Can't-Wait Wednesday: The Land of Lost Things by John Connolly & Normal Rules Don't Apply by Kate Atkinson

  

Can't-Wait is a weekly meme hosted by Wishful Endings that spotlights exciting upcoming releases that we can't wait to be released! This meme is based off of Jill @ Breaking the Spine's Waiting on Wednesday meme.

This week's upcoming book spotlights are:

The Land of Lost Things by John Connolly
Publication: September 19th, 2023
Atria/Emily Bestler Books
Hardcover. 368 pages.
Pre-order: Amazon | Bookshop.org

From Goodreads:
"The redemptive power of stories and family is revealed in New York Times bestselling author John Connolly’s atmospheric tale set in the same magical universe as The Book of Lost Things.

“Twice upon a time—for that is how some stories should continue…”

Phoebe, an eight-year-old girl, lies comatose following a car accident—a body without a spirit. Ceres, her mother, can only sit by her bedside and read aloud the fairy stories Phoebe loves in the hope they might summon her back to this world.

But an old house on the hospital grounds, a property connected to a book written by a vanished author, is calling to Ceres. Something wants her to enter, to journey to a land colored by the memories of childhood, and the folklore beloved of her father—a land of witches and dryads, giants and mandrakes; a land where old enemies are watching and waiting…"

The Book of Lost Things is one of my favorite books ever and one I read for the first time many many years ago, and for a variety of reasons it holds an incredibly special place in my heart. I was so surprised when I saw that a follow-up was being published earlier this year and this is now probably one of my most anticipated books of the year, as well as the one I'm most nervous about! I cannot wait for this to come out. I don't think this is a direct sequel, rather just set in the same world, so I'm not sure if it's necessary to read the first book first, but... The Book of Lost Things is incredible and you should check it out, anyway!

Normal Rules Don't Apply by Kate Atkinson
Publication: September 12th, 2023
Doubleday
Hardcover. 224 pages.
Pre-order: Amazon | Bookshop.org

From Goodreads:
"In this brilliant volume, nothing is quite as it seems. We meet a queen who makes a bargain she cannot keep; a secretary who watches over the life she has just left; a lost man who bets on a horse that may—or may not—have spoken to him. Everything that readers love about the novels of Kate Atkinson is here—the inventiveness, the verbal felicity, the sharp observations of human nature, and the deeply satisfying emotional wallop.

Witty and wise, with subtle connections between the stories, Normal Rules Don’t Apply is a startling and funny feast for the imagination, stories with the depth and bite to create their own fully-formed worlds."

I am really captivated by the sound of these stories and can't wait to have a chance to check them out.