Whether you love cozy tales, epic fantasy, or romantasy, the best fantasy books of July 2025 definitely include something for you! This month’s new releases feature plenty to keep you busy while you hide out from the summer heat. Check out highly-anticipated sequels from Juno Dawson, Mai Corland, H.M. Long, and others. Or if you’d rather start a whole new journey, pick up buzzy books by Morgan Ryan, Elise Kova, Rosália Rodrigo, and more.
Travel away from the summer heat and into magical worlds with our picks for the best fantasy books of July 2025! Check them out below.
Human Rites by Juno Dawson
Release date: July 1
Read it if: You’d like the best fantasy books of July 2025 to channel some righteous rage. A broken coven navigates their own traumas and the tempting demands of Lucifer himself.
Publisher’s synopsis: Niamh, Ciara, Leonie, Elle and Theo. Five very different witches with one thing in common: they were unwittingly chosen by the dangerously charming Lucifer, the demon king of desire, to fulfil a dark prophecy: Satanis will rise and the daughters of Gaia will fall.
The coven is reunited—but broken. Niamh is back from the dead…but she hasn’t come back alone. Elle mourns a son she never had. Ciara languishes in a prison for witches, and Leonie reels from a very unexpected surprise.
Meanwhile, Lucifer offers fledgling witch Theo a deal: if she helps him, her coven—her family—will be spared. But the magic he asks for will take her out of London—out of time, entirely.
Get it on Amazon or support your local bookstores through Bookshop.org.
Red Tempest Brother by H. M. Long
Release date: July 8
Read it if: You love pirate lore, epic adventures, and uptight men forced to loosen up. A stormsinger and two seafaring brothers fight to bring truth to light and avoid a deadly war.
Publisher’s synopsis: In the wake of the events of Black Tide Son, Hart flees into pirate-infested waters to shelter on the island where former rogue James Demery and the Fleetbreaker, Anne Firth, now rule.
Reeling from their discoveries about the truths of the Mereish-Aeadine war, Mary and Samuel hover on the precipice of a terrible, world-altering choice – they can stay silent and maintain their good names, or they can speak out and risk igniting total war across the Winter Sea.
Meanwhile, Benedict captains The Red Tempest, a lawless ship of deserters and corrupted mages in search of an Usti spy with incendiary stolen documents. Benedict is determined to make the truth known, consequences be damned.
As rumours spread of a new Ghistwold sprouting in the Mereish South Isles, Mary and Samuel sail once more into intrigue, espionage and an ocean on the brink of exploding into conflict. They must chart a course toward lasting, final peace, at the heart of the age-old battle for power upon the Winter Sea.
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The Undercutting of Rosie and Adam by Megan Bannen
Release date: July 8
Read it if: You want a lighter, quirkier read among the best fantasy books of July 2025. A demigod and an inventor reluctantly team up when magical portals trap them in a dangerous place.
Publisher’s synopsis: mmortal demigod Rosie Fox has been patrolling Tanria for decades, but lately, the job has been losing its luster. When Rosie dies (again) by electrocution (again) after poking around inside a portal choked with shadowy thorns, she feels stuck in the rut that is her unending life.
The portal’s uptight creator, Adam Lee, must come in person to repair the damage. But when all the portals break down at once, Rosie and Adam wind up trapped inside the Mist. And the reticent inventor in his bespoke menswear seems to know a lot more about what’s happening than he lets on.
Maybe two people who have found themselves stuck in this thorny, tangled life together can find a way to unstick each other … just when their time on this earth seems to be running out.
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Soulgazer by Maggie Rapier
Release date: July 8
Read it if: You love fairytale heroines who take destiny into their own hands. Cursed and forcibly betrothed, a young woman strikes a deal with a ruthless pirate to get rid of her magic.
Publisher’s synopsis: Every legend has a beginning.
Saoirse yearns to be powerless. Cursed from childhood with a volatile magic, she’s managed to imprison it within, living under constant terror that one day it will break free. And it does, changing everything.
Horrified at her loss of control, Saoirse’s parents offer her hand to the cold and ruthless Stone King. Knowing she’ll never survive such a cruel man, Saoirse realizes there is only one path forward. She must break her curse.
On the eve of her wedding, Saoirse seeks out the legendary Wolf of the Wild—Faolan, a feral, silver-tongued pirate. He swears to help rid her of the deadly magic if she’ll use it to locate a lost mythical isle. Crafted by the slaughtered gods, it’s the only land that could absorb her power.
But Saoirse knows better than to trust a pirate’s word. With the wrath of her disgraced father and scorned betrothed chasing them, Saoirse adds one last condition to protect herself: if Faolan wants her on his ship, he’ll have to marry her first.
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Lore of the Tides by Analeigh Sbrana
Release date: July 8
Read it if: This much-anticipated sequel was always on your list for the best fantasy books of July 2025. Betrayed and unsure who to trust, a young woman must find the sun book and free her people.
Publisher’s synopsis: Lore Alemeyu wakes up to discover she’s on a ship in the middle of the ocean. Held prisoner and with no way to escape, she’s faced with a dire set of circumstances…
A crew that’s distrustful of Lore’s magic capabilities…
Her betrayal by a Fae she thought she could trust…
A dangerous quest for the sun book, which, if placed in the wrong hands, will make the Alytherian Fae even more powerful.
Lore must navigate threats on the ship and beyond, into the ocean’s magical and mysterious depths, in order to find the sun book herself and help free the humans. All the while, Lore can’t help but feel the intense pull of one Fae male who has been helping her all along. But is she willing to risk her human heart for creatures that have burned her in the past, and jeopardize her people’s future?
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A Resistance of Witches by Morgan Ryan
Release date: July 15
Read it if: You want the best fantasy books of July 2025 to include some good old-fashioned resistance. During World War II, a witch and her allies try to find a grimoire before the Nazis do.
Publisher’s synopsis: Stubborn, plain-spoken and from an unimpressive family, Lydia Polk never expected to be accepted into the Royal Academy of Witches. Now, with Hitler’s army rampaging across Europe, the witches of Britain have joined the war effort, and Lydia must use her magic to track down magical relics before Hitler and his sycophants can.
When a Nazi witch infiltrates the Academy with heart-breaking consequences, the coven is left shaken, exposed and divided. The elder British witches have no interest in further loss of coven life in service of a government that has forced them into hiding for decades, no matter the consequences to the world. But with the discovery of the Grimorium Bellum, an ancient book that leaves a trail of death and destruction wherever it goes, Lydia knows her mission has never been more urgent.
Alone and woefully outnumbered, Lydia makes her way to the heart of occupied France, where she finds allies in Rebecca Gagne—a fierce French resistance fighter chockful of secrets—and Henry Boudreaux—a handsome Haitian-American art historian with a little magic of his own. Together, they traverse the country, stalked by the natural and supernatural alike, in search of the grimoire. But, as Lydia soon discovers, finding the book is only half the battle. The Grimorium Bellum has a dark agenda all its own. Lydia must subdue it before the Witches of the Third Reich can use it. But she’ll have to survive the book herself, first.
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Three Shattered Souls by Mai Corland
Release date: July 15
Read it if: You love misfit teams and battles for justice. A ragtag team risks everything to take down a usurper and save their realms.
Publisher’s synopsis: Some betrayals cut deeper than blades.
The Blades were never supposed to survive this long. But after the battle in Quu Harbor, escaping is no longer enough. The most dangerous liars in the four realms have one last mission―return to Yusan and finish what they started.
But now a usurper sits on the serpent throne. And he may be more dangerous than the god-king.
With three relics of the Dragon Lord in their possession, the Blades will face the might of the four realms. Enemies will become allies. Allies will become traitors. And the ones they love most? They’ll be the ones to break them.
Grief will carve the Blades into something ruthless and unrecognizable. But only by losing everything can they win this game of kings and crowns.
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The Enchanted Greenhouse by Sarah Beth Durst
Release date: July 15
Read it if: Cozy, botanical fantasy is your preference for the best fantasy books of July 2025. A cast-out magician helps a grumpy gardener save an island full of magical greenhouses.
Publisher’s synopsis: Terlu Perna broke the law because she was lonely. She cast a spell and created a magically sentient spider plant. As punishment, she was turned into a wooden statue and tucked away into an alcove in the North Reading Room of the Great Library of Alyssium.
This should have been the end of her story . . . Yet one day, Terlu wakes in the cold of winter on a nearly-deserted island full of hundreds of magical greenhouses. She’s starving and freezing, and the only other human on the island is a grumpy gardener. To her surprise, he offers Terlu a place to sleep, clean clothes, and freshly baked honey cakes. At least, until she’s ready to sail home.
But Terlu doesn’t want to return home. As she grows closer with the unwittingly charming gardener, Yarrow, she learns that the magic that sustains the greenhouses is failing―causing the death of everything within them. Terlu knows she must help, even if that means breaking the law again.
This time, though, she isn’t alone. Assisted by Yarrow and a sentient rose, Terlu must unravel the secrets of a long-dead sorcerer if she wants to save the island―and have a fresh chance at happiness and love.
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In the Veins of the Drowning by Kalie Cassidy
Release date: July 15
Read it if: You love siren lore and duty-versus-love conflict. A siren in hiding agrees to help a visiting king, in hopes of defeating a greater monster.
Publisher’s synopsis: The monster is always slain…
Imogen Nel is in hiding. Hiding from a cruel kingdom that believes Sirens are monstrous, blood-hungry creatures. Hiding from a king and his captain who viciously hunt her kind. And hiding from her own alluring abilities. By keeping herself from the sea, Imogen’s bloodlust is dulled, and her black wings remain concealed beneath her skin.
When a neighboring king comes to visit, Imogen can no longer hide. He knows precisely what she is, and he believes she can save their kingdoms from an even greater monster. But Imogen’s power threatens to violently reveal itself, and the two form a blood bond that protects them both. They flee together, traversing waters teeming with the undead. As the lines between duty to their people and desire for each other begin to blur, Imogen worries her ancestral powers may not be enough to kill what hunts her. The only way to defeat a monster may be to become one herself.
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The Jasad Crown by Sara Hashem
Release date: July 15
Read it if: You want lost kingdoms and Egyptian-inspired lore in the best fantasy books of July 2025. A queen-in-hiding must risk everything to control her magic and save her people.
Publisher’s synopsis: Held deep in a mountain refuge, Sylvia has been captured by the Urabi, who believe the Jasad Heir can return their homeland to its former power. But after years of denying her legacy and a forbidden alliance with Jasad’s greatest enemy, Sylvia must win the Urabi’s trust while struggling to hide the dangerous side effects her magic is having on her mind.
In a rival kingdom, Arin must maneuver carefully between his father’s desire to put down the brewing rebellion and the sacred edicts Arin is sworn to uphold. He is determined to find Sylvia before it’s too late. But Arin’s search unravels secrets that threaten the very core of his beliefs about his family and the destruction of Jasad.
War is inevitable, but Sylvia cannot abandon her people again. The Urabi plan to raise the Jasadi fortress. It will either kill Sylvia or destroy the humanity she’s fought so hard to protect. For the first time in her life Sylvia doesn’t just want to survive. She wants to win.
The fugitive queen is ready to reign.
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The Nightshade God by Hannah Whitten
Release date: July 15
Read it if: You prefer the best fantasy books of July 2025 with a gothic vibe. A necromancer gathers her strength to defeat the god who controls the king.
Publisher’s synopsis: Lore has failed. She couldn’t save King Bastian from the rotten god speaking voices in his mind. She couldn’t save her allies from being scattered across the continent. Their own lesser gods whisper to them in their dreams. She couldn’t save her beautiful, corrupt city from the dark power beneath the catacombs. And she couldn’t save herself.
Banished to the Burnt Isles, Lore must use every skill she earned on the streets of Dellaire to survive the prison colony and figure out a way to defeat the power capturing everything and everyone she holds dear. When a surprise ally joins her, she realizes the way forward may lie on the island itself. Somehow, her friends must help her collect the far-scattered pieces of the broken Fount—the source of all the god’s powers—and bring them back together on the Burnt Isles, returning all magic to its source and destroying, once and for all, the gods corrupting the land.
But as Lore gets closer to her goal, her magic grows stronger. To a woman who’s always had to fight for survival, that kind of power may be hard to give up.
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Arcana Academy by Elisa Kova
Release date: July 22
Read it if: You’d like tarot magic and dark academia in the best fantasy books of July 2025. A mysterious headmaster recruits a thief to help him steal a tarot card from the king.
Publisher’s synopsis: Clara Graysword has survived the underworld of Eclipse City through thievery, luck, and a whole lot of illegal magic. After a job gone awry, Clara is sentenced to a lifetime in prison for inking tarot cards—a rare power reserved for practitioners at the elite Arcana Academy.
Just when it seems her luck has run dry, the academy’s enigmatic headmaster, Prince Kaelis, offers her an escape—for a price. Kaelis believes that Clara is the perfect tool to help him steal a tarot card from the king and use it to re-create an all-powerful card long lost to time.
In order to conceal her identity and keep her close, Kaelis brings Clara to Arcana Academy, introducing her as the newest first-year student and his bride-to-be.
Thrust into a world of arcane magic and royal intrigue, where one misstep will send her back to prison or worse, Clara finds that the prince she swore to hate may not be what he seems. But can she risk giving him power over the world—and her heart? Or will she take it for herself?
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Beasts of Carnaval by Rosália Rodrigo
Release date: July 29
Read it if: You’d love the idea of a Caribbean-inspired The Night Circus. On an island of revelry, a freedwoman searches for her brother and uncovers the truth of the island.
Publisher’s synopsis: Within the shores of Isla Bestia, guests from around the world discover a utopia of ever-changing performances, sumptuous feasts and beautiful monsters. Many enter, but few ever leave—the wine is simply too sweet, the music too fine and the revelry endless.
Sofía, a freedwoman from a nearby colonized island, cares little for this revelry. Born an enslaved mestiza on a tobacco plantation, she has neither wealth nor title, only a scholarly pragmatism and a hunger for answers. She travels to el Carnaval de Bestias in search of her twin brother, who disappeared five years ago.
There’s a world of wonder waiting for her on the shores of this legendary island, one wherein conquerors profit from Sofia’s ancestral lands and her people’s labor. But surrounded by her former enslavers, she finds something familiar in the performances—whispers of the island’s native tongue, music and stories from her Taike’ri ancestors…a culture long hidden in the shadows, thrust into the light.
As the nights pass, her mind begins unraveling, drowning in the unnatural, almost sentient thrall of Carnaval. And the sense that someone is watching her grows. To find her brother and break free, Sofia must peel back the glamorous curtain and face those behind Carnaval, before she too loses herself to the island…
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The Memory Hunters by Mia Tsai
Release date: July 29
Read it if: You want Inception-esque twistiness in the best fantasy books of July 2025. A memory collector grows obsessed with finding answers after a memory diverges from official “truth.”
Publisher’s synopsis: Kiana Strade can dive deeper into blood memories than anyone alive. But instead of devoting her talents to the temple she’s meant to lead, Key wants to do research for the Museum of Human Memory. . . and to avoid the public eye.
Valerian IV’s twin swords protect Key from murderous rivals and her own enthusiasm alike. Vale cares about Key as a friend—and maybe more. But most of all, she needs to keep her job so she can support her parents and siblings in the storm-torn south.
But when Key collects a memory that diverges from official history, only Vale sees the fallout. Key’s mentor suspiciously dismisses the finding; her powerful mother demands she stop research altogether. And Key, unusually affected by the memory, begins to lose moments, then minutes, then days.
As Vale becomes increasingly entangled in Key’s obsessive drive for answers, the women uncover a shattering discovery—and a devastating betrayal. Key and Vale can remain complicit, or they can jeopardize everything for the truth.
Either way, Key is becoming consumed by the past in more ways than one, and time is running out.
Get it on Amazon or support your local bookstores through Bookshop.org.
Birth of a Dynasty by Chinaza Bado
Release date: July 29
Read it if: You love rich world-building and feuding families. Scions of warring families seek their own paths, despite the shadow of a prophecy.
Publisher’s synopsis: After witnessing the massacre of everyone he’s ever known and loved, M’Kuru Mukundi, the sole surviving member of the High Noble House Mukundi of Madada, vows revenge. M’kuru flees to a small village where he hides under the guise of farm boy Khalil Rausi… unaware that the real Khalil’s father is the bloodthirsty General of Zenzele army, and under the direction of the King’s scheming son, Prince Effiom, was responsible for the murder of M’kuru’s people. When an imposter claiming to be M’kuru shows up in the village, the real M’kuru—now Khalil—must bide his time amongst his enemies, pretending to be everything that he hates in order to get vengeance.
In another part of the country where giants roam free, young Zikora Nnamani, the only daughter of Lord Nnamani, knows nothing of political intrigue. She wants little more than to be a fierce Seh Llinga warrior. But a well-known prophecy places too much potential power on her small shoulders. As far as Prince Effiom and the King know, she is the only living threat to their dynasty ruling forever. However, when a messenger arrives to “invite” Zikora to stay at the palace, her family is not in a position to refuse. Before she is taken away, she begins The Rite of Blessing, a magical inheritance that she will need to learn how to use, but that may also bring the world one step closer to the completion of the prophecy that Prince Effiom so fears.
Between scheming ladies at court, backstabbing princes on the prowl, and paranoid kings, M’kuru and Zikora must do what they can, no matter how terrible, to save their people and claim vengeance for their families. But they are just two young people against an entire kingdom—and a prophecy destined to thwart their dreams. The last thing they can do is trust anyone…even each other.
Get it on Amazon or support your local bookstores through Bookshop.org.
A Theory of Dreaming by Ava Reid
Release date: July 29
Read it if: You want some dark academia romantasy in the best fantasy books of July 2025. After a stunning discovery, two would-be soulmates struggle to find the balance between dreams and reality.
Publisher’s synopsis: All stories come to an end.
Effy learned that when she defeated the Fairy King. Even though she may never know exactly what happened at Hiraeth, she is free of her nightmares and is able to pen a thesis with Preston on the beloved national fairytale Angharad. She has finally earned a spot at the literature college, making her the first woman in history to enroll.
But some dreams are dangerous, especially when they come true. The entire university—and soon the entire nation—is waiting for her to fail. With the Fairy King defeated and Myrddin’s legacy exposed, Effy can no longer escape into fantasy. Who is she without her stories?
With Effy under threat, Preston is surprised to discover a rage simmering inside him, ringing in his ears like bells. He begins to dream of a palace under the sea, a world where he is king—visions that start to follow him even in waking.
As the war between Llyr and Argant explodes, Effy and Preston find themselves caught in the crossfire: Effy losing her dreams and Preston losing himself in his.
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