Reads 365: No.14
January - New Voices
Emerging authors & fresh perspectives
Some of the books features heavy subject matter, so please be mindful of the content warnings and research them fully.
Your mental wellbeing matters.
Freshwater
by Akwaeke Emezi
Ada is inhabited by multiple selves, Nigerian ọgbanje spirits living in a human body. This is their story.
Akwaeke Emezi's stunning debut blends Nigerian mythology with mental health, gender identity, and what it means to contain multitudes. Told from the perspectives of Ada and the spirits within her, this is unlike anything you've read—experimental, powerful, and deeply personal.
💫 Perfect for:
Readers seeking experimental fiction
Anyone interested in Nigerian culture
Fans of magical realism
Those exploring identity and multiplicity
⭐ Nigerian mythology
👑 Experimental and revolutionary
🧠 Mental health/plurality
📚 Genre: Literary Fiction
#MarginsXReads #NewVoices #Freshwater #AkwaekeEmezi #NigerianLit #NonBinary #LGBTQ #MagicalRealism #Mythology #ExperimentalFiction #Lambda #DiverseBooks
Wonder
by R.J. Palacio
Auggie Pullman was born with facial differences. He's been homeschooled his whole life. Now he's starting fifth grade at a regular school. R.J. Palacio's debut is about kindness, difference, and choosing to be more than what people see.
✨ "There is no greater disability in society, than the inability to see a person as more."
💫 Perfect for:
Middle grade readers and adults
Anyone seeking disability representation
Fans of uplifting, emotional stories
Readers who believe in kindness
📚 Genre: Middle Grade/Young Adult
#MarginsXReads #NewVoices #Wonder #RJPalacio #ChooseKind #DisabilityRep #MiddleGrade #Kindness #FacialDifference #Uplifting #DiverseBooks
There There
by Tommy Orange
Tommy Orange's debut follows twelve characters converging on the Big Oakland Powwow. Native Americans navigating urban life, addiction, stolen regalia, and the violence of history. Formally inventive, emotionally devastating, and essential for understanding urban Indigenous life.
💫 Perfect for:
Literary fiction readers
Anyone seeking Indigenous perspectives
Fans of interconnected narratives
Readers ready for powerful, urgent storytelling
⭐ National Book Award Finalist ⭐ NYT Bestseller ⭐PEN/Hemingway Award
📚 Genre: Literary Fiction
#MarginsXReads #NewVoices #ThereThere #TommyOrange #IndigenousLit #NativeAmerican #Oakland #NationalBookAward #UrbanNative #Essential #DiverseBooks
The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab
She made a deal: immortality. The cost: everyone who meets her forgets her the moment she's gone.
In 1714 France, Addie LaRue makes a Faustian bargain for freedom and immortality—but she can't leave a mark on the world. For 300 years, she's been forgotten by everyone she meets. Until she meets a boy in a bookstore who remembers her name.
✨V.E. Schwab's love letter to art, memory, and leaving your mark.
💫 Perfect for:
Fantasy readers who want literary depth
Fans of The Night Circus
Anyone pondering mortality and memory
Romance with supernatural twists
⭐ NYT Bestseller
⏳ Time travel/immortality fantasy
💕 Philosophical romance
📚 Genre: Fantasy
#MarginsXReads #NewVoices #AddieL aRue #VESchwab #Fantasy #Immortality #BookTok #TimeTravel #Romance #PhilosophicalFantasy #DiverseBooks
The Only Good Indians
by Stephen Graham Jones
Four Blackfeet men killed an elk on forbidden land. Ten years later, something is hunting them.
Stephen Graham Jones's horror masterpiece follows four friends haunted by their past—literally. Indigenous horror that's about guilt, tradition, masculinity, and the violence passed down through generations. Terrifying, literary, and impossible to put down.
💫 Perfect for:
Horror fans seeking fresh perspectives
Readers interested in Indigenous literature
Anyone who loves atmospheric dread
Fans of smart, literary horror
📚 Genre: Horror
⭐ One of the best horror novels of the decade
#MarginsXReads #NewVoices #TheOnlyGoodIndians #StephenGrahamJones #IndigenousLit #Horror #NativeAmerican #BramStoker #Literary Horror #Blackfeet #DiverseBooks
How High We Go in the Dark
by Sequoia Nagamatsu
A plague emerges from melting permafrost. These interconnected stories span decades, exploring how humanity grieves, adapts, and endures.
Sequoia Nagamatsu's speculative fiction follows scientists, artists, theme park workers, and pig-human hybrids across a plague-altered future. Each chapter is its own story, but together they ask: How do we live with mass grief? Inventive, emotional, and hauntingly relevant.
💫 Perfect for:
Readers who loved Station Eleven or Cloud Atlas
Anyone processing pandemic trauma
⭐ National Book Award Longlist
🌌 Speculative fiction
🦋 Interconnected stories
📚 Genre: Science Fiction
#MarginsXReads #NewVoices #HowHighWeGo #SequoiaNagamatsu #SciFi #SpeculativeFiction #Pandemic #CliFi #JapaneseAmerican #Interconnected #DiverseBooks
Great Circle
by Maggie Shipstead
Marian Graves wants to fly around the world in 1950. Hadley Baxter, a disgraced actress, plays her in a biopic. Maggie Shipstead's epic weaves aviation history, Hollywood scandal, and two women refusing to be grounded. Sweeping, ambitious, brilliant.
✨ Two women, decades apart, connected by obsession, flight, and the need to escape.
💫 Perfect for:
Historical fiction fans
Readers who love aviation/adventure
Anyone seeking epic, ambitious novels
Fans of dual timelines
📚 Genre: Historical Fiction
#MarginsXReads #NewVoices #GreatCircle #MaggieShipstead #BookerPrize #HistoricalFiction #Aviation #Epic #DualTimeline #WomenInHistory #DiverseBooks
Milk Blood Heat
by Dantiel W. Moniz
Dantiel W. Moniz's debut collection is sensual, unsettling, and brilliant. Girls navigate sexual awakening, family dysfunction, racial violence, and the humid intensity of Florida. Each story pulses with life, danger, and the complicated ways we survive.
💫 Perfect for:
Short story enthusiasts
Fans of Roxane Gay's Difficult Women
Readers seeking Black women's stories
Anyone who loves sensual, literary prose
🌟 Stunning debut
#MarginsXReads #NewVoices #MilkBloodHeat #DantielWMoniz #ShortStories #BlackWomen #Florida #LiteraryFiction #BlackAuthors #WhitingAward #DiverseBooks
January’s New Voices list