Time for some February books, and also a few for March! And maybe one for June? Idk I think it’s a long story…

In Time With You by Kristin Dwyer
After the Fall by Edward Ashton
Otherworldly by Dwain Worrell
Sentient by Michael Nayak
Postscript by Cory McCarthy
All We Have is Time by Amy Tordoff

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In Time with You: A Novel by Kristin Dwyer
Published by Wednesday Books on March 3, 2026
Pages: 384
Format:eARC
Source:Copy provided by publisher for review, via Netgalley

A gripping speculative romance about one girl saving her first love's life by falling for the last person she ever should - his best friend.

Nieve Monroe is devastated after her boyfriend Carter dies saving her from drowning. Even worse she blames herself for his death… and so does his best friend, Max. He was there with them on that fateful day, and he’s never liked Nieve.

Unable to pull herself from her grief and wanting to hide from the accusation in his eyes, Nieve goes to stay with her grandmother, who has always had strange stories to tell of uncanny happenings, of magic and make believe. The next morning, Nieve wakes up on the first day of college, the year before.

This time she plans to make sure Carter never follows her into that river. She’ll do everything in her power to keep him safe, even if it means losing him in other ways. But the more distance she puts between her and Carter, the closer she gets to Max, drawn to him in ways she never expected.

But is she betraying Carter if the only way she can save him is to move on? And can she ever forget her past to embrace her future?

Kristin Dwyer’s In Time With You is a heartbreaking story of first love, loss, and one chance to change everything.

So, I loved this book. Loved, loved, loved. The book had me from the start, where we’re introduced to a grieving Nieve at her boyfriend’s funeral. Oof, right? I was completely sucked in, and felt so much for Nieve. And honestly, it just kept getting better from there! We have:

• Amazing side characters! Okay Nieve’s grandma is my favorite, full stop. I adored this woman! Her cousin Linden is such a great support too, and I loved their bond. Max and Carter are equally well-developed characters, and honestly their whole friend group was epic. Also, don’t forget the sheep!
• Nieve has to face herself, in every timeline. Nieve is, when we meet her, in an identity crisis, because she’s kind of wrapped herself up in the identity of “Carter’s girlfriend” and well, he’s dead(ish). And when Nieve ends up back at the start, she has to reconcile that Carter literally does not know her, even though she has her memories of their time together.
• The timeline resets were bonkers and fun and added some levity to the story, which I appreciated.
• I loved the romance. A lot. Keeping it vague, friends. Keeping it vague.
• It is just so easy to fall in love with. I thought about it even when I wasn’t reading it, and honestly if that isn’t a sign of a great book, Idk what is.

Bottom Line: The only negative I can come up with is that I am forced to wait at least another year for a new Kristin Dwyer book.

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After the Fall by Edward Ashton
Published by St. Martin's Press on February 24, 2026
Pages: 288
Source:Copy provided by publisher for review, via Netgalley

Part alien invasion story, part buddy comedy, and part workplace satire

Would humans really make great pets?

Humans must be silent. Humans must be obedient. Humans must be good.

All his life, John has tried to live by those rules. Most days, it’s not too difficult. A hundred and twenty years after The Fall, and a hundred years after the grays swept in to pick the last dregs of humanity out of the wreckage of a ruined world, John has found himself bonded to Martok Barden nee Black Hand, one of the "good" grays. Sure, Martok is broke, homeless, and borderline manic, but he’s always treated John like an actual person, and sometimes like a friend. It’s a better deal than most humans get.

But when Martok puts John’s bond up as collateral against an abandoned house in the woods that he hopes to turn into a wilderness retreat for wealthy grays, John learns that there are limits to Martok’s friendship. Soon he finds himself caught between an underworld boss who thinks Martok is something that he very much is not, a girl who was raised by feral humans and has nothing but contempt for pets like John, and Martok himself, whose delusions of grandeur seem to be finally catching up with him.

Also, not for nothing, something in the woods has been killing people.

John has sixty days before Martok’s loan comes due to unravel the mystery of how humans wound up holding the wrong end of the domestication stick and find a way to turn Martok’s half-baked plans into profit enough to buy back his life, all while avoiding getting butchered by feral humans or having his head crushed by an angry gray. Easy peasy, right?

I did not quite know what to expect from After the Fall, and was a wee bit worried, because humans as pets?! But as with every other Edward Ashton book I’ve read, it definitely works! John is a human just trying to survive with his… owner(? Idk that sounds wrong, but also accurate, so let’s roll with it) Martok. Martok is an alien of some sort (in fairness, I could never quite picture him, but as I have said before, I am bad at that, so that might be on me) but he also generally treats John pretty well- way better than most other grays. John thinks of Matrok as a friend, and thinks the feeling is close to mutual. Until Martok uses John as collateral for a house he wants to buy.

I mean, I personally wouldn’t leverage my friends, but John doesn’t really know any better, having grown up in a creche for the sole purpose of being sold to one of these aliens. So you have to forgive him his blissful ignorance. Martok grabs another human, named Six, and she’s wildly entertaining. Six was raised partly by feral humans- that is, humans who weren’t raised in the creche to serve the aliens, humans who somehow survived the end of the world/alien takeover.

This is funny and charming, heartbreaking and heartwarming, a very unique end-of-the-world take, and provides a good amount of commentary. I did want a few more answers and world-building, but it was wholly enjoyable and entertaining, so that is a win!

Bottom Line: I too feel like I would have been a creche reject, John. 

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Otherworldly by Dwain Worrell
Published by 47North on March 1, 2026
Pages: 301
Format:eARC
Source:Copy provided by publisher for review, via Netgalley

From award-winning writer, producer, and filmmaker Dwain Worrell comes a poignant and thrilling science fiction adventure about a young astronaut navigating addiction and loss who finds herself stranded on a mysterious planet where members of her crew go missing one by one.

Cleo Xavier is a renowned astronaut and explorer—not an addict. At least, that’s what she tells herself. She’s always been able to navigate the isolation and loneliness that come with space exploration, which makes her a perfect candidate to join four other astronauts on a mission to Orbis Alius, the farthest planet in the solar system, to test its terraforming viability.

But when Cleo and her crew arrive on Orbis Alius, its orbiting wasteland reveals mysteries and horrors that none of them could ever imagine. Here, the tortured atmosphere changes as dramatically as the landscape. The sky itself seems to be descending. And something sinister lurks in the unknown. One by one, the crew goes missing and Cleo must venture deeper into the planet to save them—even while she finds herself falling to old vices as the isolation she once so craved becomes as oppressive as the shifting black fog.

The farther Cleo ventures and the more she uncovers about the secrets Orbis Alius holds, the more she starts to realize that maybe she isn’t alone at all.

Otherworldly is a very cool concept, basically summed up as this: Cleo and a very small band of explorers are sent to Orbis Alius, a new(?) planet found in the outer reaches of the solar system to explore and see if they can terraform it. Scientists have conclusively decided that there is no sentient life other than humans, and I don’t fully get why that matters to this mission, but I guess it does? Anyway. Cool, right? Let’s see what this planet has to offer!

Here’s the thing: I kept thinking that this would be much cooler as a movie, because I was having a bit of a hard time visualizing all the unique attributes of the planet. That is likely on me- I have a hard time with that sort of thing, so blame me, not the author. That said, the author is a filmmaker, so it makes sense that this would work in that medium, too. Anyway, I liked the adventure side of it, but I did wish we got to know the characters a bit better. Even though we’re in Cleo’s head, I didn’t feel like I totally knew her, or what made her tick all the time. Her rapping AI bot was fun, though like some others said, the rhyming got a little difficult to read at points. Still, clever enough that it gave Shakes (the bot, named after Shakespeare of course) some personality, and I liked that. The other characters just didn’t feel very fleshed out, especially the two dudes whose names I have already forgotten.

I also have a bit of a gripe: there are a lot of references to contemporary people, music, brand logos, etc. And sure, maybe a handful of those things will survive centuries, but overall? No one will remember most of our pop culture in hundreds of years. Like sorry to him, but no one is referencing Kristaps Porziņģis in 3 centuries. They just aren’t. I know it is a minor gripe, but man I needed to get it off my chest. Anyway.

It did get a little repetitive/draggy in the middle, which is honestly my biggest qualm. Especially since we’re in Cleo’s head most of the time, it felt a little rough in the middle. Cleo also has a lot of plot armor along the way, too. Like- she’s near death at least half a dozen times, but you know she’s not dying at 40%, you know? That said, I was invested enough to want to know what happened, and I did think that the ending was quite fitting and well done, so that’s a nice way to tie it all up.

Bottom Line:  Honestly this would be a very cool movie. Atmosphere and concept and ideas are definitely on point!

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Sentient by Michael Nayak
Series: Ice Plague Wars #2
Published by Angry Robot on February 24, 2026
Pages: 336
Format:eARC
Source:Copy provided by publisher for review, via Netgalley

Extinction Horizon meets Contagion in this sequel to 2025's sci-fi thriller Symbiote, where the biological threat has escaped the South Pole and is now wreaking havoc upon humanity.

The survivors of the South Pole massacre will find that getting off the Antarctic continent may cost them their lives…

Months after the events of Symbiote, sunrise has come to the ice continent. At the coastal McMurdo Station (77 deg S), that means an annual series of flights to lay the groundwork for the 1,500 summer visitors that will soon call “Mac” home. Among the Winfly crew are the architects of Have Viking, the classified CIA program that unleashed the microbes onto Dome-A. They are determined to discover what happened with their experiment, and harvest samples of the mutated microbes to turn into a biological weapon.

Their plan goes haywire when the microbe-symbiote Ben Jacobs shows up after an impossible walk from Pole. When Ben is reunited with an asymptomatic carrier of the symbiotic microbes (Penny), all hell breaks loose at McMurdo. The microbes have their origins in the icy waters of Antarctic lakes, and the sea ice surrounding the station becomes a fertile breeding ground for a new and more dangerous infestation. Rajan Chariya and his friends will have to join forces with the CIA to fight the onslaught of infected “sea people” roving the snowy streets of McMurdo. But as they dig in to make their new stand, when do they stop being useful to Langley, and start being targets who know too much?

Worse, Penny may not be the only asymptomatic carrier…

I was quite eager to get to Sentient after really enjoying Symbiote last year, and it was a satisfying conclusion! The action picks up back at the South Pole, where the survivors of the messiness are trying to figure out their next move. Meanwhile, it’s about to be summer in Antarctica, which means an influx of people- bad news for humanity, good news for the symbiote.

Without giving anything about either book away, the atmosphere is equally fabulous, and the tensions are insanely high. Obviously, the stakes are also gigantic, but we know from the start of the first book that some semblance of humanity survives via the first-hand accounts we get over a decade in the future. This, for me, does take a little of the intensity out of the situation, because you do sort of know the outcome of a few things/characters. But, for all those things we don’t know, the intensity is there.

I liked that there was a more tightened focus on fewer characters (that might be because so many others are dead, but whatever, it made me feel more connected to the ones who live).  There are a ton of morally gray decisions to be made, and a great balance of character moments and action, and I really appreciated that. Now, I thought this was a duology, but I am hearing that maybe it is not? I think I would be content if it wrapped up here, but I would also definitely read more, so bring it on!

Bottom Line: Great follow-up, we love a high stakes, high octane sequel!

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Postscript by Cory McCarthy
Published by Dutton Books for Young Readers on February 17, 2026
Pages: 240
Format:eARC
Source:Copy provided by publisher for review, via Netgalley

From Stonewall Honoree Cory McCarthy, a heartbreaking, joyful, read-it-in-one-sitting YA novel about the last of us.

“I’m not sure the how-pocalypse changes anything. I don’t think about it; this is hard enough.”

This is a depopulated archipelago off the coast of Massachusetts, home to a tiny handful of sapiens sifting the remnants of civilization for scraps of comfort and joy.

There’s no sense in trying to figure out exactly how humans got to this place of endless gray skies and so many mass graves—that’s a very long letter no one has the heart to read again. What matters is this fleeting postscript, a strangely joyous house of bones built by an unlikely quintet of survivors.

Postscript is a melancholic yet beautiful take on the apocalypse. Weird sentence, sure, but let’s go with it. The vibe is spot on- you can really feel the isolation, and the desperation, at the end of the world. The author does not sugar coat that things are bad, and that people can be bad, but they also can be really great too. It’s all in how the characters choose to live and what they live for. The world-building is sparse, but I feel like that was kind of the point- it didn’t quite matter to the characters why things got this way, they just had to live with it. There was a lot of character growth in this tiny book, and I absolutely adored the found family aspect. Main character West is wonderful, and it’s impossible to not like him. He has a sort of childlike wonder that is hard to keep in tact in any time, but I imagine especially so at the end of the world. The only thing I felt a little iffy on was that West seemed quite a bit younger than Emil- was he? Perhaps not, perhaps Emil just seemed older, and maybe it doesn’t quite matter when there are only a handful of people left, but I did kind of wish that was explained a bit better, mostly for my own peace of mind. But, a small gripe in an otherwise really lovely story. I could not put it down- when the synopsis tells you “read-it-in-one-sitting”, it isn’t lying.

Bottom Line:  Heartwarming and heartbreaking all at once, this short novel packed a big punch.

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All We Have Is Time by Amy Tordoff
Published by Atria Books on February 24, 2026
Pages: 352
Format:eARC
Source:Copy provided by publisher for review, via Netgalley

In this fresh and entrancing debut novel that is perfect for fans of The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue and The Ministry of Time, a jaded immortal woman and a time traveler fall in love across the centuries, learning what it means to really live and love before their time together runs out.

1605, London. Beatrix lives a solitary life in the shadows, wandering the city streets looking for ways to forget. Forget that everyone she has ever loved has been dead for nearly a century. Forget that, for her, love can only ever mean loss. Because Beatrix has a secret: a lifetime ago her deathbed wish was granted, making her immortal.

Until one day, while picking pockets amid the raucous crowds of Shakespeare's Globe, she meets Oliver. They spend a single, perfect day together before he tells her that he has to leave. She’s not surprised; eternity is a lonely place.

When Beatrix and Oliver meet again by chance a century later, recognition hits her like a bolt of lightning. It’s impossible. He’s impossible. Just like her. A chance for Beatrix to truly live – and love – again sparks into existence.

Woven between the biggest events in history and the quiet moments lost to it, from London in 1605 to Woodstock in 1969 and beyond, All We Have Is Time is an unforgettable love story for anyone who believes love can rewrite the rules of time.

“Everyone she has ever known is gone. Everyone she has ever loved is dead. But she is still here, still twenty-three, still Beatrix. She will exist forever and always, and not at all.”

Before I get into this review, I have some questions and comments. Like, when is this book coming out? Netgalley says tomorrow, but bookstores say June. So I don’t know what to do about that. I’ll go ahead and review it now, because if I wait until June, I’m going to forget all the things!

Second. I’ve not read Addie LaRue. So is this similar? I haven’t a clue! You’ll just have to take someone else’s word for it, and I am afraid the results are quite divided. So, it might be too much like Addie, or it might not, but your guess is as good as mine.

All that to say, I adored this book! It hit me right in the feels, friends. Over and over and over. Honestly, just putting myself in Beatrix’s shoes was emotional, can you even imagine living for centuries as the world changes around you? Waiting for your one small glimmer of hope to return? And for Oliver’s part, he’s trying to race against time, literally, as he tries to see Beatrix before he dies. I also loved the little glimpses of history. Obviously, we can’t linger too long in any one time period, but it was so cool watching time march on. From Beatrix’s youth in Lancaut (very cool, look it up!) to 1600s London, to the Space Race, I devoured that part of the story, too. Beatrix having to reinvent herself over and over was so thought provoking- and heartbreaking, too. My one gripe is that Oliver is supposed to be like, 200 years in our future, but it seems awfully contemporary. I just wish his world felt a little more futuristic or something, I don’t know. But I was able to mostly put that aside because I enjoyed all the other stuff so much. View Spoiler »And the ending, I know it was fitting, so I can’t exactly gripe, but I did want an HEA. I really did. Not sorry. « Hide Spoiler

Bottom Line: This one made me cry, it make me think, and I really enjoyed it.

Have you read any of these books? Plan to? Let us chat about them!