Mike Konczal and J.W. Mason argue in the New York Times that the U.S. economy is poised for a historic boom: "It’s been half a century since Americans have seen an extended period where the economy was running at anything like full capacity. This time, if we play it right, it could be different." Mike Konczal’s book FREEDOM FROM THE MARKET was published January 12, 2021 from The New Press.

Conor Dougherty author of the acclaimed book GOLDEN GATES joined The Realignment podcast to unpack the housing crisis, the connection between homelessness and affordability, NIMBYs vs YIMBYs, and what a backlash to policies that increase construction could look like. GOLDEN GATES published February 18, 2020 from Penguin Press.

YES, DADDY, Jonathan Parks-Ramage's novel, was chosen for The Advocate's 5 Most Exciting LGBTQ+ Debut Books to Read This Summer. The reviewer writes: "Things I liked about the novel [are] the masterful pacing and how the book explores how challenging it can be when a victim comes forward with their story. This is a knockout debut, one of the most exciting of the year. Will it make you uncomfortable? Yes, Daddy. Should you still absolutely read it? Yes, Daddy." HMH/Mariner Books published the novel May 18, 2021.

The New York Times bestselling novel THE PROPHETS by Robert Jones, Jr. has been named a Best Book of the Year So Far 2021 by Goodreads and the Amazon Book Review. In their review, Amazon writes: “The intimate connection between two male slaves toiling on a Mississippi plantation is the only thing that cuts through their otherwise brutal existence. This is the one bright spot in a lyrical but devastating debut novel that shines a harsher light on a shameful legacy that is still deeply felt today. It’s also a profound reminder of love’s power to repudiate it.” Putnam published the book January 5, 2021.

Rosecrans Baldwin's EVERYTHING NOW has been reviewed by the New York Times on the day of its highly anticipated release. They write: “To write the definitive book about Los Angeles would be impossible. In EVERYTHING NOW, the novelist Rosecrans Baldwin doesn’t try. And in not trying, he may have written the perfect book about Los Angeles. Freewheeling and polyhedral, the book could serve equally as an ornament on the coffee table of a Silver Lake architect; a pamphlet at an anti-deportation rally downtown." The Los Angeles Times also ran a feature interview with Baldwin, hailing EVERYTHING NOW as “an impressionistic, ambivalent, interview-heavy, judgment-light book of reportage about L.A. today.” MCD Books published the book on June 15, 2021.

Padma Lakshmi’s TOMATOES FOR NEELA was featured in the U.S. Book Show, which was held from May 25-27 and featured keynote speeches and discussions with authors of upcoming high-profile titles. Lakshmi sat down with Viking Children’s Books editorial director Tamar Brazis for her keynote, where she spoke about “[wanting] to create a story that taught [her] daughter about respecting the seasons, knowing when different things grew, and also where our food comes from,” as well as “[shortening] that distance…between the tomato on the dinner table and the hands that picked it.” The keynote was also highlighted on Publishers Weekly’s best-of list from the event. Viking Books for Young Readers will publish the book on August 31, 2021.

Praise has been flooding in for Joss Lake's debut novel FUTURE FEELING. A feature profile of the author in The Cut praises the book's "flamboyant surreality" and its vision of a world in which "everyone’s spiritual state is highly surveilled and fantastically color-coded... Subway cars glow the amalgamated color of their passengers’ moods. Emotional frequencies are of the utmost importance." FUTURE FEELING has also been featured in a slew of summer reading roundups, including Refinery29 ("a riotously glistering world"), Wired ("an original, trippy caper"), Bustle (“[a] Black Mirror-esque story of magic and mayhem”), Alta ("illustrates the significance of community and connection"), and The A.V. Club (“this witty, inventive debut novel sounds like a lot of fun”), as well as Pride Month reading lists from Goodreads, Harper's BAZAAR, and Parade. Soft Skull published the book on June 1, 2021.

Madeleine Schwartz profiled Xiaolu Guo's literary and film works for The New York Review. On Guo's latest novel, A LOVER'S DISCOURSE, she writes: "Guo seems interested in describing distance rather than points of commonality, capturing an inability to talk rather than a global conversation. While the language of globalized literature can be flat and universal to the point of alienation, Guo’s English, with its deliberate missteps, its open confusion, and its pockets of cold, is perhaps better able to capture a certain kind of alienation that people feel when being forced to communicate in a language that isn’t native to them." Grove Press published A LOVER’S DISCOURSE on October 13, 2020.

EVERYTHING NOW by Rosecrans Baldwin was featured in Alta Magazine's “13 New Books for June.” They write: “Baldwin offers an amalgam of voices in the form of stories, conversations, and reflections that add up to a spectacular collage portrait of Los Angeles. The result is a daring and innovative excavation of the City of Angels as 'the Great American City-State.'” MCD will publish the book on June 15, 2021.

Dawnie Walton's debut novel THE FINAL REVIVAL OF OPAL & NEV was included in the Daily Beast's round-up of best summer reads. They hail it as a "showstopper,” noting: “Unsparing and raw in its exploration of the personal and political complications these characters face, the novel explodes with color, style, and music as it explores the challenges of love and art, racism and gender inequality in a story that doesn’t leave a single note out of place.” 37 Ink published the novel on March 30, 2021.