WINNER OF THE ASPEN WORDS LITERARY PRIZE • Shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction • Finalist for the Chautauqua Prize • A New York Times and Washington Post Notable Book of the Year“Assured and formidable.” — Wall Street JournalAfter years away from her family’s homeland, and reeling from a disastrous love affair, actress Sonia Nasir returns to Haifa to visit her older sister Haneen. This is her first trip back since the second intifada and the deaths of their grandparents: while Haneen made a life here commuting to Tel Aviv to teach at the university, Sonia remained in London to focus on her acting career and now dissolute marriage. On her return, she finds her relationship to Palestine is fragile, both bone-deep and new.At Haneen’s, Sonia meets the charismatic and candid Mariam, a local director, and finds herself roped into a production of Hamlet in the West Bank. Sonia is soon rehearsing Gertude’s lines in Classical Arabic and spending more time in Ramallah than Haifa, along with a dedicated group of men from all over historic Palestine who, in spite of competing egos and priorities, each want to bring Shakespeare to that side of the wall. As opening night draws closer it becomes clear just how many violent obstacles stand before a troupe of Palestinian actors. Amidst it all, the life Sonia once knew starts to give way to the daunting, exhilarating possibility of finding a new self in her ancestral home.A stunning rendering of present-day Palestine, Enter Ghost is a story of diaspora, displacement, and the connection to be found in family and shared resistance. Timely, thoughtful, and passionate, Isabella Hammad’s highly anticipated second novel is an exquisite feat, an unforgettable story of artistry under occupation.

Enter Ghost

An announcement blares over the TV: TWENTY-FIVE DAYS UNTIL IMPACT Thanks to an unrelenting cycle of cancer treatments, thirty-two-year-old Gabe is too weak to dance gracefully on stage or through NYC's sparkling social scene like he once did. And although he and Josie have been in love for six years, lately Gabe's been feeling more like Josie's patient than his boyfriend. So one day, Gabe makes a choice: he'll forgo treatment and live out his remaining days on his own terms.Then a harrowing announcement blasts over the news-TWENTY-FIVE DAYS UNTIL IMPACT-and as the world falls into chaos around him, something sparks inside Gabe for the first time in a long time: the chance for adventure. When his cousin, Lisi, shows up with a car and a plan, the three begin a journey none of them ever expected--a road trip through the end of the world.Profound, moving, and delicate, We Have Reached the End of Our Show is a crystalline depiction of the best of humanity and the love we're all capable of, even in the bleakest of times. Gabe, Josie, and Lisi take turns at the wheel of this novel, steering readers along hauntingly empty highways and through the adventure that happens when we're forced to put down the carefully drawn map of our lives and look around at what really matters: each other.

We Have Reached the End of Our Show

A bold, inventive, and fiercely original debut novel that begins with an uncle dead and his tween niece’s private confession to the reader—she and her sister killed him, and they blame the British.Summer, 1986. The Creel sisters, Georgie Ayyar and Agatha Krishna, welcome their aunt, uncle and young cousin—newly arrived from India—into their house in rural Wyoming where they’ll all live together. Because this is what families do. That is, until the sisters decide that it’s time for their uncle to die.According to Georgie, the British are to blame. And to understand why, you need to hear her story. She details the violence hiding in their house and history, her once-unshakeable bond with Agatha Krishna, and her understanding of herself as an Indian-American in the heart of the West. Her account is, at every turn, cheeky, unflinching, and infectiously inflected with the trappings of teendom, including the magazine quizzes that help her make sense of her life. At its heart, the tale she weaves is: a) a vivid portrait of an extended family b) a moving story of sisterhood c) a playful ode to the 80s d) a murder mystery (of sorts) e) an unexpected and unwaveringly powerful meditation on history and language, trauma and healing, and the meaning of independenceOr maybe it’s really: f) all of the above.

How to Commit a Postcolonial Murder: A Novel

Fledgling, Octavia Butler’s last novel, is the story of an apparently young, amnesiac girl whose alarmingly un-human needs and abilities lead her to a startling conclusion: she is in fact a genetically modified, 53-year-old vampire. Forced to discover what she can about her stolen former life, she must at the same time learn who wanted—and still wants—to destroy her and those she cares for, and how she can save herself. Fledgling is a captivating novel that tests the limits of "otherness" and questions what it means to be truly human.

Fledgling

Could you abandon your past, your family, even your own name for the chance to be a hero? Millions attempt to do just that by applying to East Technical Institute's hero program, trying to earn the right to use the powers they were born with. After all, only licensed heroes can use their powers freely; if they are not accepted into the program, those caught using their abilities- even to save themselves- are branded villains.Kirin has, in his opinion, only barely managed to grab one of these spots. He's determined to make the most of the opportunity, doing his best to focus on the rigorous program itself. But, more and more, he's drawn to his most standoffish classmate, a man who knows more about the secretive school than he should. When disaster strikes midway through his first school year, Kirin and his classmates are thrown into the conflict of hero versus villain, as well as human versus superhuman. Battling prejudice and his own past, Kirin must decide what being a hero is worth and what he's willing to sacrifice to become one. After all, in a world that treats most people with powers as monsters, it's not easy to see the line between victim and villain.

Warm-Blooded (Carbon Chronicles)

Teen fashionista Ayana always believed she’d go to hell and back for her sister, Sabrina, but she never thought it would be so literal. After a family dinner where Sabrina’s boyfriend, Damian, is replaced by a shape-shifting mirror demon that’s out for her soul, Ayana is forced to put her designing dreams on hold to become the chic demon-slayer her sister needs.Unfortunately, demon hunting isn’t as easy as sprinkling holy water around, especially after she has a brush with death and is rescued by sweet, musical Carter. Not only is he charming and handsome, but suddenly he’s popping up everywhere, distracting her from her mission. Just as she starts to fall for him, coincidences begin to pile up, Ayana realizes that Carter and Damian’s sudden appearances in her life may not be due to chance after all. Perhaps the two are more intertwined than she thought.To save her sister and protect her heart, Ayana is forced to team up with her disaster cousin, her baking-obsessed best friend, and her eccentric guardian angel to confront the one thing she hadn’t been expecting to fight: love.In this stylish, laugh-out-loud story of sisterhood and self-acceptance, Ayana learns to face the demon in the mirror, and that sometimes, you can fall in love for the hell of it.

Love Be Damned

The first-ever memoir of a child’s experience in detention on the US/Mexico border under President Trump’s infamous family separation policy.D Esperanza was just thirteen years old when he lost his caregivers, his beloved grandmother and uncle. Since both of his parents were working and living in the United States, D was left on his own in a small town in Honduras. He quickly realized he simply could not make enough money to survive so he made the difficult decision to head north with his cousins and hopefully reunite with his parents in el norte. Together, the boys struggled to survive a long and treacherous journey through Central America and Mexico. Along the way, D and his cousins formed a deep bond, only for the four to be brutally separated at the border of the United States. When he is captured and processed at a facility, neither D nor his family are given an update on when he will be released or where he’ll go next. Over the next five months, he kept a journal of his experience. The pages tell a story of pain, cruelty, friendship, and resilience, a living testament to the reality of the border. Amidst the senseless inhumanity and violence of US immigration policy, D found hope in the friendship he and his fellow companions forged, and mentorship from one intrepid advocate who fought on his behalf named Gerardo Iván Morales. Timely, powerful, and unforgettable, Detained brings the border crisis to vivid life.

Detained: A boy's journal of survival and resilience

From the National Book Award finalist and author of Pet comes a novel set in a magical West African world, about a teen girl who must save her missing twin while learning to navigate her own terrifying new powers.Somadina and her twin brother, Jayaike, are practically the same person: they finish each other's sentences and make each other whole. When the twins come of age, their magical gifts begin to develop, but while Jayaike's powers enchant, Somadina's cause fear to ripple through her town.Always an outsider, Somadina now faces blatant--and dangerous--hostility. And things go from bad to worse when her brother—the one person she trusted—vanishes. Somadina knows that no matter the dangers, she must track him down. Even if it means entering the Sacred Forest. Even if it means grueling, otherworldly travel she may not survive. Even if it means finding the hidden places where those closest to the spirit world don't dare to go. Does Somadina have the strength --within both her body and her soul -- for the trying journey ahead?National Book Award finalist Akwaeke Emezi masterfully weaves a tale of family, identity, and the power of the past, in a world where the extraordinary is ordinary.

Somadina

Perfect Victims is an urgent affirmation of the Palestinian condition of resistance and refusal―an ode to the steadfastness of a nation. Palestine is a microcosm of the world: on fire, stubborn, fragmented, dignified. While a settler colonial state continues to inflict devastating violence, fundamental truths are deliberately obscured―the perpetrators are coddled while the victims are blamed and placed on trial. Why must Palestinians prove their humanity? And what are the implications of such an infuriatingly impossible task? With fearless prose and lyrical precision, Mohammed El-Kurd refuses a life spent in cross-examination. Rather than asking the oppressed to perform a perfect victimhood, El-Kurd asks friends and foes alike to look Palestinians in the eye, forgoing both deference and condemnation. How we see Palestine reveals how we see each other; how we see everything else. Masterfully combining candid testimony, history, and reportage, Perfect Victims presents a powerfully simple demand: dignity for the Palestinian.

Perfect Victims: And the Politics of Appeal

The River Has Roots is the hugely anticipated solo debut of the New York Times bestselling and Hugo Award winning author Amal El-Mohtar. Follow the river Liss to the small town of Thistleford, on the edge of Faerie, and meet two sisters who cannot be separated, even in death.. The hardcover edition features beautiful interior illustrations.. "Half delicious murder ballad, half beguiling love story." ―Holly Black • "An absolute must-read." ―T. Kingfisher • "Every sentence sings!" ―Sarah Beth Durst • "Utterly enchanting." ―Fonda Lee • "A story that outlasts itself." ―Alix E. Harrow • "Truly exquisite." ―Zoraida Córdova "A beautiful, musical, and loving story." ―Emma Törzs. “Oh what is stronger than a death? Two sisters singing with one breath.”. In the small town of Thistleford, on the edge of Faerie, dwells the mysterious Hawthorn family.. There, they tend and harvest the enchanted willows and honour an ancient compact to sing to them in thanks for their magic. None more devotedly than the family’s latest daughters, Esther and Ysabel, who cherish each other as much as they cherish the ancient trees.. But when Esther rejects a forceful suitor in favor of a lover from the land of Faerie, not only the sisters’ bond but also their lives will be at risk…

The River Has Roots

A chilling historical horror novel set in the American west in 1912 following a Lutheran priest who transcribes the life of a vampire who haunts the fields of the Blackfeet reservation looking for justice. . A diary, written in 1912 by a Lutheran pastor is discovered within a wall. What it unveils is a slow massacre, a chain of events that go back to 217 Blackfeet dead in the snow. Told in transcribed interviews by a Blackfeet named Good Stab, who shares the narrative of his peculiar life over a series of confessional visits. This is an American Indian revenge story written by one of the new masters of horror, Stephen Graham Jones.

The Buffalo Hunter Hunter

From the acclaimed author of The Stardust Grail comes the epic tale of two sisters who sail across oceans to find their missing third sister―and Earth’s environmental salvation.In Earth's not too distant future, seas consume coastal cities, highways disintegrate underwater, and mutant fish lurk in pirate-controlled depths. Skipper, a skilled sailor and the youngest of three sisters, earns money skimming and reselling plastic from the ocean to care for her ailing grandmother.But then her eldest sister, Nora, goes missing. Nora left home a decade ago in pursuit of a cure for failing crops all over the world. When Skipper and her other sister, Carmen, receive a cryptic plea for help, they must put aside their differences and set out across the sea to find―and save―her. As they voyage through a dying world both beautiful and strange, encountering other travelers along the way, they learn more about their sister's work and the corporations that want what she discovered.But the farther they go, the more uncertain their mission becomes: What dangerous attention did Nora attract, and how well do they really know their sister―or each other? Thus begins an epic journey spanning oceans and continents and a wistful rumination on sisterhood, friendship, and ecological disaster.

Saltcrop

Celestial

Hi friend! I’m Steph – let’s devour some otherworldly stories together.

Steph

During this phase, we're reviewing manuscripts and deciding which book we want to publish. At the end of this phase, we offer an author a book deal.

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Reading is better in community, and I’m grateful to welcome you to mine! I’ve been a content creator most of my life & an avid reader my entire life. Celestial is our home base to celebrate imaginative stories from galaxy-wide voices. (Think: fantasy, horror, sci-fi, magical realism & beyond.) I love being playful with my recommendations, but I always read with intention – this is a discerning and deliberately diverse space. Join my chaotic community … and let’s have fun while uplifting all voices. 

steph ✨ 📚 ✡︎ (@starrysteph)

Hi! I'm Steph. You can mostly find me on booktok (@starrysteph). I love reading & sharing book reviews and recommendations.

book reviews & recs 📚 • animal lover 🐇 • actor & content creator 🎭
