Waiting On Wednesday: Macmillan Fall 2014 Catalog

Waiting On Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Jill of Breaking The Spine in which upcoming, eagerly anticipated releases are highlighted on the blog.

This week, I've chosen to feature a few picks from the Macmillan Fall 2014 Catalog:

The Vault of Dreamers by Caragh M. O'Brien
Date: September 16, 2014

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The Forge School is the most prestigious arts school in the country. The secret to its success:  every moment of the students' lives is televised as part of the insanely popular Forge Show, and the students' schedule includes twelve hours of induced sleep meant to enhance creativity. But when first year student Rosie Sinclair skips her sleeping pill, she discovers there is something off about Forge. In fact, she suspects that there are sinister things going on deep below the reaches of the cameras in the school. What's worse is, she starts to notice that the edges of her consciousness do not feel quite right. And soon, she unearths the ghastly secret that the Forge School is hiding—and what it truly means to dream there.

While it is true that I am a bit over dystopians at this point, I still can't help but feel drawn to premises such as the one in The Vault of Dreamers. I feel like I just need to know this ghastly secret that the school is hiding! And I've heard great things about Caragh M. O'Brien's Birthmarked, so I'm definitely curious about this new book of hers!

Bitter Greens by Kate Forsyth
Date: September 23, 2014

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French novelist Charlotte-Rose de la Force has been banished from the court of Versailles by the Sun King, Louis XIV, after a series of scandalous love affairs. At the convent, she is comforted by an old nun, Sœur Seraphina, who tells her the tale of a young girl who, a hundred years earlier, is sold by her parents for a handful of bitter greens...
After Margherita’s father steals parsley from the walled garden of the courtesan Selena Leonelli, he is threatened with having both hands cut off, unless he and his wife relinquish their precious little girl. Selena is the famous red-haired muse of the artist Tiziano, first painted by him in 1512 and still inspiring him at the time of his death. She is at the center of Renaissance life in Venice, a world of beauty and danger, seduction and betrayal, love and superstition.
Locked away in a tower, Margherita sings in the hope that someone will hear her. One day, a young man does.

Wooo Rapunzel retelling!! Of course I loved such retellings as Cress and Tangled so I feel like I have to read this! Bitter Greens sounds amazing and I love how real history is worked into the story. It's already received a lot of buzz from readers as it was originally released a couple of years ago in Australia, so that's pretty exciting!

Lailah by Nikki Kelly
Date: October 7, 2014

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The girl knows she’s different. She doesn’t age. She has no family. She has visions of a past life, but no clear clues as to what she is, or where she comes from. But there is a face in her dreams – a light that breaks through the darkness. She knows his name is Gabriel.
On her way home from work, the girl encounters an injured stranger whose name is Jonah. Soon, she will understand that Jonah belongs to a generation of Vampires that serve even darker forces. Jonah and the few like him, are fighting with help from an unlikely ally – a rogue Angel, named Gabriel.
In the crossfire between good and evil, love and hate, and life and death, the girl learns her name: Lailah. But when the lines between black and white begin to blur, where in the spectrum will she find her place? And with whom?
Gabriel and Jonah both want to protect her. But Lailah will have to fight her own battle to find out who she truly is.

Okay so, there's definitely a love triangle at play here - which could be disastrous - and it sounds pretty romance-heavy - which is not my kind of thing - and there are vampires and angels - which I'm kind of over at this point -, BUT! Well, Lailah has been getting some pretty smashing early reviews and I have been wrong about romance-heavy paranormals before (Daughter of Smoke and Bone, I'm looking at you), so I'm definitely curious about this one. I'll wait for more reviews to come out though before making the decision to read it.

The Accidental Highwayman: Being the Tale of Kit Bristol, His Horse Midnight, a Mysterious Princess, and Sundry Magical Persons Besides by Ben Tripp
Date: October 14, 2014

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In eighteenth-century England, young Christopher “Kit” Bristol is the unwitting servant of notorious highwayman Whistling Jack. One dark night, Kit finds his master bleeding from a mortal wound, dons the man’s riding cloak to seek help, and changes the course of his life forever. Mistaken for Whistling Jack and on the run from redcoats, Kit is catapulted into a world of magic and wonders he thought the stuff of fairy tales.
Bound by magical law, Kit takes up his master’s quest to rescue a rebellious fairy princess from an arranged marriage to King George III of England. But his task is not an easy one, for Kit must contend with the feisty Princess Morgana, goblin attacks, and a magical map that portends his destiny: as a hanged man upon the gallows….

OMG how can you not love that title and accompanying beautiful typography-laden cover?! The Accidental Highwayman sounds like it will follow in the vein of the classical fairy-tale fantasies that we all know and love, so of course I'm ALL over it.


How about you? Are you waiting on any of these Macmillan Fall 2014 reads? Are there any upcoming books from the Macmillan Fall 2014 Catalog that I didn't include here that you feel I should add to my list?