With so many great books being published every month, some literary titles worth exploring can get lost in the stacks. Page One offers the first lines of a dozen recently released books, including A Small Apocalypse by Laura Chow Reeve and Watchnight by Cyrée Jarelle Johnson.
“Before I meet Gloria, my life belongs to me.” The Other Profile (Europa Editions, February 2024) by Irene Graziosi, translated from the Italian by Lucy Rand. First book, novel. Agent: Giulia Pietrosanti. Editor: Michael Reynolds. Publicist: Kristi Bontrager.
“You will surely forgive me if I begin this brief time we have together by talking about our enemies.” There’s Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension (Random House, March 2024) by Hanif Abdurraqib. Eighth book, fourth book of nonfiction. Agent: Alia Hanna Habib. Editors: Ben Greenberg and Maya Millett. Publicists: Maria Braeckel and Marni Folkman.
“What song to sing in tired times as now” Watchnight (Nightboat Books, February 2024) by Cyrée Jarelle Johnson. Second book, poetry collection. Agent: None. Editors: Lindsey Boldt and Jaye Elizabeth Elijah. Publicist: Lina Bergamini.
“I have read the report—inconclusive.” Glitter Road (CavanKerry Press, February 2024) by January Gill O'Neil. Fourth book, poetry collection. Agent: None. Editor: Baron Wormser. Publicist: Heather Brown.
“If I can be called a bird-watcher, my spark was a pair of burrowing owls, painted on the narrow storefront gate of a shuttered real estate business on 145th Street, in Harlem, that brokers single-room-occupancy housing for two hundred dollars a week.” Lessons for Survival: Mothering Against “the Apocalypse” (Henry Holt, March 2024) by Emily Raboteau. Third book, second book of nonfiction. Agent: Amy Williams. Editor: Retha Powers. Publicist: Sarah Jean Grimm.
“This has been the hardest book I’ve ever had to translate.” The Extinction of Irena Rey (Bloomsbury, March 2024) by Jennifer Croft. Second book, first novel. Agent: Katie Grimm. Editor: Daniel Loedel. Publicist: Emily Fishman.
“I was a little suit on a little boy, watching mother in her goodbye box.” Each Knuckle With Sugar (Driftwood Press, February 2024) by Sarah Levine. First book, poetry collection. Agent: None. Editor: Jerrod Schwarz. Publicist: Justin Hargett.
“She unpacked the revelation like a souvenir from her suitcase.” A Small Apocalypse (TriQuarterly Books, March 2024) by Laura Chow Reeve. First book, story collection. Agent: Soumeya Bendimerad Roberts. Editor: Marisa Siegel. Publicist: Charlotte Keathley.
“The baby and I arrived at our sublet with garbage bags full of shampoo and teething crackers, sleeves of instant oatmeal, zippered pajamas with little dangling feet.” Splinters: Another Kind of Love Story (Little, Brown, February 2024) by Leslie Jamison. Fifth book, first memoir. Agent: Jin Auh. Editor: Ben George. Publicist: Lena Little.
“The first thing you’re supposed to do is introduce yourself.” You Get What You Pay For (One World, March 2024) by Morgan Parker. Fifth book, first essay collection. Agent: Dan Kirschen. Editor: Nicole Counts. Publicist: Carla Bruce.
“There were children, and then there were the children of Indians, because the merciless savage inhabitants of these American lands did not make children but nits, and nits make lice, or so it was said by the man who meant to make a massacre feel like killing bugs at Sand Creek, when seven hundred drunken men came at dawn with cannons, and then again four years later almost to the day the same way at the Washita River, where afterward, seven hundred Indian horses were rounded up and shot in the head.” Wandering Stars (Knopf, February 2024) by Tommy Orange. Second book, novel. Agent: Nicole Aragi. Editor: Jordan Pavlin. Publicist: Jordan Rodman.
“I want the miracle that makes me ordinary:” The Moon That Turns You Back (Ecco, March 2024) by Hala Alyan. Seventh book, fifth poetry collection. Agent: Michelle Tessler. Editor: Gabriella Doob. Publicist: Nina Leopold.
