STACEY SWANN holds an M.F.A. from Texas State University and was a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University. Her fiction has appeared in Epoch, Memorious, Versal, and other journals, and she is a contributing editor of American Short Fiction. She is a native Texan.
The Pillagers' Guide to Arctic Pianos (2026) Kendra Langford Shaw "Kendra Langford Shaw has created a world equal parts real and fantastical, evoking both our frontier-questing past and our ecologically uncertain future. Rowdy and boisterous, yet deeply heartfelt and thoughtful, this debut novel is a delight."
Walk Softly on This Heart of Mine (2025) Callie Collins "Callie Collins summons 1970s Austin and the Rush Creek Saloon with such tangibility, such heft, they feel as real to me as if I had lived within them. Her debut is gorgeously written and unflinchingly wise. This book and its characters have my heart."
Dear Dotty (2024) Jaclyn Westlake "Dear Dotty is a joy to devour! Westlake gives us compelling characters, a page-turning plot, and laugh-out-loud humor. But it's also a novel with a huge heart, thoughtfully exploring the difficulty in finding our authentic way in the world and the power of our chosen communities. A remarkable debut!"
Goldenseal (2024) Maria Hummel "Goldenseal is the rare novel whose style perfectly evokes an earlier era while its meaning feels wholly contemporary. Like the characters within it, we realize how hard it is to understand our lives without the wider view that only comes with time. Sweeping yet intimate, and with characters who feel as alive as our closest friends, Goldenseal is a marvel."
Belonging (2024) Jill Fordyce "Fordyce captures the complexities of both love and forgiveness as well as the painful ways the events of the past can't help but color our present-day lives. BELONGING is a wise, uplifting, and deeply compassionate novel with characters so vivid they feel like part of your own family."
The Last Language (2023) Jennifer duBois "The Last Language explores how language can both create our reality and utterly fail to capture it. As we fall deeply into the mind of the narrator, with her brilliance, humor, and humanity, duBois masterfully allows us to live in the ambiguities that the characters fiercely reject. A hauntingly beautiful, darkly comic, and unforgettable novel."
Banyan Moon (2023) Thao Thai "Thao Thai captures the complexities of familial love with an unflinching, yet gorgeously lyric, eye. Banyan Moon is an ambitious and masterful debut!"
Beasts of the Earth (2022) James Wade "Like Flannery O'Connor, James Wade explores what it means to be human--our capacity for good rivaled only by our capacity for evil, our weakness alongside our urge for redemption and grace--with gloriously complex characters and gorgeous prose. Beasts of the Earth is a beautiful gut-punch of a novel."
Attribution (2022) Linda Moore "Moore's passion for art, and her deep knowledge of the field, makes Attribution as beautifully rendered as the mysterious painting at the center of its gripping mystery. An engrossing debut about the importance and power of truth."
A Gracious Neighbor (2022) Chris Cander "Even upscale Houston neighborhoods, filled with families, can hold secrets and dangers. And even those lucky enough to live in them can feel like outsiders in their own lives. Cander navigates the complexities of female friendship and the power of an extended hand with deep insight and empathy. I was completely riveted!"
The Midcoast (2022) Adam White "The Midcoast expertly weaves sharply-realized scenes and a profound sense of empathy into a plotline full of tension, resentments, and dangerous secrets. In capturing Maine, Adam White has captured America as a whole, with our complicated mix of class mobility and class constraints. In his talented hands, we understand how virtues like love and loyalty can still lead us to a sea of vices. A wise and powerful debut!"
The Honeybee Emeralds (2022) Amy Tector "Tector's characters are a delight to follow, both through the streets of modern Paris and through the histories they uncover of three strong, unconventional women from the past. This novel, as beguiling as the jeweled necklace at the center of the story, celebrates the power of friendship and of following your heart with an irresistible mix of action, humor, and empathy. A fantastic debut!"
Shadows of Pecan Hollow (2022) Caroline Frost "Caroline Frost's beautiful and clear-eyed debut captures the huge comfort of even deeply flawed love and how our urge for survival can distort our lives as easily as it can straighten them into something true. But it also shows us that with enough patience, for ourselves as well as for others, we all have the capacity to heal even the most stubborn of wounds. These are characters you'll carry with you long after you've read the last page."
