5 Hot New Titles for August 2020

Check out these popular adult titles that will hit our collection in August. To see more titles, including new titles in popular series, check out our new titles page.

Summaries provided by the publishers.

Author Alexis Daria brings readers an unforgettable, hilarious rom-com set in the drama-filled world of telenovelas in You Had Me at Hola


After a messy public breakup, soap opera darling Jasmine Lin Rodriguez finds her face splashed across the tabloids. When she returns to her hometown of New York City to film the starring role in a bilingual romantic comedy for the number one streaming service in the country, Jasmine figures her new “Leading Lady Plan” should be easy enough to follow - until a casting shake-up pairs her with telenovela hunk Ashton Suárez. 

After his last telenovela character was killed off, Ashton is worried his career is dead as well. Joining this new cast as a last-minute addition will give him the chance to show off his acting chops to American audiences and ping the radar of Hollywood casting agents. To make it work, he’ll need to generate smoking-hot on-screen chemistry with Jasmine. Easier said than done, especially when a disastrous first impression smothers the embers of whatever sexual heat they might have had. 

With their careers on the line, Jasmine and Ashton agree to rehearse in private. But rehearsal leads to kissing, and kissing leads to a behind-the-scenes romance worthy of a soap opera. While their on-screen performance improves, the media spotlight on Jasmine soon threatens to destroy her new image and expose Ashton’s most closely guarded secret.

Publish Date: August 4


A true crime podcast host covering a controversial trial finds herself drawn deep into a small town’s dark past in The Night Swimby Megan Goldin.


Ever since her true crime podcast became an overnight sensation and set an innocent man free, Rachel Krall has become a household name - and the last hope for people seeking justice. But she’s used to being recognized for her voice, not her face. Which makes it all the more unsettling when she finds a note on her car windshield, addressed to her, begging for help.

The new season of Rachel's podcast has brought her to a small town being torn apart by a devastating rape trial. A local golden boy, a swimmer destined for Olympic greatness, has been accused of raping the beloved granddaughter of the police chief. Under pressure to make Season 3 a success, Rachel throws herself into her investigation - but the mysterious letters keep coming. Someone is following her, and she won’t stop until Rachel finds out what happened to her sister 25 years ago.

Officially, Jenny Stills tragically drowned, but the letters insist she was murdered - and when Rachel starts asking questions, nobody in town wants to answer. The past and present start to collide as Rachel uncovers startling connections between the two cases - and a revelation that will change the course of the trial and the lives of everyone involved.

Publish Date: August 4


Nationally bestselling author Fiona Davis's latest historical novel follows a series of book thefts that roils the iconic New York Public Library, in The Lions of Fifth Avenue.


It's 1913, and, on the surface, Laura Lyons couldn't ask for more out of life - her husband is the superintendent of the New York Public Library, allowing their family to live in an apartment within the grand building, and they are blessed with two children. But headstrong, passionate Laura wants more, and, when she takes a leap of faith and applies to the Columbia Journalism School, her world is cracked wide open.

As her studies take her all over the city, she is drawn to Greenwich Village's new bohemia, where she discovers the Heterodoxy Club - a radical, all-female group in which women are encouraged to loudly share their opinions on suffrage, birth control, and women's rights. Soon, Laura finds herself questioning her traditional role as wife and mother. But when valuable books are stolen back at the library, threatening the home and institution she loves, she's forced to confront her shifting priorities head on . . . and may just lose everything in the process.

Eighty years later, in 1993, Sadie Donovan struggles with the legacy of her grandmother, the famous essayist Laura Lyons, especially after she's wrangled her dream job as a curator at the New York Public Library. But the job quickly becomes a nightmare when rare manuscripts, notes, and books for the exhibit Sadie's running begin disappearing from the library's famous Berg Collection. Determined to save both the exhibit and her career, the typically risk-adverse Sadie teams up with a private security expert to uncover the culprit.

However, things unexpectedly become personal when the investigation leads Sadie to some unwelcome truths about her own family heritage - truths that shed new light on the biggest tragedy in the library's history.

Publish Date: August 4


Vanessa Yu's Magical Paris Tea Shopby Roselle Lim, is a delightful novel about exploring all the magical possibilities of life in the most extraordinary city of all: Paris.


Vanessa Yu never wanted to see people's fortunes - or misfortunes - in tealeaves.

Ever since she can remember, Vanessa has been able to see people's fortunes at the bottom of their teacups. To avoid blurting out their fortunes, she converts to coffee, but somehow fortunes escape and find a way to complicate her life and the ones of those around her. To add to this plight, her romance life is so nonexistent that her parents enlist the services of a matchmaking expert from Shanghai.

After her matchmaking appointment, Vanessa sees death for the first time. She decides that she can't truly live until she can find a way to get rid of her uncanny abilities. When her eccentric Aunt Evelyn shows up with a tempting offer to whisk her away, Vanessa says au revoir to California and bonjour to Paris. There, Vanessa learns more about herself and the root of her gifts and realizes one thing to be true: knowing one's destiny isn't a curse, but being unable to change it is.

Publish Date: August 4


A hilarious novel of social and political intrigue, set against the glittering backdrop of Florida's Gold Coast: Squeeze Me, by Carl Hiassen.


It's the height of the Palm Beach charity ball season. For every disease or cause, there's a reason for the local luminaries to eat (minimally), drink (maximally), and be seen. But when a prominent high-society dowager suddenly vanishes during a swank gala and is later found dead in a concrete grave, panic and chaos erupt. 

Kiki Pew was notable not just for her wealth and her jewels - she was an ardent fan of the Winter White House resident just down the road and a founding member of the POTUSSIES, a group of women dedicated to supporting their president. Never one to miss an opportunity to play to his base, the President immediately declares that Kiki was the victim of rampaging immigrant hordes. This, it turns out, is far from the truth. The truth might just lie in the middle of the highway, where a bizarre discovery brings the First Lady's motorcade to a grinding halt (followed by some grinding between the First Lady and a love-struck Secret Service agent). 

Enter Angie Armstrong, wildlife wrangler extraordinaire, who arrives at her own conclusions after she is summoned to the posh island to deal with a mysterious and impolite influx of huge, hungry pythons....

Publish Date: August 25