Archives par étiquette : Neon Literary

CREATURES OF HABIT de Jennifer Yeh

A warm, generous, and emotional debut novel with a speculative bent for fans of The Correspondent, Shark Heart, and Sandwich.

CREATURES OF HABIT
by Jennifer Yeh
William Morrow, March 2027
(via Neon Literary)

Gina Lee’s life might not have turned out to be terribly exciting, but it’s comfortably predictable—until her husband Mark drops a bomb that upends everything. Ever since the unexpected death of his mother Mark has been drifting out of the family orbit. Now, he has completely escaped their gravitational pull: he’s leaving to start a new relationship with a younger woman.

Reckoning with a future that looks nothing like the one she imagined and a past she now must rewrite, Gina finds herself adrift for the first time in decades. For years she has been the emotional and practical heart of her family, but with the members of that family scattered and the reality of Mark’s engagement party fast approaching, Gina wonders for the first time what she wants for herself.

It’s only when a strange amphibious creature crawls through her window to ask for help that Gina begins to understand that her life is not over. In fact, with the unlikely wisdom of her new friend, she finds that it might be just beginning.

Told with a poignantly observant eye, Jennifer Yeh’s gentle, uplifting debut that speaks to the shifting seasons of life and the deeply human ability to find joy in a few perfect moments.

Jennifer Yeh is a textbook author and a one-time frog biologist. She lives in San Francisco

THE FOOL de Baba Ademoroti

A warm, tender and absolutely heartbeaking debut from a writer to watch.

THE FOOL
by Baba Ademoroti
Henry Holt, 2027
(via Neon Literary)

When Niyi learns that his 30-year-old son is gay, the discovery unmoors him, unlocking a burning need to re-examine his life. In a series of letters to his only son, Niyi lays bare his past, and the (supposed) clarity and wisdom on the page reveals more about Niyi than he has ever cared to acknowledge. Set across Nigeria, from Kano, in the north, to the bustling metropolis of Lagos, to an unnamed quiet war town in the deep south, The Fool asks the question: How can you make sense of a life if you came of age in a time and place without a language to speak your heart or a model to mirror your existence?

In the tradition of Gilead, The Remains of the Day, and On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, THE FOOL explores themes of place, masculinity and queerness, and the ensuing shockwaves when we are confronted with a starkly different way of being, after a life lived in instructed and familiar ways.

Baba Ademoroti, a Yoruba writer from Lagos, Nigeria, received an MFA in fiction from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and is pursuing a PhD at the University of Houston. His short fiction is forthcoming or has appeared in American Short Fiction, The Southern Review, AGNI, and in a special literary supplement selected and edited by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

THE UNHELD de Luke Larkin

A girl sets out to find her father after he is carried off by an otherworldly creature in this atmospheric horror Western.

THE UNHELD
by Luke Larkin
Hyperion Ave, August 2026
(via Neon Literary)

While other twelve-year-olds are in school. Charlie spends her days skinning the animals her father hunts in the wild woods just outside their cabin. Charlie’s life in the Montana Territory is a lonely one, as her father is a mercurial man of few words who mostly ignores her until there’s a chore to be done.

One night, a living nightmare appears, stalking out of the trees. Neither animal nor human, the Beast drags Charlie’s father into the wilderness. To find him Charlie enlists the aid of two unlikely allies: an Englishman with a connection to a mysterious occuIt society and a Cheyenne policeman exiled for a crime he didn’t commit.

Yet as she and her allies prepare for a confrontation with the Beast, Charlie will need to decide if her father is ultimately worth saving. What does she owe the man who called her daughter yet never showed her love?

THE UNHELD is an unsettling and soulful historical horror novel—perfect for readers of Christopher BuehIman’s Between Two Fires, Andy Davidson’s The Boatman’s Daughter, and T. Kingfisher’s What Maxes the Dead. The novel’s ingeniously conceived monster will set your skin crawling, while the indomitable heroine at the story’s center will capture your heart.

Luke Larkin is a writer who lives in Missoula, Montana, where he earned his MFA in creative writing at the University of Montana. His writing has appeared in publications such as the Iron Horse Literary Review, HAD, and Sonora Review.

THE MIDDLE KINGDOM de Lyz Lenz

From the author of the New York Times-bestseller This American Ex-Wife, comes a new book by Lyz Lenz—a fierce, funny, and deeply reported love letter to the Midwest and a cri de coeur for collective care in our crisis-riddled country.

THE MIDDLE KINGDOM
by Lyz Lenz
Dey Street, Spring 2027
(via Neon Literary)

In the decade since Hillbilly Elegy tried to explain America through the lens of white, rural grievance, Lyz Lenz has been living—and writing—a more radical, generous truth from a few hundred miles to the northwest. A proud lowan and nationally recognized journalist, she now blends memoir, political analysis, and biting cultural critique in her signature style: Barbara Ehrenreich by way of Samantha Irby. Through floods, farm bankruptcies, Kum & Go parking lots, hot dish, and butter cows, THE MIDDLE KINGDOM shows how Midwestern communities are improvising survival—even joy— through mutual aid and stubborn care.

THE MIDDLE KINGDOM expands on themes that have made Lenz an essential voice in today’s political discourse: the failures of hyper-individualism, the radical politics of care, and the importance of taking « flyover country » seriously.

Lyz Lenz is a journalist and the author of God Land and Belabored. She has written for Insider, The New York Times, Marie Claire, and The Washington Post. Lenz also writes the newsletter « Men Yell at Me », about the intersection of politics and personhood in red-state America.

NERVE DAMAGE d’Annakeara Stinson

A riotous revenge novel about a woman’s quest to escape her stalker ex-boyfriend—by stalking him herself.

NERVE DAMAGE
by Annakeara Stinson
Knopf, May 2026
(via Neon Literary)

Credit: Greg Wonder

Clarice’s breakup with P.T. began the usual way—she discovered he was cheating. Then came the constant texts, the nonstop emails from burner accounts, hundreds of phone calls from dozens of different numbers. He showed up outside her house and her office. He sent her flowers and poems, and, perhaps most sinister of all, a link to the music video for Dido’s “White Flag.” Relief only arrived when Clarice finally obtained a restraining order and one-way ticket from New York to L.A.

Just as the restraining order expires—and three years to the day since she left him—Clarice spots a man who looks suspiciously like P.T. at a nightclub. Could it be him? Her best friend thinks she’s imagining things. Her therapist wants her to focus on healing her inner child. Her mother is busy planning her wedding to her fourth husband. A psychic medium can only reveal that P.T.’s energy is too volatile to locate on the spiritual plane. As painful memories resurface, Clarice is convinced her ex has returned to ruin her life. . . But with scant evidence to prove it, she takes increasingly unhinged steps to uncover the truth, ultimately leading to a place where paranoia and reality begin to blur.

A profane and poignant debut novel, Nerve Damage is a different kind of survivor narrative, about how far one woman will go to wrest back control of her life in a world determined to send her spiraling.

Annakeara Stinson is a writer whose work has appeared in Bustle, Brooklyn Magazine, The Inquisitive Eater, IndieWire, Pitchfork, Marie Claire, and more. She has an M.F.A. in fiction from The New School and currently lives in L.A.