A Dragoness Survival Tale, Cozy Fantasy, and More New YA Book Releases for April 1, 2026

Sci-fi fans, take note: you’ll want this one on your radar.

The Bellena is a legendary sentient spacecraft. It takes out whatever it wants, wherever it wants. Ishara Ming knows this intimately, as she’s the only survivor from a whaler that had a run-in with the Bellena. Now, she’s out for revenge.

Ishara assembles a ragtag crew to take down the Ballena. Among the team is Quinn, the only person who has always been by Ishara’s side–even and especially as people call Ishara’s desire for vengeance a surefire way to die.

When Augustus comes along and asks to be part of the team to take down the Bellena, Ishara says yes. He’s developed a way to track the evil ship, and though he won’t explain why he wants revenge, Ishara isn’t worried. Orders on the ship are getting riskier and riskier, while at the same time, Ishara finds herself torn between loyalty to Quinn and Augustus. Will her heart steer her and the team off course? Or will delving into the past help her better understand the present and bring success?

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If you like survival stories and you like dragons, is this ever the book for you!

Mid-flight, the windmaster of an airship dies. The crew and passengers aboard the ship are quickly swept to sea in a storm, and they crash land on a deserted island. At least it seems like it’s a deserted island.

Aboard that ship was a dragoness, who was stowed in a hold. Her cage was damaged in the crash and now, she’s loose. She’s now targeting the human survivors, hoping to remain free and safe.

The crash survivors have one hope to stay safe: get the girl who brought the dragoness aboard to save them. But her work alone won’t save them, nor stop the reign of the dragoness. They’ll also need the help of a teen boy who was brought onto the ship in chains. But both the girl and the mysterious teen boy have secrets that may make survival impossible.

Seventeen-year-old Mina has always just kept her eyes on the prize. Asking her father to tell her anything about her Egyptian heritage or her mother’s mysterious death leads to silence.

So when Mina is invited by her aunt to visit her mom’s childhood home, Haikal mansion, in El Agamy, she’s stoked to walk the grounds of her family’s homeland and learn more about the mother she never got to know. Sure, she’s going to need to tell some lies to make this happen, but it’s worth it.

But when Mina returns home from Egypt, she’s not alone. A sinister entity has returned to California with her, and Mina realizes she must abandon those she loves to prevent the entity from possessing them. Fighting alone is no longer an option, so Mina must team up with Jesse. He’s the son of a local mortician and is extremely hostile, appearing to be completely immune to the entity’s power. Too bad Jesse doesn’t want to ally with Mina–that is, until he realizes he has to and that the secrets both his family and Mina’s hold may be the key to defeating this monster.

You can grab this book in your preferred format, hardcover or paperback, as it’s a dual/simultaneous release.

Meera Rao-George is a dorky girl who has spent her senior year with a mega-crush on her neighbor, Sushant. Too bad Sushant is head over heels for Lucy Hughson, a cheerleader. Lucy is, unfortunately, Meera’s ex-best friend.

Tired of being the dorky girl, Meera wants to do something bold. She’s going to date Sushant and knock Lucy off her pedestal.

What Meera–nor anyone else–knows is that while everything about Lucy’s life looks good, she’s struggling on the inside. It’s anxiety, it’s fear, and it’s the idea that she will never be good enough … and that she might not like Sushant as much as he likes her.

Meera’s plan to get close to Lucy again and take her down isn’t going to go the way she planned, though. Instead, it rekindles feelings between the two of them that led to their friendship breakup in the first place.

This is a paperback original.

Here’s another paperback original, and this one will land with fans of cozy fantasy reads.

Calisa, 16, is spending the summer at her great aunt’s Vermont B&B. But when Calisa arrives, it’s not the cute and cozy retreat she expected. It’s dilapidated, and her aunt is determined not to let anyone change anything about it. But Calisa begins to get help from locals to spruce up the place, hoping to change her aunt’s mindset.

The longer she’s around, though, the more Calisa realizes there’s something strange about the B&B and the people who stay there. They may not be from this world at all.