Historical Fiction
Jonah Adebayo-Reyes
A former Bronx history teacher who spent four years in city archives researching Harlem's last lamplighters.
Debut · Lantern House, Aug 19, 2026
Authors A to Z
Every debut and emerging author we have featured, with the book that introduced them.
A
B
Essays
Hannah Birch
A former agricultural surveyor who walked 900 miles of English and Welsh field margins for her essays.
Debut · Common Ground, Aug 4, 2026
C
Romance
Imani Clarke
A romance novelist whose greenhouse love story found its readers through one Durham bookseller.
Debut · Rosewater, June 23, 2026
D
Fantasy
Rosa Delacroix-Vance
A beekeeper in Asheville, North Carolina, who drew the map of her fantasy kingdom before writing a chapter.
Debut · Farlight, Sept 22, 2026
E
Literary Fiction
Mara Ellison
A hospice night nurse in Tenney Harbor, Maine, who wrote her first novel over eleven years of 4 a.m. breaks.
Debut · Harbor Light Press, Sept 8, 2026
L
Mystery
Beatrice Lang
A year-round cold water swimmer who set her first mystery at a winter swim club in Gullhaven, Massachusetts.
Debut · Bellwether, July 7, 2026
M
Coming of Age
Colin Mercer
A retired machinist from western Pennsylvania who published his first novel at 67.
Debut · Rustbelt Editions, June 2, 2026
Memoir
Delia Montrose
A memoirist from Alton, Illinois, whose self-published debut was carried into a fourth printing by a local book club.
Debut · Independently published, May 12, 2026
N
Science Fiction
Kai Nakamura-Holt
A former air traffic controller in Portland, Oregon, writing quiet science fiction with no villains.
Debut · Farlight, Sept 15, 2026
O
Literary Fiction
Samuel Okafor
A Houston CPA who wrote his first novel one hour at a time, before dawn and before the office.
Debut · Harbor Light Press, Mar 17, 2026
V
Thriller
Priya Venkataraman
A working coastal hydrologist in Norfolk, Virginia, who built her thriller around a storm surge model.
Debut · Northwater Books, Sept 1, 2026
W
Poetry
Tomasz Wren
A poet and ESL teacher in Milwaukee, born in Gdansk, who kept 212 drafts of a single sonnet.
Debut · Finch & Quill, Apr 2, 2026
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