Tag archieven: American writer

American Novel, Amerikaanse roman, Amerikaanse schrijfster, Beste Romans

American female writers best novels

American female writers best novels. What are the best novels written by female authors from the United States? When was the novel published and what is its content? Which women’s novels from the United States are considered the best?

American female writers best novels

Of course, you can debate at length what the best American novels by female authors are. In fact, every reader will have their own personal preferences. So a top-so list of the best novels by American female authors isn’t entirely useful.

What are the best novels written by female authors from America?

Our editors have chosen to compile an alphabetical overview of American women’s novels that many consider more than worth reading. We will also be adding new, excellent novels by American authors.

Jane Bowles Two Serious Ladies 1943 novel first editionJane Bowles – Two Serious Ladies

1943 novel
Editorial rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
Miss Goering, an eccentric, impulsive New York heiress, resides in her house and tries not to be unhappy. Mrs Copperfield, an anxious, dutiful married woman, has a great fear of drowning, of lifts, of intruders in the night. Two serious ladies, nothing is natural for them and anything is possible.

Willa Cather The Song of the Lark review en recensieWilla Cather – The Song of the Lark

1915 novel
Editorial rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
Thea Kronberg, a young girl from a small town in Colorado has a great gift – her beautiful singing voice. Her talent takes her to the great opera houses of Europe, and through ambition and hard work, she forges a life as an artist. But if she can never go home again, nor can she leave behind her past.

Save Me the Waltz Zelda Fitzgerald 1932 novel first editionZelda Fitzgerald – Save Me the Waltz

1932 novel
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
One of the great literary curios of the twentieth century Save Me the Waltz is the first and only novel by the wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald. During the years when Fitzgerald was working on Tender is the Night, Zelda Fitzgerald was preparing her own story, which strangely parallels the narrative of her husband, throwing a fascinating light on Scott Fitzgerald’s life and work.

Hannah Green I Never Promised You a Rose Garden novel 1964 first editionJoanne Greenberg – I Never Promised You a Rose Garden

1984 novel, published as Hannah Green
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
Sixteen-year-old Deborah’s identity is shattering, as she retreats further and further from the ‘normal’ world into her imaginary kingdom of Yr, a fantastical inner refuge both lush and horrifying. Sent to a psychiatric hospital, she must, with the help of a gifted psychiatrist, try to find a way back.

Annie John Jamaica Kincaid novel from 1985 first editionJamaica Kincaid – Annie John

1985 coming of age novel uit 1985 about Antigua
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
An adored only child growing up in Antigua, Annie has until recently lived a peaceful and content life. She is inseparable from her beautiful mother, a powerful and influential presence, who sits at the very centre of the little girl’s existence. Loved and cherished, Annie grows and thrives within her mother’s shadow. When she turns twelve, however, Annie’s life changes, in ways that are often mysterious to her.

Elaine Kraf I Am Clarence reviewElaine Kraf – I Am Clarence

1969 novel
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
For Clarence’s mother, life revolves around her young son; she takes him to see specialists to find the cause of his blindness and developmental delays, protects him from the cruelty of other children, and loves him tenderly. But she has her own struggles too. Her sanity is precarious and fractured, making caregiving increasingly difficult.

Harper Lee To Kill a Mockingbird Amerikaanse roman uit 1960Harper Lee – To Kill a Mockingbird

1960 novel
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
Summers for Scout in the Deep South are long and golden. Her story is one of innocence, and growing up. It is also about justice. When Scout’s father Atticus Finch, a lawyer, agrees to defend a black man against an accusation by a white girl, he takes on the prejudice of the whole town.

Bernice L. McFadden Sugar review en recensieBernice L. McFadden –  Sugar

2000 novel
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
When she arrives in the southern town of Bigelow, it isn’t long before the neighbourhood is alight with gossip and suspicion. Sugar fears her past is catching up with her. Then she meets Pearl, a woman trying to forget her own trauma. As these next-door neighbours become unlikely friends, they wonder if their lives could finally be changing for the better. But small towns have long memories.

Toni Morrison – Beloved

1987 novel about slavery
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
Sethe is now miles away from Sweet Home – the farm where she was kept as a slave for many years. Unable to forget the unspeakable horrors that took place there, Sethe is haunted by the violent spectre of her dead child, the daughter who died nameless and whose tombstone is etched with a single word, Beloved.

Ayn Rand Atlas Shrugged roman uit 1957Ayn Rand – Atlas Shrugged

1957 novel
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
Opening with the enigmatic question ‘Who is John Galt?’, Atlas Shrugged envisions a world where the ‘men of talent’ – the great innovators, producers and creators – have mysteriously disappeared. With the US economy now faltering, businesswoman Dagny Taggart is struggling to get the transcontinental railroad up and running. For her John Galt is the enemy, but as she will learn, nothing in this situation is quite as it seems.

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn Betty Smith 1943 novel first editionBetty Smith – A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

1943 Brooklyn novel
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
The Nolan family are first-generation immigrants to the United States. Originating in Ireland and Austria, their life in the Williamsburg slums of Brooklyn is poor and deprived, but their sacrifices make it possible for their children to grow up in a land of boundless opportunity. Francie Nolan is the eldest daughter of the family. Alert, imaginative and resourceful, her journey through the first years of a century of profound change is difficult – and transformative…read on >

The Mountain Lion Jean Stafford Novel from 1947 first editionJean Stafford – The Mountain Lion

1947 coming of age novel
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
Ralph and Molly are inseparable siblings: united against the stupidity of daily routines, their prim mother and prissy older sisters, the world of adult authority. One summer, they are sent from their childhood home in suburban Los Angeles to their uncle’s Colorado mountain ranch, where they write, hunt, roam. But this untamed wilderness soon becomes tainted by dark stirrings of sexual desire.

The Making of Americans Gertrude Stein novel from 1925 first editionGertrude Stein – The Making of Americans

1925 novel
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
Gertrude Stein sets out to tell “a history of a family’s progress,” radically reworking the traditional family saga novel to encompass her vision of personality and psychological relationships. As the history progresses over three generations, Stein also meditates on her own writing, on the making of The Making of Americans, and on America.

Edith Wharton The Age of Innocense novel from 1920 first editionEdith Wharton – The Age of Innocence

1920 novel
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
The return of the beautiful Countess Olenska into the rigidly conventional society of New York sends reverberations throughout the upper reaches of society. Newland Archer, an eligible young man of the establishment is about to announce his engagement to May Welland, a pretty ingénue, when May’s cousin, Countess Olenska, is introduced into their circle. The Countess brings with her an aura of European sophistication and a hint of scandal, having left her husband and claimed her independence.

Edith Wharton The Glimpes of the Moon first edition from 1922Edith Wharton – The Glimpses of the Moon

1922 novel
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
Nick Lansing and Susy Branch are young and attractive, but penniless. Gracefully moving through New York high society, they have the right connections but none of the wealth. When they inconveniently fall in love, Susy devises a plan. They will marry and spend a year flitting across Europe, staying in the homes of their rich friends and living off honeymoon gifts until either one of them meets a better, richer prospect.

Marguerite Young Miss MacIntosh, My Darling review en recensieMarguerite Young – Miss MacIntosh, My Darling

1968 novel
Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
This novel is one of the most ambitious and remarkable literary achievements of our time. It is a picaresque, psychological novel—a novel of the road, a journey or voyage of the human spirit in its search for reality in a world of illusion and nightmare. It is an epic of what might be called the Arabian Nights of American life. Marguerite Young’s method is poetic, imagistic, incantatory; in prose of extraordinary richness she tests the nature of her characters—and the nature of reality.

Matching books

Afbeelding bovenzijde: Zelda Fitzgerald in 1922 (Public domain)

American Novel, Amerikaanse roman, Amerikaanse schrijfster

Betty Smith – A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

Betty Smith A Tree Grows in Brooklyn review and information about the 1943 American novel. In 1943, American author Betty Smith’s novel was published. Here you can read information about the novel’s content, reception, reviews and author.

Betty Smith A Tree Grows in Brooklyn reviews

  • “A profoundly moving novel, and an honest and true one. It cuts right to the heart of life … If you miss A Tree Grows in Brooklyn you will deny yourself a rich experience… It is a poignant and deeply understanding story of childhood and family relationships.” (New York Times)
  • “One of the books of the century.” (New York Public Library)

Betty Smith A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

  • Author: Betty Smith (United States)
  • Book type: 1943 American novel
  • Publisher: Vintage Classics
  • Length: 272 pages
  • Format: paperback / ebook
  • Prize: £ 9.99
  • Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
  • Order book from: Amazon / Bol

Blurb of the 1943 novel by Betty Smith

Betty Smith’s debut novel is universally regarded as a modern classic. The sprawling tale of an immigrant family in early 20th-century Brooklyn, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is one of the great distinctively American novels.

The Nolan family are first-generation immigrants to the United States. Originating in Ireland and Austria, their life in the Williamsburg slums of Brooklyn is poor and deprived, but their sacrifices make it possible for their children to grow up in a land of boundless opportunity.

Francie Nolan is the eldest daughter of the family. Alert, imaginative and resourceful, her journey through the first years of a century of profound change is difficult – and transformative. But amid the poverty and suffering among the poor of Brooklyn, there is hope, and the prospect of a brighter future.

Betty Smith was born December 15, 1896 in Brooklyn. New York A Tree Grows in Brooklyn Betty Smith 1943 novel first editionCity as  Elisabeth Lillian Wehner. She published four novels: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1943), Tomorrow Will Be Better (1947), Maggie-Now (1958) and, Joy in the Morning (1963). She also wrote two plays: Jonica Stars (1930) and Becomes A Woman, originally titled Francie Nolan (1931). She died in died of pneumonia in Shelton, Connecticut on January 17, 1972 in Shelton, Connecticut, at the age of 75.

Matching books

American Novel, Amerikaanse roman, Amerikaanse schrijfster

Zelda Fitzgerald – Save Me the Waltz

Zelda Fitzgerald Save Me the Waltz review and information about the 1932 American novel. In 1932, American author Zelda Fitzgerald’s only novel was published. Here you can read information about the novel’s content, reception, reviews and author.

Zelda Fitzgerald Save Me the Waltz reviews

  • “The only published novel of a brave and talented woman who is remembered for het defeats.” (Matthew Bruccoli)
  • “A strangely evocative novel, episodic in structure, painterly in its description, almost hallucinatory in overall effect.” (The New York Times)

Zelda Fitzgerald Save Me the Waltz

Save Me the Waltz

  • Author: Zelda Fitzgerald (United States)
  • Book type: 1932 American novel
  • Publisher: Vintage Classics
  • Length: 272 pages
  • Format: paperback / ebook
  • Prize: £ 9.99
  • Editorial Rating: ∗∗∗∗∗ (excellent)
  • Order book from: Amazon / Bol

Blurb of the 1932 novel by Zelda Fitzgerald

“We couldn’t go on indefinitely being swept off our feet.”

One of the great literary curios of the twentieth century Save Me the Waltz is the first and only novel by the wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald. During the years when Fitzgerald was working on Tender is the Night, Zelda Fitzgerald was preparing her own story, which strangely parallels the narrative of her husband, throwing a fascinating light on Scott Fitzgerald’s life and work.

In its own right, it is a vivid and moving story: the confessional of a famous glamour girl of the affluent 1920s and an aspiring ballerina which captures the spirit of an era.

Zelda Fitzgerald was born July 24, 1900,  in Montgomery, Alabama, Save Me the Waltz Zelda Fitzgerald 1932 novel first editionin the United States was an American writer and artist, best known for personifying the carefree ideals of the 1920s flapper and for her tumultuous marriage to F. Scott Fitzgerald. Save Me the Waltz was the only novel she wrote and was published during her lifetime. She died March 10, 1948, at the age of 47 in the Highlight Mental Hospital Asheville, North Carolina during a fire.

Matching books

Amerikaanse Schrijvers, Essays, Memoir

Tochi Onyebuchi – Racebook

Tochi Onyebuchi Racebook review and information of the content of essays, memoir and a personal history of the Internet by the American science fiction and fantasy writer and former civil rights lawyer. Grove Atlantic will publish the new Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore novel, on October 21, 2025. 

Tochi Onyebuchi Racebook reviews

  • “We are in the best, most absolute trouble, y’all, because Tochi Onyebuchi writes as well as he understands the internet, which means he writes as well as humans run from accountable desire. Racebook is absolutely singular in the history of book-making, and the love shown to Black folks and our internet here is as textured as anything Morrison made. We are in trouble, the best, most uprooting trouble, and I am thankful.” (Kiese Laymon, bestselling author of Long Division and Heavy)
  • “Starkly original, provocative and brilliantly executed, Racebook warrants our undivided attention. Onyebuchi is a sage observer of this fractured moment and among the internet’s keenest interlocutors.”(Jelani Cobb, author of Three or More is a Riot and New Yorker Staff Writer)
  • “Beginning with the adulation of Black cosplayers seizing physical and intellectual properties long coded as white spaces, [Onyebuchi] writes a memoir that contemplates his life online . . . There is personal history throughout, but the essays are global reflections on internet culture more than traditional memoir. Onyebuchi captures several universal moments of a generation growing up online but pushes the narrative further to encompass how it intersected with his offline world.” (Library Journal)

Tochi Onyebuchi Racebook

Racebook

A Personal History of the Internet

  • Author: Tochi Onyebuchi (United States)
  • Book type: essays. memoir
  • Publisher: Grove Atlantic
  • Released: 21 October 2025
  • Length: 256 pages
  • Format: hardback / ebook
  • Prize: $ 27.00 /
  • Order book from: Amazon / Bol

Blurb of the new book by Tochi Onyebuchi

When Tochi Onyebuchi realized his acclaimed science fiction and fantasy career had been centrally preoccupied with race, it prompted him to consider his responsibilities as a Black writer in the internet age. In brilliantly crafted essays, Onyebuchi excavates the internet of the late 1990s and early 2000s, tracing his online persona back to its origins to explore how both evolved in the ensuing decades. Brimming with voracious curiosity and razor-sharp wit, Racebook is a penetrating meditation on how identity and race are forged in the crucible of being online.

Beginning with the current moment when everything is a matter of dispute, back to Web 1.0’s promises of greater equality and a bright digital future, Onyebuchi deftly examines internet culture and its role in shaping our perception of ourselves, our world, and the potential realities we can envision. From the ever-changing nature of personal writing and free expression, to gaming, manga, fandom, and virtual reality, Racebook considers the internet alongside works of literature both classic and new, asking if our vision for what is possible has really broadened. And given the inequities Black people still face, on and off the page, does the internet only amplify our failures of imagination?

An original investigation of race through the lens of the modern internet age and an affecting journey into the heart of community online, Racebook argues for recognizing the individual behind the binary code that shapes our digital lives. As Onyebuchi asks, “Is this a race book or is it not? Is it either-or? Can it be both-and? Can I?”

Tochi Onyebuchi was born October 4, 1987 in Northampton, Massachusetts. He is the Hugo and NAACP Image Award finalist and author of Goliath, Riot Baby, the Beasts Made of Night series, and the War Girls series. His short fiction has appeared in The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy, The Year’s Best Science Fiction, and elsewhere. His nonfiction includes the book (S)kinfolk and has appeared in the New York Times, NPR, and the Harvard Journal of African American Public Policy, among other places. He has earned degrees from Yale University, New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, Columbia Law School, and the Paris Institute of Political Studies. He currently resides in Connecticut.

Matching books

American Novel, Amerikaanse roman, Amerikaanse Schrijvers, Queer boeken

Brandon Taylor – Minor Black Figures

Brandon Taylor Minor Black Figures review and information of the content of the new novel by the American author. Riverhead Books will publish the new Brandon Taylor novel, on October 14, 2025. 

Brandon Taylor Minor Black Figures review

  • “Taylor’s most accomplished novel – a sustained, idiosyncratic portrait of an artist.” (The New York Times Book Review)
  • “Brandon Taylor is a literary superstar … Taylor’s third novel [is] a smart and soulful exploration set in the world of art (both contemporary and historical). The book deftly explores race and sexuality, religion and community, and the way love can change a life.” (The Boston Globe)
  • “A meditative, illuminating portrait of friendship and competition, belief systems and the connections between us all.” (People)
  • “Dazzling … a poetic meditation on Black art, friendship, young love and intimacy.” (USA Today)

Brandon Taylor Minor Black Figures

Minor Black Figures

  • Author: Brandon Taylor (United States)
  • Book type: American novel
  • Publisher: Riverhead Books
  • Released: 14 October 2025
  • Length: 400 pages
  • Format: hardcover / paperback / ebook / audiobook
  • Prize: $ 39.00
  • Order book from: Amazon / Bol

Blurb of the new novel by Brandon Taylor

The story of a gay Black painter navigating the worlds of art, desire, and creativity.

New York simmers with heat and unrest as Wyeth, a painter, finds himself at an impasse in his own work.

After attending a dubious show put on by a collective of careerist artists, he retreats to a bar in the West Village where he meets Keating, a former seminarian. Over the long summer, as the two get to know each another, they talk and argue about God, sex, and art.

Meanwhile, at his job working for an art restorer, Wyeth begins to investigate the life and career of a forgotten, minor black artist. His search yields potential answers to questions that Wyeth is only now beginning to ask about what it means to be a black artist making black art amid the mess and beauty of life itself.

As he did so brilliantly in the Booker Prize finalist Real Life and the bestselling The Late Americans, Brandon Taylor brings alive a captivating set of characters, this time at work and at play in the competitive art world. Minor Black Figures is a vividly etched portrait, both sweeping and tender, of friendship, creativity, belief, and the deep connections among them.

Brandon Taylor is born June 1, 1989 in Prattville, Alabama. He  the author of the novels The Late Americans and Real Life, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Prize, and named a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice and a Science + Literature Selected Title by the National Book Foundation. His collection Filthy Animals, a national bestseller, was awarded The Story Prize and shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize. He lives in New York City.

Matching books

American Novel, Amerikaanse roman, Amerikaanse schrijfster, Familieroman

Jennifer Niven – Meet the Newmans

Jennifer Niven Meet the Newmans review and information of the content of the novel by the American writer. MacMillan will publish the new Jennifer Niven novel, on January 15, 2026. 

Jennifer Niven Meet the Newmans reviews

  • “This story of a famous fiction TV family in 1960’s America and their subsequent unravelling is as thoughtful as it is entertaining. The writing thrums with energy, and the characters feel wholly believable. Definitely a recommend from me.” (Jennie Godfrey, author of The List of Suspicious Things)
  • “Very unique and cleverly written. A big fat family drama and huge slice of social history in the 1960s when life for each family member pivots, attitudes are challenged and relationships are tested. This family is like a simmering pot on the stove, waiting to boil over. And when it does, it’s a recipe for drama.” (Jo Thomas, author of Love in Provence)

Jennifer Niven Meet the Newmans

Meet the Newmans

No family is perfect

  • Author: Jennifer Niven (United States)
  • Book type: American novel
  • Publisher: Pan Macmillan
  • To be released: 15 January 2026
  • Length: 400 pages
  • Format: hardcover / ebook / audiobook
  • Order book from: Amazon / Bol

Blurb of the new Jennifer Niven novel

Los Angeles, 1964.

For two decades, Del and Dinah Newman and their sons, Guy and Shep, have ruled television as America’s Favourite Family. Millions of viewers tune in every week to watch them play flawless, black-and-white versions of themselves. But now the Sixties are in full swing, and the Newmans’ perfection suddenly feels woefully out of touch.

Ratings are in free fall, as are the Newmans themselves. Del is keeping an explosive secret from his wife, and Dinah is slowly going numb. Steady, stable Guy is hiding the truth about his love life, and rock ‘n’ roll idol Shep may finally be in real trouble.

When Del is in a mysterious car accident, Dinah decides to take matters into her own hands. She hires Juliet Dunne, an outspoken young reporter, to help her write the final episode. But Dinah and Juliet have wildly different perspectives about what it means to be a woman, and a family, in 1964 America.

Can Dinah Newman bring her family together to change television history? Or will she be cancelled before she ever had the chance?Maybe it’s time for perfection to fall out of style…

Jennifer Niven was 14 May 1968 in Charlotte, North Carolina. Ze is an American author of thirteen books, fiction and nonfiction, including All the Bright Places, which she also adapted for film. Her award-winning books have been translated into more than seventy-five languages and have sold upward of 3.5 million copies worldwide. Jennifer has loved television and film her whole life and has been lucky enough to develop projects with Netflix, Sony, ABC and Warner Bros. She divides her time between coastal Georgia and Los Angeles with her husband and literary cat.

Matching books

American Novel, Amerikaanse roman, Amerikaanse Schrijvers

Jay McInerney – See You on the Other Side

Jay McInerney See You on the Other Side review and information of the content of new novel by the American author. Knopf will publish the Jay McInerney novel, on April 14, 2026. Here you can read information about the content of the book, the author and the publication.

Jay McInerney See You ont the Other Side reviews

Whenever a review of See You on the Other Side, Jay McInerney’s new novel, appears in the media, we’ll highlight it on this page.

Jay McInerney See You on the Other Side

See You on the Other Side

  • Author: Jay McInerney (United States)
  • Book type: American novel
  • Publisher: Knopf
  • To be released: April 14, 2026
  • Length: 304 pages
  • Format: hardback / ebook / audiobook
  • Prize: $ 30.00
  • Order book from: Amazon / Bol

Blurb of the new Jay McInerney novel

Once again brilliantly combining the lyrical observation of F. Scott Fitzgerald with the laser-bright social satire of Evelyn Waugh, Jay McInerney gives us the stunningly accomplished and profoundly affecting final volume in the tetralogy charting the marriage of Russell and Corrinne Calloway, now in their sixties, against the backdrop of various crises that have bedeviled our society in the past forty years.

The celebration of the thirty-fifth wedding anniversary of Russell Calloway’s best friend, Washington Lee—the least likely monogamist of his acquaintance somehow having become over the years a model husband and father—at the Odeon in the Spring of 2020 sparks an at once funny and moving autumnal reckoning with mortality as the specter of the Covid-19 virus spreads. In this moment of unprecedented upheaval—frantic and fraught real-time response, piercing personal and political impact—the Calloways find themselves and their marriage tested in ways they could never have anticipated as fatal consequences ensue.

Jay McInerney was born January 13, 1955 in Hartford, Connecticut. He is the author of eight novels, two collections of short stories, and three collections of essays on wine. His latest book, Bright, Precious Days, was published in 2016. He lives in New York City and Bridgehampton, New York.

Matching books

American Crime Novel, Amerikaanse roman, Amerikaanse schrijfster

Nic Stone – Boom Town

Nic Stone Boom Town review and information of the content of the new Atlanta Crime novel by the American author. Simon & Shuster will publish the new Nic Stone novel, on October 14, 2025. 

Nic Stone Boom Town  review

Whenever a book review or review of Boom Town, the new novel by Nic Stone appears in the media, we’ll highlight it on this page.

Nic Stone Boom Town

Boom Town

  • Author: Nic Stone (United States)
  • Book type: American novel, crime novel
  • Publisher: Simon & Schuster
  • To be released: 14 October 2025
  • Length: 282 pages
  • Format: hardcover / ebook / audiobook
  • Prize: $ 28.00 / $ 14,99 / $ 23.99
  • Order book from: Amazon / Bol

Blurb of the new novel by Chris Nic Stone

Nic Stone’s adult thriller debut about two missing erotic dancers from Atlanta’s most notorious gentlemen’s club and the woman committed to finding them.

When Damaris “Charm” Wilburn, a new daytime dancer, is missing for her shift at Boom Town, former headliner Michah “Lyriq” Johanssen suspects something more than a “no call, no show.” As Lyriq’s former headline partner and lover—Felice “Lucky” Carothers—also vanished under similar circumstances, Lyriq decides she’s going to find them.

Delving deeper into Charm and Lucky’s disappearances, Lyriq uncovers a tangled web of deceit, privilege, and power. The line between friend and foe blurs, forcing Lyriq to confront the question: Is finding for these women worth the threat to her own life?

This tantalizing thriller will take you on a heart-pounding and page turning journey through the peaks and valleys of Atlanta’s underworld.

Nic Stone born July 10, 1985 in Atlanta, Georgia, is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Dear Martin. A Spelman College graduate, Nic lives in Atlanta with her family. Boom Town is her first adult novel.

Matching books

American Novel, Amerikaanse roman, Amerikaanse schrijfster, coming-of-age roman, Debuutroman

Portia Elan – Homebound

Portia Elan Homebound review and information of the content of the coming-of-age novel by the American author. Chatto & Windus will publish the Portia Elan debut novel, on May 7, 2026. Here you can read information about the content of the book, the author and the publication.

Portia Elan Homebound reviews

  • “A joy – at once a gripping mystery that confidently spans centuries, and a hauntingly beautiful exploration of what makes us human…. it kept me up all night!” (Madeline Miller)
  • “Homebound is the most original and arresting novel I’ve read in a very long time. Elan has created a century-spanning epic that’s also an utterly intimate story of love, loss, and found family. What a joy; what a marvel.” (Anna North)

Portia Elan Homebound

Homebound

  • Author: Portia Elan (United States)
  • Book type: American debut novel, coming-of-age novel
  • Publisher: Chatto & Windus
  • To be released: 7 May 2026
  • Length: 320 pages
  • Format: hardcover / ebook / audiobook
  • Prize: £16.99 / £ 8.99 / £ 14.00
  • Order book from: Amazon

Blurb of the novel by Portia Elan

Six hundred years. Five interlocking lives. One computer game. And the many paths that can lead us home.

  • 1983: a grieving teenager can’t wait to leave home.
  • 2083: a scientist makes a radical discovery about the human spirit.
  • 2586: a pirate captain navigates the perils of a flooded world.
  • Meanwhile: an astronaut is on a rescue mission in deep space.

It’s 1983 and Becks can’t wait to get the hell out of Cincinnati. In the meantime, she has work to do: her uncle, the only person who understood her, has left her a half-finished game to complete.

What Becks is coding will outlast her by centuries and shape the lives of a scientist, an astronaut and a desperate sea captain in ways she cannot imagine. It will connect these four pioneering women across time, vast oceans and far-distant planets and introduce them to a remarkable robot destined to gather together this disparate crew and bring them home.

Homebound is a coming out and coming-of-age story, a wild and precarious sea adventure, a space odyssey. As it slips through time, loss, creativity, found family, it journeys deep into humanity’s future and capacity for love.

Portia Elan studied history at Stanford University and earned an MFA from the University of Victoria before returning to California, where she has worked as a waitress, bookseller, teacher and public librarian. She was a 2016 Lambda Literary Fellow and lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her wife and an abundance of cats. Homebound is her first novel.

Matching books

American Novel, Amerikaans historicus, Amerikaanse roman, Amerikaanse schrijfster, Feminisme, Feministische boeken, Historische Roman

Brigitte Dale – The Good Daughters

Brigitte Dale The Good Daughters review and information of the content of the first novel by the American author and historian. Pegasus Books will publish the Brigitte Dale historical novel about the Sufragettes in London, on November 4, 2025. Here you can read information about the content of the novel, the author and the publication.

Brigitte Dale The Good Daughters review

  • “The Good Daughters brings fresh energy to the plight of the Suffragettes and fight for women’s right to vote. This retelling of the battle for women’s votes sheds light on another side of the Suffragette movement. It contrasts the pressures each of the characters face to conform, and be so-called ‘good daughters,’ with the need to stand up for oneself and their collective rights. The narrative also alludes to the gritty reality that the Suffragettes faced at the hands of the police…Together, they achieve more than they ever thought they could.” (Jessica Mills, author of The English Chemist)
  • “Dale’s beautifully written novel drew me right in—it was almost as if I were marching right along with her vibrant cast of characters in their fight for suffrage. The depth and nuance of the storytelling, the vivid portrayal of the injustices suffered, and the power of women determined to bring about change build to a crescendo that feels fiercely relevant today. I loved it.” (Fiona Davis, athor of The Stolen Queen and The Lions of Fith Avenue)
  • “Knowing the price many paid is an essential piece of history, powerfully communicated in this engaging novel” (Booklist)
  • “The Good Daughters is a powerful novel inspired by the real women who risked everything to fight for women’s voting rights. With vivid insight to the dangers, the persecution, the judgement, and terror these women faced, the story reflects just how steep the stakes could be. Dale’s immense research and atmospheric writing shines in this must-read debut.” (Madeline Martin, author of The Booklover’s Library)

Brigitte Dale The Good Daughters

The Good Daughters

  • Author: Brigitte Dale (United States)
  • Book type: historical novel about the Suffragettes
  • Publisher: Pegasus Books
  • Released: November 4, 2025
  • Length: 352 pages
  • Format: hardcover/ ebook
  • Prize: $ 27.95 / $ 18.99
  • Order book from: Amazon / Bol

Blurb of the novel by Brigitte Dale

A moving and vivid story of three suffragettes in London and the battle for equality that tests the strength of their will and the bonds of their friendship.

In 1912, three young women from wildly different backgrounds are bound together by their desire to have a say in their future.

Charlotte, disappointed to discover that college isn’t the key to the freedom she longed for, shocks her family when she moves to London and joins a group of suffragettes willing to upend social norms for the vote. Aristocratic Beatrice, with a law degree she legally can’t put into practice and a fiancé she’s not particularly excited to marry, escapes to London to spend her last months of unmarried life with the suffragettes, and falls deeply—and dangerously—into forbidden love. Emily, the daughter of the warden of the infamous Holloway Jail, grieves her mother and saves her wages for a better life outside the prison’s walls. Her best chance at escaping the drudgery of her life is to stay out of trouble, but when the suffragettes land in her father’s cells, she must consider risking not only her family’s livelihood, but her own future.

With the dangerous stakes of the suffrage campaign becoming a fight for the women’s bodies and lives, they enter a treacherous world where the laws and justice system are stacked against them. They face violent protests, hunger strikes, and brutal forced feedings, and the women must decide how much they are willing to risk for their freedom and for each other.

Brigitte Dale is an American author, editor, and historian. She earned her master’s degree in women’s history at Yale and has written about suffragettes and feminist history in the anthology Women’s Suffrage in Word, Image, Music, Stage, and Screen (Routledge); Electric Literature; Medium; and other publications. She is an assistant editor at St. Martin’s Press and her bookstagram.

Matching books