George R.R. Martin, James S. A. Corey and Douglas Preston have a hand in some of the best new science fiction books of April 2026

I’m currently reading the sci-fi classic Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson with the New Scientist Book Club (this is our April read). It’s fantastic, so any further trips to the red planet are welcome from my point of view, and I’m looking forward to Charlotte Robinson’s thriller. March One. Elsewhere in this month’s sci-fi, there’s space horror from SA Barnes, resurrected Neanderthals from Douglas Preston and his daughter Aletheia Preston, and ghosts in AI-generated videos from Max Lury. There is something for everyone, I would say.

March One by Charlotte Robinson

This near-future space thriller follows a one-way mission to Mars, as well as the disappearance of a programmer in Hong Kong, who leaves behind only a cryptic warning. As the Argo spaceship heads towards Mars, the crew realizes that it is being sabotaged. How are the two plots linked? The one from Mars The editor compares this to two of my favorite books: Andy Weir’s. The Martian and Terry Hayes’ spy thriller I am a pilgrim. I hope it lives up to the hype, because a combination of these two novels would be a truly excellent read.

Claire and her beacon repair team pick up a strange distress signal and decide to investigate. They discover a luxurious spaceship that disappeared on its first tour of the solar system 20 years ago – and they also discover that something is wrong aboard the Aurora, with whispers in the dark and words scrawled in blood on the walls. Horror in space? It’s my cup of tea.

This collection of speculative short stories ranges from science fiction to fantasy to literary fiction, including stories of first contact, a time-traveling fisherman, and a new consciousness seeking the wonders of the universe. It also features Mills’ story Rabbit testwhich won the Nebula, Locus and Sturgeon awards.

This is a collection of stories set in the Game of Thrones from the author Wildcards universe, in which the world has been ravaged by an alien virus with random effects: you die, you receive superpowers, or you become strangely mutated. Featuring writers like Cherie Priest and Walter Jon Williams, these peculiar tales follow Croyd Crenson as he finds himself split into six different incarnations.

Paradox by Douglas Preston and Aletheia Preston

It was very silly, but I have to admit that I really enjoyed Preston’s previous novel. ExtinctionA Jurassic Parkthriller in which various long-extinct creatures have been brought back to life to frolic in a wildlife park. In this sequel, written with his daughter, there’s even more going on: an alien artifact that “UFO researchers say will change the world,” a fanatical secret society, and resurrected Neanderthals from the last book who aren’t too fond of. Homo sapiens…I hope I’ll read it.

This is the second of The War of the Captives series by the author of The Extent. It is a space opera in which humanity fights for survival against the monstrous Carryx Empire. We follow the story of human captive Dafyd Alkhor and the Swarm, an agent of the Carryx enemy who seeks to bring down the empire.

I’m intrigued by the sound of this novel, in which a science fiction conceit is used to tell a story of loneliness. Lonely Ada lives in London. When she meets Atticus, she feels a connection between them – but her estrangement from the rest of the world begins to widen, and eventually her attachment to the world and her body fails entirely, and Ada finds herself in a new artificial environment, The Facility. Was it really created and designed just for her?

Permanence by Sophie Mackintosh

I really loved Mackintosh’s previous novel The water curea sinister fable set on an island surrounded by water that may or may not have been venomous. It bordered on science fiction, even if it wasn’t there yet, and it seems to me that Permanence could do a similar thing. This new story follows Clara and Francis, who have a secret affair, carried out in hotel rooms – until they wake up in a room they don’t recognize. They discover that they are in a town populated only by their fellow adulterers, where they can live openly as a couple – but contact with the real world is impossible.

Event Horizon by Balsam Karam, translated by Saskia Vogel

Published by the independent literary press Fitzcarraldo, which has several Nobel Prizes under its belt, it is the story of Milde, 17, who rebels against the injustices of a government which banishes mothers and daughters from society. After being imprisoned and tortured, she is given the choice of a public execution or an experimental mission that will send her into space and a black hole known as the Mass.

This is a standalone story set in the Stroud universe. The fractal series, opening in 2121 AD, three years after the first conflict on Mars. As the colony struggles to recover, vigilante-turned-revolutionary Magnus Sirocco is given a cause, Peter Iskander leads a religious mission, and Commodore Ellisa Shann is drawn into a deadly duel when a ship is stolen.

I’m intrigued by the sound of this novel, in which Harlow, searching for his missing friend Annie, discovers fragments of the dead in AI-generated videos, while Kieran, also on Annie’s trail, finds a community searching for missing ghosts. Its publisher promises that it will explore new forms that haunting could take, as new technologies emerge. It may not be straight science fiction, but it sounds interesting.

Metro 2035 by Dmitri Glukhovsky

This is the last novel of the Metro trilogy that inspired Metro computer games. The story takes place 20 years after World War III wiped out most of humanity, with the only survivors being those who managed to enter the Moscow Metro. Artyom tirelessly tries to bring his people back to the light and searches for signs of life on the surface.

The many by Sylvain Neuvel

This first contact story sees five people in the small town of Marquette, Michigan discover their minds merging, as “something bigger and stranger than they could ever have imagined” begins.