Born in Lubbock, Texas, Kimberly King Parsons won the 2020 National Magazine Award for fiction. Her debut collection, Black Light (2019), was longlisted for the National Book Award and the Story Prize, and her fiction has been published in The Paris Review. She lives in Portland, Oregon with her partner and children. We Were the Universe is her first novel.
Kill Dick (2026) Luke Goebel "Stunning . . . Part noir thriller, part searing social commentary, Kill Dick follows a young artist-turned-addict through the dark, unforgiving, and stratified streets of Los Angeles, as she confronts her father's complicity in the opioid epidemic. In bleak, beautiful prose, Luke Goebel weaves together a narrative that exposes the savage heart of privilege and power, raising questions about truth, memory, and the nature of storytelling itself. With haunting descriptions of a city literally and metaphorically aflame, Kill Dick captures the burning zeitgeist of our time."
Every Happiness (2026) Reena Shah "Moving and unforgettable, containing what I love most about fiction: a lush, unique, urgent voice steeped in cultural relevance, biting humor, and sentences that swerve and surprise."
The High Heaven (2025) Joshua Wheeler "With shimmering intelligence and innovative grace, this assured, prismatic debut fuses earthbound struggle and cosmic wonder. Giving a nod to America's richest literary traditions, Joshua Wheeler has unleashed a wildly entertaining, daringly original, genre-blending vision. The High Heaven deftly traces the evolution of faith and technology, illuminating how our boundless aspirations reshape our sense of what it means to be human."
Extinction Capital of the World (2025) Mariah Rigg "In Extinction Capital of the World, Mariah Rigg traces the contours of contemporary Hawai'i with exquisite precision and grace. Across these ten stories, she shows how desire anchors us to vanishing landscapes, and how the heart finds its coordinates even as familiar worlds shift beneath our feet. These are breathtakingly beautiful dispatches from the frontlines of an imperiled ecosystem, rendered with astonishing clarity."
There Are Reasons For This (2025) Nini Berndt "There Are Reasons for This is haunting and incantatory, a perfectly calibrated exploration of longing, lust, and life after a tremendous loss. Nini Berndt is one of my all-time favorite writers-her prose is sublime, fearless, and full of heat. This is a blistering, brutally beautiful debut from a formidable talent."
Sky Daddy (2025) Kate Folk "Sky Daddy is a voyeuristic masterpiece - you'll never look at a contrail (or an airplane blanket) the same way again."
Bitter Texas Honey (2025) Ashley Whitaker "Bitter Texas Honey is wildly offbeat and endlessly entertaining - a novel that manages to be incisive, heartrending, and hilarious all at once. With nimble prose and a deadpan delivery, Whitaker brings each of these deeply relatable, deeply endearing characters to vibrant life. This is a dazzling debut from an outrageously gifted writer."
Blob (2025) Maggie Su "Maggie Su has written an inventive, utterly unique debut. BLOB is not only a deliciously creepy, deeply entertaining take on modern relationships, it's also a moving look at new adulthood, and the inherent vulnerability that comes along with figuring out exactly who you're meant to be."
Madwoman (2024) Chelsea Bieker "Electrifying and vital, MADWOMAN is literary suspense of the highest order - a page turning study of motherhood, memory, and the menace of an untold past. Chelsea Bieker's propulsive, unsparing take on generational violence is potent and stylish, rendered in prose that's beautiful and devastating all the way down to the heart stopping and unforgettable end. Sexy and turbulent, witty and whip smart, this is a brilliant novel from a blazing, singular talent."
The Audacity (2024) Ryan Chapman "Fearless, irreverent, and so very funny, The Audacity skewers the ego-driven disruption culture of the uber rich. Chapman is a master of satire, and his hilarious runs are threaded through with moving looks at American identity, grief, self-loathing and self-worth. This is a dark, timely, super smart book."
The Young of Other Animals (2024) Chris Cander "The Young of Other Animals is chilling, moving, and urgent, one of those books that demands your full attention until you've finished the very last page. Chris Cander's propulsive, beautifully layered prose tackles cycles of violence and the complicated shame of survival, but this is also a story full of hope - a novel about resiliency, growing up, mothers and daughters, and above all, the way women love and care for one another."
After World (2023) Debbie Urbanski "Riveting, creepy, and full of bleak, biting humor, After World is dazzling - a propulsive, outrageously bright, wildly inventive novel about loss, storytelling, and love at the end of the world. Urbanski's prose is vibrant, precise, and staggeringly intelligent; her vision is singular, haunting, and all too prescient. This book wrecked me."
How to Care for a Human Girl (2023) Ashley Wurzbacher "Ambitious, evocative, and deeply empathetic, How to Care for a Human Girl eloquently examines the many facets of personal choice. In assured, calibrated prose, Wurzbacher plumbs the deep love and complicated history that binds two captivating, troubled sisters. This intricately layered novel is prescient, smart, and heartfelt - a compelling look at family, loss, and forgiveness."
Holler, Child (2023) LaToya Watkins "Holler, Child is a triumph of storytelling. With compassion, urgency, and exhilarating craft, Watkins plunges headlong into the voices, hearts, and minds of these unforgettable characters. This collection is outstanding - fearless, timely, and beautifully layered."
Every Drop is a Man's Nightmare (2023) Megan Kamalei Kakimoto "Megan Kakimoto is one of those rare writers who has mastered both story and sentence. The women in this story are audacious, resilient, and unforgettable-they have my whole heart."
All-Night Pharmacy (2023) Ruth Madievsky "Witty, poignant, and darkly funny, All-Night Pharmacy is a vibrant debut about longing, identity, and the wild, unbreakable bonds of family. In prose that is sharp, exuberant, wry, and smart, Madievsky conjures an affecting, utterly unforgettable tale of two tempestuous sisters."
Aesthetica (2022) Allie Rowbottom "Nobody investigates the relationship between surface and self like Allie Rowbottom. Full of biting observations and stunningly beautiful prose, Aesthetica is poetic and singular - an unforgettable novel about power and loneliness, mothers and daughters, self-destruction and self-preservation."
Sacrificio (2022) Ernesto Mestre-Reed "Compelling and sinuous, bleak and darkly funny, Sacrificio is a book about queer desire, the mutability of language, and layer upon layer of deceit: self-deception, family betrayals, and the disinformation of spies and governments. Mestre-Reed's prose is frenetic, wry, and utterly charming--I'd follow these characters anywhere."
Florida Woman (2022) Deb Rogers "Welcome to the weird world of Atlas, an animal refuge that also happens to be home to some deeply strange human behavior. Droll, refreshing, and full of magnificent monkeys, Florida Woman is a wild and wildly propulsive novel about public mistakes, dangerous charisma, and the dark side of sanctuary. Rogers writes with verve, charm, and disarming honesty--this debut is as witty as it is heartfelt."
The Novelist (2022) Jordan Castro "Jordan Castro brilliantly manipulates time and perception in The Novelist: A Novel. Prescient, funny, and deeply uncanny, this is a wholly unique book about distractions, digressions, and what it means to make art and live meaningfully while trapped in the bright, narcotic thrall of social media."
Body Grammar (2022) Jules Ohman "Body Grammar is prescient and provocative, a stunning exploration of the complex relationship between artistic creation and queer first love. Ohman writes with graceful, measured precision about image and self-image, seeing and being seen. Delicate, empathetic, and full of delicious longing, this is a gleaming coming-of-age novel from a tremendously talented debut writer."
She Is Haunted (2022) Paige Clark "She is Haunted is a beautiful, brutal, and unsettling debut. Clark confronts agency, identity and longing with masterful precision and true originality -- each story has its own skewed logic and wonderfully odd atmosphere. I can't stop thinking about this stylish, deeply strange collection."
The Red Arrow (2022) William Brewer "Conceptually dazzling and darkly comic, The Red Arrow is a graceful, relentless exploration of a man on his way back from the edge. Brewer somehow manages to spin sentences that are at once meticulous and effortless, fractally complex and full of heart. This is an achingly beautiful, intensely brilliant debut from an outrageously talented writer - I can't stop thinking about this book."
Neruda on the Park (2022) Cleyvis Natera "A lush, beautifully layered look at class, culture, and change. . . . Natera's prose is intricate, tender, and perfectly calibrated. This is a tremendous debut novel from a profoundly gifted writer."
Nobody Gets Out Alive (2022) Leigh Newman "Emotionally astute and slyly funny, Nobody Gets Out Alive is a commanding examination of home, family, intimacy, and self-reliance. With exacting precision and endless wit, Newman gracefully leaps into any perspective she pleases-you get the impression she's not only writing unforgettable, brilliantly complex characters, she's somehow inventing souls. This is a stunningly beautiful debut collection by a masterful prose stylist."
Maria, Maria (2022) Marytza K Rubio "Maria, Maria is pure magic: fearless, funny, and endlessly original. Full of dark wit and sparkling charm, this is a shimmering portal of a book. Marytza K. Rubio is an absolute master of the fantastic."
Here Lies (2022) Olivia Clare Friedman "Here Lies is a work of astonishing, exacting beauty that captures both the pinhole longing of personal grief and the expansive pleasure of closely observed, deeply felt moments between women. Friedman writes the kind of prose you want to till and turn over with your hands - sentences so lush and exquisite they deserve to be held up and cherished in sunlight."
The Brittanys (2021) Brittany Ackerman "Full of brilliantly-rendered awkwardness and the hilarious minor horrors of a privileged adolescence, The Brittanys shimmers with the everyday incandescence of youth—car rides and homework, tampons and eyeliner, questionable fashion choices. Ackerman writes convincingly and empathetically about fourteen-year-old girls caught in that painful, exhilarating span of becoming. For anyone who has ever dyed their own hair, worn an absurd outfit, had a crush on someone ridiculous, or said the wrong thing—in other words, for anyone who was once a teenager—this book is for you."
Milk Blood Heat (2021) Dantiel W Moniz "Wild and lush, Milk Blood Heat is teeming with complex women and girls: the contours of their relationships, their fears, their many desires. Moniz mesmerizes and unnerves in prose so precise and decadent it rises to incantation."
Folk Songs for Trauma Surgeons (2021) Keith Rosson "Folk Songs for Trauma Surgeons is full of magic, but Rosson manages to glaze even the everyday with a singular glow. Wild, weird, quietly unsettling, beautifully absurd - each of these stories is bound by the riskiest and most rewarding human endeavor: a desire for connection."
A Room Called Earth (2020) Madeleine Ryan "A Room Called Earth offers a strikingly unique look at intimacy, identity, and time itself. From now on I want every novel to be this fiercely authentic, this assured, this untethered from the status quo. Madeleine Ryan is a wholly original writer; this debut announces a tremendous talent."
Sensation Machines (2020) Adam Wilson "Sensation Machines is pitch dark and pitch perfect—a whip-smart take on marriage, capitalism, grief, and loneliness in a farcical, not-so-distant future. Adam Wilson effortlessly toggles between wry humor and genuine existential dread; the result is lyrical and lewd, brilliant and bleak."
The Bright Lands (2020) John Fram "John Fram’s gripping debut announces a remarkable talent—this prose is tight, stylish, and explosive, depicting a Texas that is by turns lusty and menacing, supersaturated and bleak. As propulsive as it is pitch dark, The Bright Lands will seep into the shadowy contours of your most unsettling, unforgettable dreams."
Pizza Girl (2020) Jean Kyoung Frazier "In fearless, propulsive prose, Jean Kyoung Frazier perfectly captures the listless ache of a grieving, aimless teen on the cusp of terrifying responsibility. A sublime ode to obsessive outcasts and lovable screw-ups everywhere, Pizza Girl is irresistible and bold, brutal and sweet, with an ending that will thrash your heart."
Kept Animals (2020) Kate Milliken "A wildly compelling and all-consuming debut, Kept Animals flares with the unforgettable voices and textures of adolescence. Milliken precisely captures the danger, anxiety, and white-hot hunger of being a teenage girl on the cusp—and she does so in prose full of wit, brazen beauty, and style."
Boys of Alabama (2020) Genevieve Hudson "Boys of Alabama perfectly captures the magic and inevitable heartache of young lust."
