SEPTEMBER TEXAS BOOK PREVIEW
Preview of Texas-connected books publishing in September, 2026
Welcome aboard the Lone Star Lit Express!
Take the September Texas Books Preview train to reach the latest and greatest Texas-connected new releases. Join your significant other on a trip to Romance Station. Grab a connection to New Nonfiction. Buy a ticket to Mystery and Suspense. Join the littles in your life on a visit to Children’s Fiction. Follow the rails to Fantasy and Adventure. Need some direction? The LSLL Conductor has these first-class titles to put you on the track to your next favorite read.
Against the background of real participants, places, and events of World War II, fictional characters interact with them to create an alternative ending to the deadliest military conflict in history, which saw sixty million people killed, incalculable numbers wounded and homeless, and the clouded dawn of a changed world. And the Walls Came Tumbling Down combines treachery, evil, war, and hope for a better future. But at what cost?
With warmth, wit, and a sharp eye for the comedy tucked inside ordinary days, Miller celebrates the beautiful imbalance between domestic duty and creative ambition — the dead tomato plant that meant more than a paycheck, the chaos that became comedy, and the love that held it all together.
There are many devils in Texas. Too many. Join us for a discussion of a few in southwest Texas. You’ve never heard of them for a reason.
A sadistic murder of a Mexican American teenager in 1953 and the demented slaughter of a Mexican American family in 1968 have remained unsolved for decades. Both slayings were linked by geography, prejudice and perversity. Both atrocities were committed at the intersection of race, class and entitlement. The aggrieved community and key agencies of law enforcement turned a blind eye. A reckoning is long overdue, and Devil of Devils delivers the impetus.
The Dread from the Drows is the epic fantasy sequel that raises the stakes of the smash bestseller The Orphans of Nilad, and proves that some journeys home begin by venturing deeper into the unknown.
What if your future self told you the world was ending, and the only way to stop it was to… go to school?!
For Lu Jacobs, losing her grandma was a double-whammy—costing her the one person who understood her love of math and upending her world. She escapes reality by dominating The Aftermath, a VR game with clear rules and consequences.
When her future self appears with a warning that a rogue AI is rewriting history, Lu must infiltrate the ultra-advanced Prescott Academy to stop it. Hidden among the high-tech classrooms is a sentient program pretending to be human—and if Lu and her gaming team can’t expose it in time, reality becomes a permanent virtual prison.
Crystal Marie Reynolds thought she understood the world around her—until a whisper begins calling her toward something she cannot explain. What starts as an unsettling interruption becomes an invitation into a reality where the unseen is closer than she imagined and every choice carries weight.
Drawn toward the mysterious Fortress, Crystal must learn to recognize the voice calling her, confront what has kept her bound, and discover who she was created to become. But awakening comes with a cost, and not every voice speaking into her life wants her free.
The Lion’s Whisper is a gripping Christian supernatural novel about identity, spiritual warfare, courage, and the unmistakable voice of the King. A whisper can shake kingdoms.
In a case of duplicity and deception, Sydney Lockhart and Ralph Dixon travel to the Faust Hotel in New Braunfels, Texas, where Milton Sweetwater checked in and soon disappeared.
When the police find Sweetwater’s body on the bank of the Guadalupe River, guess who’s wanted for questioning?
Sydney fears her past has come back to haunt her, and only a flimsy motive keeps her out of jail. With Dixon recovering from a gunshot wound, Lydia LaBeau and Cousin Ruth Echland arrive to help unravel the mystery. However, Lydia becomes interested in birdwatching, and Ruth, undercover as a Miss Texas contestant, gets too involved in the pageant to focus on the investigation. To make matters worse, a dead body’s found in Sydney’s apartment, and Lydia disappears.
After her mother’s death, Abigail thinks she and her brother will inherit their mother’s estate equally. She doesn’t expect the shocking decision revealed in her mother’s will, a final act meant to change both her children’s lives and push Abigail beyond the grief and need for control that have kept her from moving forward.
As Abigail struggles to understand her mother’s decision, old wounds and secrets arise. Now she must decide whether redemption is worth the risk, confront truths about the mother she thought she knew, and learn to open her heart again.
Naomi’s Legacy is an inspiring story of love, loss, forgiveness, and second chances. It asks: Is a legacy measured by what we leave behind, or by the lives we change?
The day foster child Benny Garza is kidnapped, homicide detectives Deborah Smith and Alex Luna find the bones of a little girl not far from his abduction site. Determined to save him and solve a five-year-old murder, the two travel from the seamy underside of San Antonio’s drug-dealing gang territory to the back roads of rural America.
Deborah struggles to hang on to her newfound sobriety in the face of the pressure of her job, while Alex fights to get a foothold in the life of a woman who refuses to trust him or any other man.
As the two investigations become more entwined, Deborah and Alex risk everything—even their lives—to bring a little boy home and unmask a child’s murderer.
In 1890s McDade, Texas, Dellie O’Barr is given everything a young woman is supposed to want—security, status, and marriage to a prosperous rancher. But beneath the polished surface of her life, Dellie’s heart stirs with longings she cannot name and passions she cannot quiet. Dellie’s restlessness stirs to life when she begins to embrace the Populist cause—and the man who embodies it.
In a world where loyalty is survival and scandal can kill, Dellie discovers the greatest danger lies not outside her home, but within her own heart, as she steps into a storm of passion and betrayal.
In the first history of this vital river, historian Scot McFarlane illuminates how the Trinity has defined Texas history. Its floods enriched the soil and destroyed crops, its channel served as both a route and barrier to freedom, and its once-polluted waters now sustain a significant portion of the state.
McFarlane’s captivating narrative brims with stories of the people who called the Trinity home over the centuries: the Comanche, steamboat pilots, enslaved and freed people, sharecroppers, inmates, and millions of urban residents. The result is a fresh perspective on economic development, slavery, and the environment—revealing the Trinity not as a backdrop to Texas history but as a force that shaped it.
Welcome to New England. Sitting quietly on the Other Cape is a sleepy coastal town. Through the fall and winter, the town feels untouched by time. The narrow streets are calm, the harbor is still, and the sea air carries only the sounds of seagulls and fishing boats.
In the dead of winter, a stranger hidden behind a family arrives. At first, nothing seems strange about a new family in town. Even this late in the school year.
Before long, it becomes clear that this arrival wasn’t happenstance. The stranger is running from something, but what? Why did they choose this town that only comes alive for part of the year? As the days begin to grow longer and the promise of spring is in the air, the stranger makes their move. Nothing will ever be the same.
A struggling single mother and a suspicious widow, at odds. Both have a habit of hiding from hard truths.
When a Tragedy No One Sees Coming Divides Their Small Texas Town, Secrets Rise to the Surface.
INSPIRED BY REAL EVENTS.
BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!
There are so many Texas-connected books publishing this month that we couldn’t feature all of them. The following books also publish in September:
CHILDREN'S, MIDDLE GRADE, & YOUNG ADULT BOOKS
Did You Hear What Happened at the Alamo? by Katie Kennedy
Don’t Be Scared by Saadia Faruqi
The Girl in Green by Laura Creedle
Let it Wag by Natalie McKearin
The Miracle Menorah of Mariupol by Nancy Churnin
Ms. Swirly’s Compliment Machine by Jana Mattern
Of Compassion of Courage by Kendra E. Ardnek
Off the Rails by Susan Count
Rosie’s Cowboy Christmas: Saving the Holidays Together by Paige Murray
The Secret to Belonging by Megan E. Freeman
Snow-Clearing Day by Breanna Carzoo
Steamboat’s The Name by Preston Lewis & Harriet Kocher Lewis
Tastes like Candy 2 by Jessica Lacy
Turkey On the Run by Alayne Kay Christian
FANTASY / SCI-FI
Ashes of the Order by Lynn Nodima
Billy’s and Johnny’s Road Trip To The Hidden Planet by Brian Yansky
The Chronicles of Reaper: Harmony by Irish Rivers
A Hard Left by Paul McGrath
Heimlock by Jenna Avery
Knight of the Golden Platter by Cynthia Breeding
Night of the Cooters by Howard Waldrop
The Nymph King by Jacquelyn Gilmore
Unbearable by A. Lee Martinez
The Worst Carrier in the Resistance by Skyler Ramirez
MYSTERY / HORROR
Crystal Clear Standing by Leanne Leeds
Danishes and Death by Nova Walsh
Dead Body in the Water by L.J. Breedlove
Deadly Relic by Jeff Kerr
Done Dirty by Liliana Hart
Fighting Edge by Margaret Miziushima
First Chance by Kasey Lansdale
Glazed Grudges by Erica J. Whelton
It Runs in the Family by Denise Grover Swank
Kolaches and Killers by Erica J. Whelton
The Memory House by Mary Alford
The Murder at Mesa Verde by Jayna Morrow
Murder is Personal by BJ Condike
Normal for the Spider by Hank Schwaeble
Off-Target by D.J. Maughan
Owl the Small Things by Leanne Leeds
Project Chimera by Natasha Bajema
Ranger Devotion by Lynn Shannon
The Raven by Susan McCauley
Safe Anchor by Charlene Tess & Judi Thompson
Sanctuary and Sabotage by Lori DeJong
Stomped by Bessie Barr
The Vanished Sister by Sherry Thomas
NONFICTION
Basic Pistol: Living and Dying by the Gun in America by Harel Shapira
The Best American Newspaper Narratives, Volume 13 by Gayle Reaves
The Blackwell School by Cristobal Lopez and Dr. Kirsten Gardner
A Brief History of the Philippines by Gregg Jones
Chomping at the Bit by Matt Evans
The Daring World War II Raid on Ploesti by William R. Bradle
Deluge Before Dawn by Thomas R. Fox
The Educator’s Guide to Texas School Law by Jim Walsh & Sarah Orman
Hill Country Ball by Richard W. Butler
I Once Knew a Guy Named Charlie by Jaclyn Smith
John M. Schofield: Soldier–Statesman of the Civil War and Gilded Age by Robert Wooster
Living and Writing in West Texas: Two Speeches by Elmer Kelton by Elmer Kelton, Foreward by Patrick Dearen
Lone Star Séance: A History of Texas Spiritualism by John Benedict Buescher
The Long Road to Surrender by Jeff Whelchel
Looking for Justice in Texas edited by Omar Valerio-Jiménez
The Only Thing There Is to Want by Sarah Hepola
Pati Jinich Foods of La Frontera by Pati Jinich
Perini Ranch Steakhouse Cocktails: Celebrating the Tradition and Spirit of Cocktail Hour by Tom Perini & Lisa Perini
Rewriting American Architecture edited by Charles L. Davis, Kathryn E. Holliday and Joanna Merwood-Salisbury
Stolen by Lauren Burns
The Story the Bones Tell by Sally Logue Post
Texas and the Civil War by Carl H. Moneyhon
Texas Cotton and Confederate Finance by L. Tuffly Ellis and Richard B. McCaslin
The Texas Fencing Riposte by John Lee Baird
The Texas Way by William H. Cunningham and Monty Jones
Treason and Traitors in Texas: Facilitators of the American Civil War by Randolph Farmer
Ungrateful Immigrant Daughter: A Memoir From the Child of a Mail-Order Bride by Katya Suvorova
“When All Our Troubles Will Be Forgotten”: The Civil War Letters and Recollections of Captain George Henry Pettis by Jerry D. Thompson
OTHER FICTION
Bejeweled: Jezebel’s Story by Amy W. Vogel
Blood of the Oath by W.D. Smith
Great is Thy Faithfulness by Caryl McAdoo
The Hard-boiled Era: The Architects of Crime Noir by K.C. Sivils
Shadowing You by Robin Patchen
Texas Promise by Mark Greathouse
That Texas Blood: Hell Comes to Allison Ranch #1 by Chris Condon
Two Birds, One Stone by J.J. Bonham
Wheat: Rust & Ruin by Tom Abrahams
The Witch of Sonora by Johnnie Bernhard
POETRY
Days & Chances by Joanna Klink
The E.Q. of a Lyricist Volume I by T.D. Montena
The House Has Teeth by Aldo Amparán
I Am Trying to Love the Whole World by Jenny Browne
ROMANCE
The Alpha Wolf’s Secret Baby Boy by Kayla Wolf
Alpha’s Conquest by Elizabeth Dunlap
Alpha’s Wife by Kayla Wolf
Battle Scars by Jennifer Rebecca
Beneath the Texas Sky by Sarah Shah
A Betrothal So Bloody by Mary Dublin & Anne Kendsley
Branded by Bonnie Poirer
Bright is the Light by Linda Broday
Cass by Claire Shaw
A Chance at Home by Beth Gildersleeve
Claimed by the EX-SEALS by Adelaide Brook
Claimed By The Mountain Man by Shaw Hart
The Cowboy Contractor by Honey Dallas
Cowboy Elite: Joe by Mindy Neff
The Cowboy’s Marriage of Convenience by Elizabeth Jane Adams
Crossfire Creek Vengeance by Delores Fossen
The Decoy by Ava Sutton
Diamond by Mackenzy Fox
Dyeing Forsoothly by L J Mercer
East of Desire by Jules Woods
Falling for Keeps by Kasey Stockton
Flirty Fall Fling by Lyra Parish
Forced to Run by Mallory King
Fortune’s Baby Dilemma by Tif Marcelo
Goats and Soap by L J Mercer
Grumpy by Elise Gedicke
A Hart to Call Home by S Sidney
Haunt Mess by Kat Wilde
Healing My Protector by Samantha C Michaels
Heartstrings and Mercenary Things by Sarah Primiano
Her Reluctant Protector by Maya Black
Her Wounded Protector by Liza Bee
His Texas Claim by Avery Snow
How to Break a Bad Boy by Mallory Black
Isabella’s Promise by Jovie Grace
Isleen, Sequoia Bride by Linda Carroll-Brad
It’s Got to be You by Twinkle Zaman
Just My Luck by Jill Sanders
Knocked up by a Texas Cowboy 2 by Ky West
Labor of Love by Jenna Lockwood
Liberating Lily by Laylah Roberts
Little Fangs of Bliss by Clio Evans
Little Spell of Stars by Clio Evans
Make It A Double by Amber Palmer
Merlot at Midnight by Regina Morris
The Mistletoe Baby by Heidi Main
Oops, I Fell For The Ranch Hand Next Door by Tiffany Bloom
Pretend Its Forever by Carrie Ann Ryan
Right Up His Alley by Bradley James & Anastasia Dean
Risking it for the Cowboy by E. Elizabeth Watson
Sapphire by Mackenzy Fox
September’s Cowboy Travis by Eve London
She’s Getting Married by Kelly Smith
A Star in the West by Karen Witemeyer
Taylor’s Warrior by Christie Adams
The Texan’s Surprise Son by Sasha Summers
Texas by H.N. Defore
Torrent’s Treasure by Nat Logan
Tortured Hero by Jo Grafford
Trapped by M.R. Becker
Tutoring Her Rebellious Knight by Kaity Norriss
Unscheduled Stop: Always by Kathryn Kaleigh
Up in a Blaze by Alice Brown
A Very Grumpy Green Beret by Shaw Hart
Wilder by Evie Riley
Worth Keeping by Janalyn Knight
XOXO, Yours by Kat Baxter