Oh pussycat, I’m so glad to hear your voice,’ the girl’s mother said on the telephone.” Purity (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, September 2015) by Jonathan Franzen. Ninth book, fifth novel. Agent: Susan Golomb. Editor: Jonathan Galassi. Publicist: Jeff Seroy.
“My midway journey, my emancipated eyes / like runaways, exposed, and the row homes stacked / again, colorless drab LEGO blocks.” Roll Deep (Norton, August 2015) by Major Jackson. Fourth book, poetry collection. Agent: None. Editor: Jill Bialosky. Publicist: Lauren Maturo.
“In my earliest memory I’m three years old, running down the hall of our old house in Henderson, North Carolina, a small, gray-shingled one in a stand of oak trees on a hilltop overlooking Ruin Creek.” Barefoot to Avalon (Atlantic Monthly Press, August 2015) by David Payne. Sixth book, first memoir. Agent: Tina Bennett. Editor: Elisabeth Schmitz. Publicist: Deb Seager.
“Punting the prairie dog into the library was a mistake.” Gold Fame Citrus (Riverhead Books, September 2015) by Claire Vaye Watkins. Second book, first novel. Agent: Nicole Aragi. Editor: Rebecca Saletan. Publicist: Jynne Martin.
“Very little is known, though much has been written, about the true nature of the jinn, the creatures made of smokeless fire.” Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights (Random House, September 2015) by Salman Rushdie. Fifteenth book, tenth novel. Agent: Andrew Wylie. Editor: Will Murphy. Publicist: Barbara Fillon.
“I like the lady horses best, / how they make it all look easy, / like running 40 miles per hour / is as fun as taking a nap, or grass.” Bright Dead Things (Milkweed Editions, September 2015) by Ada Limón. Fourth book, poetry collection. Agent: None. Editor: Daniel Slager. Publicist: Casey O’Neil.
“A spring-fed creek ran through the ranch and so even in the harshest summer weeks there was a narrow lane of willows and green grass.” Half an Inch of Water (Graywolf Press, September 2015) by Percival Everett. Twenty-fifth book, fourth story collection. Agent: Melanie Jackson. Editor: Fiona McCrae. Publicist: Erin Kottke.
“I saw someone coming in the distance, but couldn’t make / out who it was.” Dome of the Hidden Pavilion (Ecco, August 2015) by the late James Tate. Nineteenth book, seventeenth poetry collection. Agent: None. Editor: Daniel Halpern. Publicist: Martin Wilson.
“A young man hiking through a forest is abruptly confronted with a fork in the path.” The Road Not Taken (Penguin Press, August 2015) by David Orr. Second book, essay collection. Agent: Betsy Lerner. Editor: Ann Godoff. Publicist: Yamil Anglada.
“Edward Darby knew that an artist’s work had the power to change the way in which art was perceived, for every successful artist must recreate the medium, but he did not know, each time he went to a new artist’s studio, if he’d ever find it.” The Prize (Counterpoint Press, September 2015) by Jill Bialosky. Eighth book, third novel. Agent: Sarah Chalfant. Editor: Dan Smetanka. Publicist: Megan Fishmann.
“I’m the best auctioneer in the world, but no one knows it because I’m a discreet sort of man.” The Story of My Teeth (Coffee House Press, September 2015) by Valeria Luiselli, translated from the Spanish by Christina MacSweeney. Third book, second novel. Agent: Laurence Laluyaux. Editor: Chris Fischbach. Publicist: Amelia Foster.
“And when I heft a tomato / in my hand, sere orange, seamed / with scar along the split, in September / the bush still blossoming but fruit / no longer sets— / what’s left is the last of the season.” Antidote for Night (BOA Editions, September 2015) by Marsha de la O. Second book, poetry collection. Agent: None. Editor: Peter Conners. Publicist: Jenna Fisher.
For author podcasts and excerpts of books featured in Page One, visit us at www.pw.org/magazine.
