12 must-read August YA book releases to close out your summer

The Dark Tide – Alicia Jasinska

A must-read new YA fantasy series kicks off with The Dark Tide, a story of a witch queen who must repeatedly sacrifice a boy in order to appease the titular dark tide and keep the city-island of Caldella from sinking into a hungry ocean.

But when the Witch Queen Natalia decided to sacrifice herself rather than the boy she loved, she left her sister Eva to rule in her place. Eva, having already lost so much, chooses to harden her heart against further pain by literally removing it. But the ritual to keep Caldella safe requires the queen to suffer, and in feeling nothing, Eva has ensured that her home and her people are in terrible danger.

But when she’s given the chance to kill the boy she blames for the death of her sister, she crosses paths with a girl named Lina, who offers herself as a sacrifice in his place. And as they await the full moon together, they become closer than they ever could have imagined – which will ultimately lead to an impossible choice.

The official synopsis goes into a lot more detail about the novel’s story.

"Every year on St. Walpurga’s Eve, Caldella’s Witch Queen lures a boy back to her palace. An innocent life to be sacrificed on the full moon to keep the island city from sinking. Lina Kirk is convinced her brother is going to be taken this year. To save him, she enlists the help of Thomas Lin, the boy she secretly loves, and the only person to ever escape from the palace. But they draw the queen’s attention, and Thomas is chosen as the sacrifice. Queen Eva watched her sister die to save the boy she loved. Now as queen, she won’t make the same mistake. She’s willing to sacrifice anyone if it means saving herself and her city. When Lina offers herself to the queen in exchange for Thomas’s freedom, the two girls await the full moon together. But Lina is not at all what Eva expected, and the queen is nothing like Lina envisioned. Against their will, they find themselves falling for each other. As water floods Caldella’s streets and the dark tide demands its sacrifice, they must choose who to save: themselves, each other, or the island city relying on them both."

The Dark Tide is available on August 4.