Hold onto your hats, because 2026 is bringing loads of fresh weird westerns for your TBR list! These Old West-themed stories cover supernatural horror, sci-fi, adventure, fantasy and more.
The list is updated on an ongoing basis, so be sure to check back for new book recommendations.
April 2026
Title: Smoke and Other Storms [re-release]
Author: Jenaiya Delavega
Type: western fantasy
Description: Welcome to the Rim. Come seek your fortune in a paradise of endless sun. Land is cheap and the possibilities endless, where the edge of the map meets the end. The mining campaigns always forget a few details. Moon Season makes storms volatile. You’re more likely to be killed by your neighbor than strike a crystal vein, and there’s only one name you should bother knowing around here: Revere.
Moira and her granddaughter Adelaide are professionals. Smugglers, thieves, and arms dealers, the Revere women have lifted their family business from the dust, and with their train they’ve become the most notorious gang in the territory. After an accident damages her sister’s eyes, Adelaide finds an opportunity that will not only pay for a sight-saving operation but pull the family from the shadows of the back market for good. Accompanied by her sisters, Adelaide guides a survey crew into the uncharted West Rim –a poisonous desert concealing untapped riches– with the full intent to claim the fortune for themselves. But when Moira learns a bounty has been placed on the family, she discovers a deeper plan already in motion that will change the Rim forever.
May 2026
Title: Neon Moon
Author: Grace R. Reynolds
Publisher: Dark Matter Ink
Type: horror western
Description: Darlene Boone is a survivor. For more than a year, she’s been bartending at the famous Teegarden Saloon, a honky tonk in the Texas Hill Country, while attempting to put her life back together in the wake of an abusive past. But when an axe-wielding maniac descends on The Teegarden during one of the bar’s busiest nights of the year, Darlene, along with everyone else in the crowded establishment, will have to put down their whiskeys and take up the nearest weapon if they’re to survive this unexpected night from hell. No one knows if they’ll make it out alive, least of all Darlene, but one thing’s for sure no matter what: Texans don’t go down without a fight.
June 2026
Title: Women of the Weird West
Editor: KC Grifant
Publisher: Brigids Gate Press
Type: Horror, sci-fi and fantasy westerns
Description: Saddle up. The Old West is weirder than you think. In this bold reimagining of the Old West, dive into haunted canyons, frontier towns hiding cosmic horrors, vast deserts, and far-flung worlds where women take center stage. Women of the Weird West features 25 original speculative poems and short stories set in landscapes both familiar and strange. Gunslingers, outlaws, dreamers, and survivors face overwhelming forces both human and supernatural. Subversive and genre-bending, this anthology captures the wonder, violence, and resilience at the heart of the Old West while featuring women who were all too often left off the page.
Edited by KC Grifant and with a foreword by Kasey Lansdale, the book features short stories and poems by: Eugen Bacon, Jennifer Brody, V. Castro, K.M. Chavez, Deborah Daughetee, Sarah Faxon, Jendia Gammon, Anastasia Jill, R.J. Joseph, Nicole Givens Kurtz, Angela Liu, Christine Lucas, Anna Madden, Tiffany Morris, Donna J.W. Munro, SJ Myles, Nico Martinez Nocito, Cynthia Pelayo, Grace Quon, Stephanie Rabig, Rebecca Rowland, Tammy Salyer, Lisa Timpf, Angelica Urquizo and Mathilda Zeller.
August 2026
Title: The Night Pool
Author: Lauren Lee Smith
Publisher: Blackstone Press
Type: horror western
Description: The Night Pool is a blood-soaked, page-turning horror set in the Gold Rush West, where three women must battle monsters both human and inhuman to survive–perfect for fans of Alma Katsu’s The Hunger and Victor LaValle’s Lone Women.
The American West is no safe haven for women–least of all in the Gold Rush town of Coloma, California. Not for Clara Tice, the blacksmith’s strange and stubborn daughter. Not for Mei, the healer whose calm presence in the makeshift camp for Chinese immigrants contrasts sharply with her brother’s hard-eyed pursuit of riches. And certainly not for Haloke, a Nisenan shaman’s granddaughter whose native village has been devastated by smallpox, hunger, and the relentless greed of Outsiders.
One night, Clara and Haloke meet at the river’s edge and watch in horror as Clementine Cobbs, the town beauty, is lured across the water. Together they witness something terrible in the Night Pool. Soon after, an unseen attacker descends upon the mining men of Coloma, abandoning heartless bodies one by one. As the gruesome killings in Coloma threaten to incite further violence, Clara, Haloke, and Mei find themselves unlikely allies–without the gangs, guns, or bravado of the men who claim Coloma’s riches. The three women must work together to confront the evil that menaces them from both monsters and men.
A gripping tale of sisterhood, vengeance, and survival, The Night Pool explores the horrors of greed and lust, and the hidden strength of the most vulnerable among us.
*Know of a book that should be featured? Shoot over a message to have a book or recommendation considered for inclusion. Please include the publisher, description and date of release. The book should be set in the Old West and have a speculative element or crossover with another genre to be considered (e.g., not a classic western).
Weird West Fiction 