Book cover of Pew

Book description

WINNER of the 2021 NYPL Young Lions Fiction Award. Finalist for the 2021 Dylan Thomas Prize. Longlisted for the 2021 PEN/Jean Stein Book Award, the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction and the Joyce Carol Oates Prize. One of Publishers Weekly's Best Fiction Books of 2020. One of Amazon's…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Pew as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

This book strikes that perfect tone that hits oddness and singularity on the head, with a bit of spirituality thrown in. When a genderless, racially ambiguous person is found on a church pew (and thus called “Pew” by the parishioners), what is one to think?

Lacey expertly leads us through others’ reactions to the stranger: at first, confiding and confessing their fears, then becoming more menacing. It’s the perfect juxtaposition of what so many of us tend to do when experiencing someone who is different: projecting ourselves and our dreams and fears onto her or him or them. 

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