20 sci-fi and fantasy books we can’t wait to dive into this summer

polygon.com:

The other summer blockbuster season is upon us. Some of the year’s biggest science fiction and fantasy books are hitting shelves over the next four months, including new titles from Ken Liu, Holly Black, and Ruthanna Emrys. Plus, widely celebrated genre-straddling writers like Akil Kumarasamy, Megan Giddings, and Georgi Gospodinov are back with new head-scratchers alongside a fresh crop of debut authors.

Whether you’re looking for a quick fix to devour in a single weekend or an epic tome to pore over for months, here are the 20 best science fiction and fantasy books coming your way in May, June, July, and August 2022.

Fans of Madeline Miller’s Circe and Margaret Atwood’s The Penelopiad will be drawn to this reimagining of The Iliad that zooms in on Helen of Troy’s niece, Elektra. It’s another gripping historical fantasy in the vein of Saint’s debut novel, Ariadne, but this time she expands the focus to include two additional women: Elektra’s mother, Clytemnestra, and her father Agamemnon’s mistress, Cassandra.

Not many former Wall Street Journal technology reporters have written a science fiction novel, but Vauhini Vara has done just that with this stunning, nuanced book about memory, capitalism, and climate change. It’s the story of a South Indian child who grows up to become the most powerful man in the world — first as the CEO of a tech company, then as the leader of an international corporatocracy — and gives his daughter access to his memories in a desperate attempt to save the planet.

The co-author of The Spiderwick Chronicles is back with her first novel for adults, a dark fantasy set in a world that could be our own if it weren’t for “shadow magic” and the “gloamists” who study it. When a 28-year-old thief named