world, arrives to take Aestas to task for some of their more unconventional practices, Katherine’s dislike for him reaches blistering levels. She hates his money, his good looks, and his coven’s dangerous attitude towards unsettled witches. She can absolutely overlook that he sets her off in more ways than one.
But a powerful threat is about to rise. Stronger than any one coven. More insidious than the decades-long power struggle that exists in the hidden witch world. One that will pull Katherine and Silas together despite their differences. And one that will lead to an all-out war.
If you’ve read any of these and want to share your thoughts, I’d love to hear them! And feel free to point me towards your own Top Ten Tuesday posts.
Unwrapping Words 