The books Southern indie booksellers are recommending to readers everywhere!

Literary

The True Confessions of First Lady Freeman by Deesha Philyaw

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The True Confessions of First Lady Freeman by Deesha Philyaw
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First Lady Freeman has my vote in the upcoming First Lady USA pageant, but with scandals, relationships, and secrets breaking, she’s going to need more than God on her side. Sinfully good gossip with layered drama, tenderness, sexiness, and ferocity as you follow Scharisse biting the apple and letting the truth set her free. If you like the sound of Scam Goddess meets If Honk For Jesus Save Your Soul meets Celeste Ng, you’re gonna want to read this immediately!

The True Confessions of First Lady Freeman by Deesha Philyaw, (List Price: $32, Marnier Books, 9780063383074, September 2026)

Reviewed by Ashley, Underbrush Books in Rogers, Arkansas

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Under Story by Chloe Benjamin

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Under Story by Chloe Benjamin
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A beautiful and mind-boggling (in a very good way) book about grief and moving backward and forward through time. As much a literary drama as it is speculative fiction. Loved and perfect for book clubs!

Under Story by Chloe Benjamin, (List Price: $32, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 9780593545218, September 2026)

Reviewed by Kate, Main Street Books in Davidson, NC

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Exit Party by Emily St. John Mandel

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Exit Party by Emily St. John Mandel
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Introspective novel set in two dystopic versions of the US where the same people experience different versions of themselves due to a doorway at one party. Mandel is a master of gorgeous prose and plots that weave together in unexpected ways.

Exit Party by Emily St. John Mandel, (List Price: $32, Knopf, 9780593321461, September 2026)

Reviewed by Carrie, Dog-Eared Books in Raleigh, North Carolina

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How Can My Manager Be So Stupid? by Kazumasa Hayami

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How Can My Manager Be So Stupid? by Kazumasa Hayami
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As I was reading, I kept falling in love more with the story. Kyoko is a relatable main character who highlights how it feels to work and feel stuck in something you originally loved. I love Hayami’s storytelling; it feels like you’re talking to a friend that you connect deeply with. This book feels perfect and personal.

How Can My Manager Be So Stupid? by Kazumasa Hayami, (List Price: $30, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 9798217182299, September 2026)

Reviewed by Victoria, Bookmarks in Winston-Salem, NC

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The Nightingales by Emil Wilson

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The Nightingales by Emil Wilson
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A beautifully rendered coming-of-age story told through a high schooler’s sketchbook after her dad takes in a coworker with AIDs in the ’80s. This book is full of care and empathy; family strife but also understanding as Lou reflects on her parents’ backgrounds; and pops of humor, primarily from the dancing Pomeranian duo. The Nightingales will break your heart but heal it too.

The Nightingales by Emil Wilson, (List Price: $38, Avid Reader Press, Simon & Schuster, 9781668217771, August 2026)

Reviewed by Julie, Hub City Bookshop in Spartanburg, SC

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Last Day of a Prior Life by Andrés Barba

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Last Day of a Prior Life by Andrés Barba
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This is indeed a ghost story, but truly a very eerie tale even for a spooky ghost story. The haunting begins with a realtor showing an empty house that includes an apparition of a young boy who lived in the house. The next time she enters the house, which seems to have a hold on her, the realtor also sees herself as a ghost. The haunting gets even stranger…..hold on….with suspended time and eternal recurrences with the boy and his family. Dear reader, you have not happened upon a more bizarre and lonely tale than Last Day of a Prior Life.

Last Day of a Prior Life by Andrés Barba, (List Price: $26, HarperVia, 9780063352056, August 2026)

Reviewed by Nancy, Bookmiser in Marietta, GA

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Etna by Paul Yoon

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Etna by Paul Yoon
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Etna is a story about continuing on when everything you have known and loved is lost and gone forever. We follow Etna as he strives towards the coast where he was a puppy before enduring the harsh realities of being a working dog in a devastating war that ravaged his country. The land is forever changed, and other animals are now a rare sight. Most notably, there is an absence of birds in the country. The missing birds bring into sharp focus the lack of peace and the total disruption to a way of life. Nothing will ever be the same. All Etna has left is a memory of that coastal place where he once had a mother and siblings, and he clings to the possibility of a future in the last place he knew safety and happiness in the past. The novel ends with the hopeful message that we can endure terrible things and yet, in the ruins, there is always new life waiting for us if we are strong enough to accept what has occurred and move forward with a sense of hope for the future, even if that new life is a different life, a stranger to us. With time, a strange life, like a stranger, can become as familiar to us and as much our home as that echo of the past.

Etna by Paul Yoon, (List Price: $28, Scribner, 9781668020821, August 2026)

Reviewed by Savannah, The Country Bookshop in Southern Pines, NC

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Etna by Paul Yoon

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Etna by Paul Yoon
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Etna is one of those rare books that quietly sneaks into your heart and stays there. Told through the eyes of a war dog searching for home after unimaginable loss, this novel is both devastating and deeply hopeful. Paul Yoon’s writing is spare, lyrical, and so beautifully observant that every page feels like poetry. I laughed, I cried, and more than once I had to stop reading just to sit with a particularly stunning line. Etna’s journey is ultimately about belonging, resilience, and finding light after darkness. If you’re drawn to character-driven stories that leave a lasting mark, keep tissues nearby and make room on your shelf for this unforgettable novel.

Etna by Paul Yoon, (List Price: $28, Scribner, 9781668020821, August 2026)

Reviewed by Stephanie, Story Hollow in Madisonville, Tennessee

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Book Buzz: Etna by Paul Yoon

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Paul Yoon, photo credit the author“I think, like all my projects, it was not just one thing [that started this project]. It was a few things. The obvious one and the fastest answer would be I fell in love with a dog. I have a dog who’s 12 years old now. His name is Oscar. My first dog ever, I never had a dog growing up. I know a lot of people who have animals, and they talk to their dogs. I’ll wake up, and I’ll hear my wife, Laura [van den Berg], talking, and I’ll think she’s on the phone or something. And then I realize she’s just talking to Oscar. But I never talked to him out loud, and I still don’t. Other than basic commands, it’s this silent communication, almost like telepathy or something like that, or imagined telepathy. I spent a lot of time thinking about what his voice would sound like. At the same time, over the past few years as we experience the world, read about the world, open up the newsfeed and all that, there’s been a feeling like I’m exhausted by humanity. Exhausted by humans. I say this a little bit jokingly, but I think I just needed a break from humans. ”

  ― Paul Yoon, Interview, Interview Magazine

Etna by Paul Yoon

What booksellers are saying about Etna

  • Etna is one of those rare books that quietly sneaks into your heart and stays there…I laughed, I cried, and more than once I had to stop reading just to sit with a particularly stunning line.
      ― Stephanie, Story Hollow in Madisonville, TN | BUY

  • Oh, Etna! I didn’t know what to expect going into this book but fell in love almost instantly. What an odyssey! This is one that will stick with me for quite some time.
      ― Mackenzie, Thank You Books in Birmingham, AL | BUY

  • Etna is a story about continuing on when everything you have known and loved is lost and gone forever. The novel ends with the hopeful message that we can endure terrible things and yet, in the ruins, there is always new life waiting for us if we are strong enough to accept what has occurred and move forward with a sense of hope for the future, even if that new life is a different life, a stranger to us. 
    ― Savannah, The Country Bookshop in Southern Pines, NC | BUY

About Paul Yoon

Paul Yoon is the author of six works of fiction: Etna; Once the Shore, a New York Times Notable Book; Snow Hunters, winner of the Young Lions Fiction Award; The Mountain, an NPR Best Book of the Year; Run Me to Earth, a Time Must-Read Books of 2020 and longlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction; and The Hive and the Honey, winner of the 20th Annual Story Prize and longlisted for the Joyce Carol Oates prize.

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Etna by Paul Yoon

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Etna by Paul Yoon
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Oh, Etna! I didn’t know what to expect going into this book but fell in love almost instantly. What an odyssey! From the horrors of war to the horrors of its aftermath to the persistent, stubborn, damning hopefulness of both dog and human spirit, I felt as if I walked with Etna step-for-four-legged-step across this unnamed, war-shattered land in an attempt to find home. Each character stole my heart – Hong, Soojin, Semeru, the old dog – and proved that home is not so much a place as it is the pack that follows you and fights for you, even into and against the unknown. This is one that will stick with me for quite some time.

Etna by Paul Yoon, (List Price: $28, Scribner, 9781668020821, August 2026)

Reviewed by Mackenzie, Thank You Books in Birmingham, AL

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Book Buzz: Dèy by Edwidge Danticat

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Edwidge Danticat, photo credit Lynn Savarese“In December 2017, I was doing some last-minute Christmas shopping in a mall in Miami. I was about to leave when I heard some pops over a loudspeaker. People around me started running, screaming, crying. We thought we were in a mass shooting. It turned out to be a hoax. Before I knew it wasn’t real, I ran with the crowd and hid behind a bush, where I pondered my whole life.

I couldn’t let go of the experience, in part because it’s linked to the much larger issue of massacres and gun violence in the U.S. and Haiti. If there’s an image or sound or character that inspired Dèy, it’s the sound of gunshots, the image of those people fleeing and hiding in the mall that day, among whom emerged Magnolia Elie, the seemingly successful but very conflicted narrator of the book. ”


  ― Edwidge Danticat, Interview, Harper’s Bazaar

Dèy by Edwidge Danticat

What booksellers are saying about Dèy

  • Edwidge Danticat is brilliant – again. In Dèy she explores the impacts of violence on families in Miami and Haiti, the evolution and changeable meaning of home, and the grounding and healing power of family.
      ― Candice, Tombolo Books, St. Petersburg, FL | BUY

  • Taking its title from the Haitian Kreyòl word for mourning, Dèy is a life-affirming novel about not only the fragility of existence, but also the value of love and family.
      ― Jude, Square Books, Oxford, Mississippi | BUY

  • Brilliant, propulsive storytelling!
    ― Cristen, Long Story Books, Atlanta, Georgia | BUY

  • A timely and evocative novel written by master American writer, Edwidge Danticat, the novel follows the life of a Haitian American woman and opens with a bang. Yes, an actual bang, as the main character is caught up in a random act of violence. This begins her questioning of everything she holds dear. What makes a family a family and a home a home? I experienced it all with her.
    ― Karen, Righton Books, St Simons Island, Georgia | BUY

About Edwidge Danticat

Edwidge Danticat is the author of numerous books, including The Art of Death, a National Book Critics Circle finalist; Claire of the Sea Light, a New York Times Notable Book; Brother, I’m Dying, a National Book Critics Circle Award winner and National Book Award finalist; The Dew Breaker, a PEN/Faulkner Award finalist; The Farming of Bones, an American Book Award winner; Breath, Eyes, Memory, an Oprah’s Book Club selection; and Krik? Krak!, also a National Book Award finalist. A Neustadt International Prize for Literature winner and the recipient of a MacArthur Genius Grant, she has been published in The New Yorker, The New York Times, Harper’s Magazine, and elsewhere.

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Superstars by Ann Scott

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Superstars by Ann Scott
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Happy Women in Translation Month! This long-awaited cult classic novel is finally available in English, thanks to the incredible Jonathan Woollen. Superstars is an intimate portrait of a life in the 90s Parisian techno subculture. In three words: French, lesbian, DJs.

Superstars by Ann Scott, (List Price: $22, Astra House, 9781662603471, April 2026)

Reviewed by Abigail, Parnassus Books in Nashville, TN

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Under the Falls by Richard Russo

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Under the Falls by Richard Russo
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Richard Russo has written many memorable novels, and Under the Falls is again a study into the minds of characters as they exist with the people they know best. Tyler Sinclair, at 36, is a successful frontman for the band Stone Mountain, and he is returning to his hometown after leaving abruptly eighteen years earlier. The band is coming to Stone Mountain for a benefit for Doc, who is in a wheelchair because of an accident that Tyler may have caused. Tyler also sees his childhood best friend Curt, who is married to Tyler’s former lover Freddi. The concert is interrupted by jeering audience members, and the night ends with a tragic incident causing deaths. Many questions are raised… why did Curt leave Stone Mountain at age 18? What caused the deaths on the mountain after the concert? And what is happening with drug running under the nose of the Chief of Police? The secrets and betrayals will keep the pages turning as readers get a glimpse into life in this small town.

Under the Falls by Richard Russo, (List Price: $30, Knopf, 9780593805107, August 2026)

Reviewed by Nancy, Bookmiser in Marietta, GA

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Dèy by Edwidge Danticat

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Dèy by Edwidge Danticat
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Taking its title from the Haitian Kreyòl word for mourning, Dèy is a life-affirming novel about not only the fragility of existence, but also the value of love and family. After escaping unscathed from a mass shooting at her local mall, Haitian American real estate agent Magnolia chooses not to tell anyone about her traumatic experience. Instead, she reflects on her relationships with those closest to her – her daughter, her estranged partner, and her aging and increasingly unwell parents – while becoming ever more fixated on news of the shooting and its victims. Understated and quietly powerful, Dèy is a profoundly moving reminder to cherish life, family and home.

Dèy by Edwidge Danticat, (List Price: $30, Knopf, 9780593803523, August 20265)

Reviewed by Jude, Square Books in Oxford, MS

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Sakura by Kanako Nishi

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Sakura by Kanako Nishi
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A unique take on a coming-of-age narrative, Sakura weaves through complex family dynamics and the ways only time can change perspective, while using the childhood family pet as an anchor of innocence. Kauro returns to his childhood home and is flooded with memories of growing up with his siblings, of all the good times and the bad times- all the memories of becoming an adult, and being forced to grow up too soon, and of realizing how limited a young perspective can be. But through it all, the whole family benefits from the simple joy of having a loving pet that keeps them grounded. It’s a really lovely and relatable take on perspective, family, aging, and the pure innocent love of a pet.

Sakura by Kanako Nishi, (List Price: $26.99, HarperVia, 9780063389946, March 2026)

Reviewed by Jenny, Bookmarks in Winston-Salem, NC

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