75 Books By Women of Color to Read in 2024

Eight years ago, I pulled together a list of upcoming books of interest by women of color because, as a novelist, reader, and intermittent critic, I had trouble finding as many as I’d hoped. I published that list in Electric Literature, thinking it might be useful to others as well; the piece spread widely, and I heard it helped inform other publications’ books coverage, syllabi, and book-prize considerations. 

Since then, I’ve compiled a list along these lines each year, and though books by us have become more available and visible, it’s still true that, for instance, a disproportionately large majority of books published by the Big Five—the publishers that dominate the book market—are by white writers. This is also a time when a lot of U.S. schools and public libraries, under severe pressure from right-wing extremists, are banning and censoring books by people of color, and by queer and trans writers. The number of proscribed books is growing at a shocking rate. Dissenters are losing jobs. Here and there, my first novel and an anthology I coedited have been banned; in 2024, I’ll publish my queer, sexually celebratory second novel, Exhibit, and am already bracing myself for impending bans.

I maintain the hope that, one day, American letters will be so inclusive that a piece like this will no longer be useful. But for now, here are some 2024 books I’m excited to read. This is one person’s list, skewed by, in part, an incomplete knowledge of forthcoming titles. Without a doubt, I’m missing excellent books. If you’re looking forward to a book not mentioned here and wish to support it, please consider preordering it from your local bookstore, requesting it from the library, talking about it, or all of the above. Any of this can be enormously helpful to books and their writers.

Some brief notes on methodology: this piece is necessarily front-loaded toward the earlier part of the year, as there isn’t as much information yet about later titles. Much as I love poetry, I’m less up to date on what’s forthcoming in poetry, so I’ve focused on prose. The term “of color” is flawed and ever-shifting. In the past, a couple of versions of this list included nonbinary writers; Electric Literature and I then heard from a number of nonbinary writers that it can be preferable to avoid grouping nonbinary people with women. I’ve since kept this list to women: cis women and trans women, along with nonbinary women who assented to having their books included in this space. The vast majority of nonbinary writers and readers we’ve heard from have continued to find this preferable. Electric Literature will soon publish a piece about anticipated books by LGBTQIA+ writers.

I’m so glad about the novels, memoirs, essay collections, and other marvels coming our way; please join me in celebrating these books.

January

The Fetishist by Katherine Min

I met Katherine Min a decade ago at a gathering of Korean American writers, and was deeply sorry to hear, in 2019, that she’d died much too early. She left behind an unfinished novel that her daughter, Kayla Min Andrews, has completed. The resulting collaboration, The Fetishist, about an ill-conceived kidnapping, is astonishing. I’m thankful this book exists. 

A Short History of Trans Misogyny by Jules Gill-Peterson

I’ve followed historian Jules Gill-Peterson’s remarkable writing for a while, and in this book, Gill-Peterson ranges from New Orleans to Paris to the Philippines “in search of the emergence of modern trans misogyny.” “This is a sharply argued work by a brilliant thinker,” Shon Faye says.

Behind You Is the Sea by Susan Darraj

From the winner of the AWP Grace Paley Prize for Short Fiction comes a debut novel depicting a Palestinian American community in Baltimore. According to Etaf Rum, Behind You is the Sea “fearlessly confronts stereotypes about Palestinian culture, weaving a remarkable portrait of life’s intricate moments, from joyous weddings to heart-wrenching funerals, from shattered hearts to hidden truths.”

Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts by Crystal Wilkinson

“With Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts, Crystal Wilkinson cements herself as one of the most dynamic book makers in our generation and a literary giant. Utter genius tastes like this,” says Kiese Laymon. Wilkinson brings together kitchen ghosts, family photos, and stories of Black Appalachians in this part memoir, part cookbook.

The Storm We Made by Vanessa Chan

For months, I’ve heard about and looked forward to this debut novel featuring a Malay spy who collaborates with invading occupiers during World War II, and it’s almost here. Dawnie Walton applauds The Storm We Made as a “fearless, gripping, morally complex story” imbued with “an indelible spirit of resistance that never lets you forget the light.”

Come and Get It by Kiley Reid

“Come and Get It is an engrossing novel full of intimately portrayed characters and the seemingly innocuous choices that lead to life-altering mistakes,” says Elizabeth Acevedo. Booker Prize-listed Kiley Reid’s second novel follows Millie Cousins, a senior at the University of Arkansas, offered an opportunity that ends up imperiling her hopes.

Your Utopia by Bora Chung, translated by Anton Hur

Bora Chung’s previous story collection, Cursed Bunny, a finalist for a National Book Award translated by the celebrated Anton Hur, is one of the more unforgettable and surprising books I’ve read in recent years. Chung and Hur are back with more stories.

Dead in Long Beach, California by Venita Blackburn

Dead in Long Beach, California, from Young Lions finalist Venita Blackburn, is centered on a woman who discovers her dead brother’s body then begins replying to texts as him. “You can try bracing yourself for the ride this story takes you on, but it’s best to just surrender. Your wig is going to fall off no matter what you do,” says Saeed Jones. 

Broughtupsy by Christina Cooke

In this novel, estranged sisters reconnect in Kingston to spread their younger brother’s ashes. “A luminous tale of a latter-day Antigone who navigates grief, love, death, sex, violence, language, queerness, race, and three countries with courage, joy, and a tender heart,” says Stacey D’Erasmo.

River East, River West by Aube Rey Lescure

Called a “reversal of the east-to-west immigrant narrative,” this debut is set in 1985 Qingdao and 2007 Shanghai. Garth Greenwell says it’s “a moving portrait of the love between a mother and daughter” in which “familiar narratives of adolescence are scrambled across lines of class, race, and national difference.”

February

Code Noir by Canisia Lubrin

Canisia Lubrin, a recipient of the Windham-Campbell Prize for Poetry, has written a first book of fiction that “departs from the infamous real-life ‘Code Noir,’ a set of historical decrees originally passed in 1685 by King Louis XIV of France defining the conditions of slavery in the French colonial empire.” The 1686 Code had 59 articles, and Lubrin’s book includes 59 braided stories that Christina Sharpe praises for their “formal inventiveness and sheer audaciousness.”

Whiskey Tender by Deborah Jackson Taffa 

“Whiskey Tender is unexpected and propulsive, indeed tender, but also bold, and beautifully told, like a drink you didn’t know you were thirsty for. This book, never anything less than mesmerizing, is full of family stories and vital Native history,” says Tommy Orange. A debut memoir from the director of the Institute of American Indian Arts MFA program.

I Love You So Much It’s Killing Us Both by Mariah Stovall

The profound—and, I’d argue, fictionally underexplored—pain of a friendship breakup is at the core of this novel from Mariah Stovall: after a decade of estrangement, a former friend invites Khaki Oliver to a party for her child. According to Vauhini Vara, “Mariah Stovall’s prose sounds like driving in a car with your best friend, volume up high on your favorite song.”

Almost Surely Dead by Amina Akhtar

Amina Akhtar, founding editor of The Cut, has written a novel about a woman who, having gone missing for a year, becomes the subject of a true-crime podcast. “Part thriller, part family saga, part supernatural horror, Almost Surely Dead will surprise you in the best way possible and leave you thinking about this magnificent book for a long time after you’re done,” says Alex Segura.

Praiseworthy by Alexis Wright

This epic novel from publisher New Directions begins with a cloud heralding an ecological crisis in Australia. Praiseworthy is lauded by Australia’s The Monthly as “an astonishing and monumental masterpiece.”

Acts of Forgiveness by Maura Cheeks 

In Maura Cheeks’s debut novel, America is waiting to see if the country’s first woman president will pass a bill authorizing Black families to claim up to $175,000 if they can prove they’re the descendants of slaves. “Maura Cheeks extends humanity, depth, hope, and complexity to a part of the American experience that too often gets flattened into talking points. This book is a testament to the power of great fiction to lead us to a better understanding of the truth,” says R. Eric Thomas.

Greta & Valdin by Rebecca K Reilly

A bestseller in New Zealand, Rebecca K Reilly’s novel about queer siblings in a Maaori-Russian-Catalonian family is praised by Grant Ginder as a “wholly original, laugh-until-you-ugly-cry-on-the-subway debut.”

March

Where Rivers Part by Kao Kalia Yang

Kao Kalia Yang gives an account of her Hmong mother’s journey from a Laotian village to a refugee camp, then to the United States. Where Rivers Part, according to Vanessa Chan, is “an immense and important addition to the world’s literature.”

You Get What You Pay For by Morgan Parker

I’ll read anything the virtuosic Morgan Parker writes, and this National Book Critics Circle Award-winning poet, essayist, and novelist is back with a memoir-in-essays combining criticism and personal anecdotes, and described as being “as intimate as being in the room with Parker and her therapist.” The essays explore topics including racist beauty standards, loneliness, and mischaracterizations of Serena Williams. 

Disability Intimacy by Alice Wong

The bestselling activist and writer Alice Wong has edited an anthology of first-person writing on disability, sex, and joy, a follow-up to the powerful Disability Visibility. In her new book, writers delve into “caregiving, community, access, and friendship,” offering “alternative ways of thinking about the connections we form with others.”

Say Hello to My Little Friend by Jennine Capó Crucet

Since reading her story collection How to Leave Hialeah, I’ve relished Jennine Capó Crucet’s wise, incisive, frequently hilarious writing. Say Hello to My Little Friend features a failed Pitbull impersonator who crosses paths with an orca at the Miami Seaquarium. “Crucet can make you cry before you’ve even realized you’ve become invested and make you laugh even through the hurt,” Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah says.

Memory Piece by Lisa Ko

“A group portrait of three women who wrest meaning from a world that is closing down around them, Memory Piece is bright with defiance, intelligence, and stubborn love,” says C Pam Zhang. I’ve thought often of the National Book Award-listed Ko’s first and admirable novel, The Leavers, and have been waiting for her second book. 

The Translator’s Daughter by Grace Loh Prasad

“Grace Loh Prasad interrogates the distance between the homes we have and the homes we long for with the compassion and precision of one who has spent her entire life attuned to language. ‘We were always half a world apart,’ she writes; her essays bridge that gap in innovative ways, using family photos, mythical women, and Taiwanese films,” says Jami Nakamura Lin. The Translator’s Daughter is a memoir relating Prasad’s journey as an immigrant whose family was driven out of Taiwan under the threat of political persecution. 

These Letters End in Tears by Musih Tedji Xaviere

In Cameroon, where being queer is legally punishable, a Christian girl and a Muslim girl fall in love. Soon Wiley calls this debut novel “an urgent and devastating story about the cost of living in a place that refuses to recognize your humanity.”

The Manicurist’s Daughter by Susan Lieu

Susan Lieu’s mother, a Vietnamese refugee who set up nail salons in California, died from a botched abdominoplasty. After the funeral, Lieu wasn’t allowed to talk about her mother nor what happened. Searching for answers, Lieu turns to depositions, the surgeon’s family, and spirit channelers.

Thunder Song by Sasha taqʷšəblu LaPointe

Thunder Song, a collection of essays drawing on family archives and an ancestor’s anthropological work, chronicles Sasha taqʷšəblu LaPointe’s experiences as a queer indigenous woman. “None of Sasha’s examinations fail to find truth: page after page, the intersections of family, heritage, history, and music build to countless transcendental moments for the reader, which is not only the magic of this book but a clear testament to Sasha’s immense storytelling power,” says Morgan Talty.

Invisible Hotel by Yeji Y. Ham

According to Kim Fu, “The Invisible Hotel wrestles artfully with big, vital questions: How do we honor and care for our elders without reinforcing a cycle of generational trauma? How do we forge new, joyful paths without indulging in mass cultural amnesia or closing our eyes to a world on fire? That it does so in a surreal, riveting, keep-the-lights-on masterwork of horror is all the more extraordinary.” The novel follows a South Korean woman in a small village who drives a North Korean refugee to visit a sibling in prison.

Parasol Against the Axe by Helen Oyeyemi

Helen Oyeyemi’s many fans will surely be thrilled by this new addition to her inventive oeuvre. Parasol Against the Axe is described as a joyful novel about “competitive friendship, the elastic boundaries of storytelling, and the meddling influence of a city called Prague.”

Anita De Monte Laughs Last by Xochitl Gonzalez

In this widely anticipated sophomore book, the bestselling novelist Xochitl Gonzalez tells the story of a first-generation Ivy League student who comes upon the work of a gifted artist decades after her suspicious death. Robert Jones, Jr. calls the novel “rollicking, melodic, tender, and true” and “oh so very wise.”

But the Girl by Jessica Zhan Mei Yu

But the Girl, already published to acclaim in the U.K. and Australia, features a Malaysian Australian artist traveling to Scotland intending to write a Ph.D. on Sylvia Plath, plus a novel. Brandon Taylor, the book’s acquiring editor in the U.S., says But the Girl is a “vivid novel of consciousness with a delightful sense of play.”

Starry Field by Margaret Juhae Lee

Margaret Juhae Lee combines interviews with her grandmother, investigative journalism, and archival research to learn more about her grandfather, a student revolutionary who died after protesting the Japanese government’s occupation of Korea.

The Tree Doctor by Marie Mutsuki Mockett

“This is a gorgeous and completely unique novel, bristling with life like the garden it describes. It is melancholy, erotic, hopeful, meditative, frightening, and even funny―a book about solitude that is never lonely, a book that is both timeless and utterly contemporary,” says Lydia Kiesling. Marie Mockett’s intriguing new novel brings together caretaking, ardor, a cherry tree, an arborist, and The Tale of Genji. 

The Great Divide by Cristina Henríquez

“Cristina Henríquez gives us cause to celebrate with this sweeping novel. It speeds us into a wild world of adventure and danger, epic visions of the creation of the Panama Canal,” according to Luis Alberto Urrea. A third novel from the writer of the striking The Book of Unknown Americans.

Green Frog by Gina Chung

I rejoiced in Gina Chung’s first novel, Sea Change, and its tender story of a woman and a giant octopus. Chung’s new book is a magic-imbued collection of fiction that Kali Fajardo-Anstine says is “pulsating with heart and profound emotional intelligence.”

Lessons for Survival by Emily Raboteau

Lessons for Survival, which mingles reportage, autobiography, and photography, is introduced as a “series of pilgrimages from the perspective of a mother struggling to raise her children to thrive without coming undone in an era of turbulent intersecting crises.” Imani Perry says the American Book Award-winning Emily Raboteau “traverses generations and geographies, all the while caring for her children, and in so doing, teaches us that to ‘mother’ is to tend, to study, to nurture, and to hand over our most precious inheritances.”

dear elia by Mimi Khúc

I grew up in a part of Los Angeles that was mostly Asian American, and didn’t know anyone who so much as spoke about thinking of seeing a therapist until I went to college. Things have changed since then, but not close to enough; I’m excited for Mimi Khúc’s book, a series of letters described as work that “bears witness to Asian American unwellness up close and invites readers to recognize in it the shapes and sources of their own unwellness.” 

Like Happiness by Ursula Villarreal-Moura

I’ve anticipated Ursula Villarreal-Moura’s debut novel since I first heard her read in 2018, and, at last, the book is almost here. Like Happiness follows a woman living in the aftermath of a consuming, destructive relationship she once had with a legendary writer in New York.

April 

I Just Keep Talking by Nell Irvin Painter

I Just Keep Talking is comprised of the bestselling Nell Irvin Painter’s essays on art, politics, and racism. “Consistently brilliant, restlessly curious and profoundly empathetic, Nell Irvin Painter’s voice is simply indispensable. This decades-spanning collection pulls together some of her most elegant, engaged and urgent work,” Jelani Cobb says.

Women! In! Peril! by Jessie Ren Marshall

Playwright Jessie Ren Marshall’s debut collection of stories is said to be “ferociously feminist” and “hilarious, heartbreaking, and defiantly optimistic.” Vanessa Hua applauds the book’s “thrilling range of characters—an android, space traveler, former ballerina, jilted wives and more—in stories that examine race, gender, sexuality and other elements of identity with confidence and grace.”

Real Americans by Rachel Khong

I had the deep pleasure of reading an early draft of Real Americans, a shape-shifting, expansive wonder that, in its large-hearted investigations into fortune, luck, class, and trauma, spans countries, decades, and altered realities. It’s an epic and splendid achievement from a writer whose work I’ve loved for years. 

I’ll Give You a Reason by Annell López

According to Nancy Jooyoun Kim, “I’ll Give You a Reason is a rare page-turner of a collection: startlingly sensitive, oozing with compassion, and full of both gentle and explosive revelations about human nature, forgiveness, and the grace we sometimes fail to offer ourselves.” These stories, about Dominican immigrants in Newark, New Jersey, have won the Feminist Press’s Louise Meriwether First Book Prize.

The Stone Home by Crystal Hana Kim

I read the entirety of The Stone Home during a recent flight to Seoul, unable to put it down, often crying. It’s set in a South Korea of the 1980s, largely taking place in a “reformatory center” for marginalized citizens, a state-sanctioned hell of terror and violence. The novel’s portrayals of caretaking, mothering, and tenderness inside and despite the reformatory’s walls are richly layered and intensely moving. 

The Lantern and the Night Moths by Yilin Wang

Poet and translator Yilin Wang translates poems by five modernist Chinese writers, then accompanies the translations with her own essays on “the key themes and stylistic features of modern Sinophone poetry and on the art and craft of poetry translation.” I’ve admired Wang’s translations of poetry, and look forward to reading their hybrid book as well. 

May

Magical/Realism by Vanessa Angélica Villarreal

I’ve loved Vanessa Angélica Villarreal’s poems, and, since I first heard about it, have eagerly awaited her debut book of prose. The collection, which with each essay attempts to “reimagine and re-world what has been lost,” explores the healing potentials of fantasy in the midst of grief. 

Bite by Bite by Aimee Nezhukumatathil

It might be evident by now that I tend to be drawn to the prose of poets, and the bestselling poet-essayist Aimee Nezhukumatathil is back with a follow-up book of essays, this time centered on food and flavors including shaved ice, lumpia, mangoes, and vanilla. The collection also incorporates illustrations by Fumi Nakamura. 

But What Will People Say? by Sahaj Kaur Kohli

Sahaj Kaur Kohli is a Washington Post advice columnist and the founder of Brown Girl Therapy, a mental health community organization for the children of immigrants. She “rethinks traditional therapy and self-care models, creating much-needed space for those left out of the narrative” with a debut that combines personal narrative, analysis, and research.

I’m a Fool to Want You by Camila Sosa Villada, translated by Kit Maude

A bestseller in Argentina, I’m a Fool to Want You is the second book by the Premio Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz- and Grand Prix de l’Héroïne Madame Figaro-winning Camila Sosa Villada to be translated into English. Hailed by Torrey Peters as “a wise, uncommon, and bewitching storyteller,” Sosa Villada’s story collection promises to be formally original and imaginatively wide-ranging. 

Oye by Melissa Mogollon

“An emotional roller coaster of multigenerational chisme, Oye jump-starts your heart in the same way the expletive piques your ear,” according to Xochitl Gonzalez. A first novel including a familial crisis, the revelation of long-held secrets, and an approaching hurricane.

The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley

In this speculative, genre-mixing debut novel taking place in the near future, time travel is run by a bureaucracy. Max Porter calls it “exciting, surprising, intellectually provocative, weird, radical, tender, and moving.” 

Wait by Gabriella Burnham

“Wait simultaneously illuminates the precariousness of young womanhood and existing as an immigrant in the U.S., while showing the resourcefulness and strength needed to survive,” says Daphne Palasi Andreades. A novel about a mother who’s vanished and the sisters trying to bring her back.

How to Make Your Mother Cry by Sejal Shah

Short stories join imagined letters to a valued English teacher in this collection from interdisciplinary writer and artist Sejal Shah. “How to Make Your Mother Cry is an incredible cross-cultural manifesto of word and body: What is home. What is mother. What is family. What is self. What is woman, and how do we story her,” says Lidia Yuknavitch.

See: Loss. See Also: Love. by Yukiko Tominaga

I have an abiding belief that punctuation marks, commas aside, are tragically underused in book titles—colons aside, too, you might say, but those are usually only used before subtitles—and am already delighted by the proliferation thereof in Yukiko Tominaga’s novel. Tominaga’s debut features Kyoko, a Japanese widow, raising her son Alex in San Francisco with the help of her Jewish mother-in-law, and is described as being “tender, slyly comical, and shamelessly honest.”

June

Bird Milk & Mosquito Bones by Priyanka Mattoo

Born in the Himalayas, writer-filmmaker Priyanka Mattoo and her family fled the region as a result of rising violence. Mattoo ended up residing at 32 subsequent addresses, an odyssey she chronicles in Bird Milk & Mosquito Bones. “Priyanka Mattoo has recreated the beloved, intoxicating Kashmir of her childhood in this beautiful memoir, and in doing so, renders the place immortal. I would follow Mattoo to the ends of the earth, because she would know what to eat there, and how to make a friend, and then sit me down and tell me a story,” says Emma Straub. 

Tehrangeles by Porochista Khakpour

Porochista Khakpour began Tehrangeles in 2011, and this long-gestated novel is described as a “tragicomic saga about high-functioning family dysfunction and the ever-present struggle to accept one’s true self.” The Milanis are fast-food heiresses in Los Angeles; the prospect of having their own reality television show, and the attendant potential fame, evoke the possibility that perhaps too many secrets will be exposed. 

Craft by Ananda Lima

Poet Ananda Lima’s first book of prose, a story collection, starts with a writer who has sex with the devil, then proceeds to write stories for him. I’m already enchanted by this idea, and Gwen Kirby calls the book “a beautiful work of alchemy: strange and familiar, experimental and narrative, topical and timeless, heart-wrenching and wickedly funny.” 

Malas by Marcela Fuentes

A family living on the Texas-Mexico border contends with what might be a forty-year-old curse in this novel said to be “rich with cinematic details—from dusty rodeos to the excitement of a Selena concert and the comfort of conjunto ballads played at family gatherings.” According to Erika Sánchez, “Fuentes has achieved something rare and indelible with this story of complex women.”

July

The Lucky Ones by Zara Chowdhary

The Lucky Ones is a memoir by a survivor of 2002 anti-Muslim violence in Ahmedabad, an Indian metropolis whose chief minister at the time, Narendra Modi, is now the prime minister of the country. “A warning, thrown to the world, and a stunning debut—Chowdhary is a much-needed new voice,” says Alexander Chee.

Colored Television by Danzy Senna

This comedic novel follows a novelist braving an ill-fated foray into Hollywood. I’m a longtime fan of Danzy Senna’s writing, and Rumaan Alam calls Colored Television “a riveting and exhilarating novel about making art and selling out, about being middle aged and precariously middle class.”

Midnight Rooms by Donyae Coles

In 1840s England, a man whisks his outsider bride, Orabella, to a family estate. Not permitted to leave the house unattended, and waking up in the morning covered in mysterious bruises, Orabella begins to realize the house is filled with dangers both human and ghostly.

The Coin by Yasmin Zaher

A Palestinian woman becomes a teacher at a New York school for underprivileged boys, and gets involved in a pyramid scheme reselling Birkin bags. “Like Jean Rhys, Yasmin Zaher captures the outrageous loneliness of contemporary life, the gradual and total displacement of the human heart. This is a novel of wealth, filth, beauty, and grief told in clarion prose and with unbearable suspense,” Hilary Leichter says. 

A Thousand Times Before by Asha Thanki

Asha Thanki’s A Thousand Times Before is a saga relating the stories of three generations of women who inherit a magical tapestry “through which each generation can experience the memories of those who came before her,” along with an ability to reshape the world. With this novel, their debut, Thanki depicts decades of loss and power in Karachi, Gujarat, and Brooklyn. 

Docile by Hyeseung Song

A coming-of-age memoir and account of living with mental illness, Docile is said to be for readers of Michelle Zauner’s Crying in H Mart and Cathy Park Hong’s Minor Feelings. The book is extolled by Kat Chow as “a story of loneliness and searching that brims with radiant empathy.”

Lion Women of Tehran by Marjan Kamali

Lion Women of Tehran is a novel about a consequential childhood friendship and eventual, terrible betrayal. Whitney Scharer calls Marjan Kamali’s prose “evocative, devastating, and hauntingly beautiful.”

August

Silken Gazelles by Jokha Alharthi, translated by Marilyn Booth

As a Jokha Alharthi enthusiast, I’m glad we’ll have a new novel from this formidable, International Booker Prize-winning writer and academic. Silken Gazelles circles around two girls in Oman, and the book is being compared to Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels.

The Hypocrite by Jo Hamya

I’ve admired Jo Hamya’s writing, and will surely rush to read this novel featuring a young playwright on the verge of finding out what her novelist father will think of her new play, which is informed by a vacation they took years ago in Sicily. Katie Kitamura lauds Hamya’s previous novel, Three Rooms, as being “precisely and beautifully rendered.”

The Volcano Daughters by Gina María Balibrera

Sisters in El Salvador flee violence, and are chased by ghosts of their murdered friends, a “chorus of furies” bent on telling their stories. Peter Ho Davies says The Volcano Daughters is a “marvel of a book, at once lush and stark, mythic and earthy.”

Black and Asian Feminist Solidarities edited by Rachel Kuo, Jaimee Swift, and Tiffany Tso

This collaborative project between Black Women Radicals and the Asian American Feminist Collective gathers organizers, artists, and writers to reflect on contemporary feminism. I can’t wait to read this Haymarket publication of their work.

The Rich People Have Gone Away by Regina Porter

In this second novel from the PEN/Hemingway Award finalist Regina Porter, a group of New Yorkers are brought together by the search for a missing pregnant woman. “A lush study of relationships, keen on the particulars of vast human catastrophes,” says Raven Leilani. 

The Palace of Eros by Caro de Robertis

I delighted in Caro de Robertis’s previous novels, and their newest book is a feminist, queer retelling of the Psyche-Eros myth. Madeline Miller calls de Robertis’s writing “brilliant and luminous.”

The Fallen Fruit by Shawntelle Madison

History professor Cecily Bridge-Davis moves through time to try to free her family from a family curse. During these dangerous temporal travels, she encounters a circle of ancestors.

September & later

Blue Light Hours by Bruna Dantas Lobato

National Book Award-listed translator Bruna Dantas Lobato has written a novel depicting a Brazilian college student’s first year in America. She forges a changing relationship with her mother over long-distance video calls. 

Tiny Threads by Lilliam Rivera

Lilliam Rivera is a force in young-adult fiction, and in Tiny Threads, her adult debut, a fashion-loving woman is overjoyed to get a job working with a legendary designer hero. But as a fashion show approaches, so does what might be supernatural menace.

Ruined a Little When We Were Born by Tara Isabel Zambrano

Memorably billed as “Jhumpa Lahiri on LSD,” this collection includes stories having to do with motherhood, mythology, and women’s desires.

First in the Family by Jessica Hoppe

Jessica Hoppe, a mental health advocate and former editor of Stylecaster, has written a memoir about being the first in her family to recover from addiction.

The Water Remembers by Amy Bowers Cordalis

Amy Bowers Cordalis, along with her family and the Yurok Tribe, fought government agencies a long time over the damming of irrigation waters. In 2022, Congress ordered that the dam be removed from the Klamath River, and Cordalis tells the story of this fight and triumph.