A new month, a new set of debut books we highly recommend for your reading. Explore our list below:
The Three of Us by Ore Agbaje-Williams
Long-standing tensions between a husband, his wife, and her best friend finally come to a breaking point in this sharp domestic comedy of manners, told brilliantly over the course of one day. At once subversively comical, wildly astute, and painfully compulsive, The Three of Us explores cultural truths, what it means to defy them, and the fine line between compromise and betrayal, ultimately asking: who are we if not for the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves, and the people we’re meant to love?
Yellowface by R. F. Kuang
What's the harm in a pseudonym? New York Times bestselling sensation Juniper Song is not who she says she is, she didn't write the book she claims she wrote, and she is most certainly not Asian American. With its totally immersive first-person voice, Yellowface takes on questions of diversity, racism, and cultural appropriation not only in the publishing industry but the persistent erasure of Asian-American voices and history by Western white society. R. F. Kuang's novel is timely, razor-sharp, and eminently readable.
The Sorrows of Others by Ada Zhang
Set in China and America, in the generations after the Cultural Revolution, The Sorrows of Others is a dazzling collection about people confronted with being outsiders—as immigrants, as revolutionaries, and even, often, within their own families. Ada Zhang writes with startling honesty and love about lives young and old, in a stunning debut that explores what happens when we leave home and what happens when we stay, and the selves we meet and shed in the process of becoming.
The East Indian by Brinda Charry
Inspired by a historical figure, an exhilarating debut novel about the first native of the Indian subcontinent to arrive in Colonial America. Set during the early days of English colonisation in Jamestown, before servitude calcified into racialised slavery, The East Indian gives authentic voice to an otherwise unknown historic figure and brings the world he would have encountered to vivid life. In this coming-of-age tale, narrated by a most memorable literary rascal, Charry conjures a young character sure to be beloved by readers for years to come.
Lesbian Love Story by Amelia Possanza
Lesbian Love Story is an intimate journey into the archives—uncovering the romances and role models written out of history and what their stories can teach us all about how to love. At the heart of this riveting, inventive history, Possanza asks: How could lesbian love help us reimagine care and community? What would our world look like if we replaced its foundation of misogyny with something new, with something distinctly lesbian?