Trade Paperback Winner of the 2020 Center for Fiction First Novel PrizeWinner of the 2020 National Book Critics Circle's John Leonard Prize for Best First BookWinner of the 2020 Kirkus Prize for FictionWinner of the 2021 Dylan Thomas PrizeA New York Times Notable Book of the YearNamed Best Book of the Year by O: the Oprah Magazine, Vanity Fair, Los Angeles Times, Town and Country, Amazon, Indigo, NPR, Harper’s Bazaar, Kirkus Reviews, Marie Claire, Good HousekeepingA Literati Book Club recommendation from Susan Orlean Edie is stumbling her way through her twenties - sharing a subpar apartment in Bushwick, clocking in and out of her admin job, making a series of inappropriate sexual choices. She is also haltingly, fitfully giving heat and air to the art that simmers inside her. And then she meets Eric, a digital archivist with a family in New Jersey, including a wife who has agreed to an open marriage - with rules.As if navigating the constantly shifting landscapes of contemporary sexual manners and racial politics weren’t hard enough, Edie finds herself unemployed and invited into Eric’s home - though not by Eric. She becomes a hesitant ally to his wife and a de facto role model to his adopted daughter. Edie may be the only Black woman young Akila knows.Irresistibly unruly and strikingly beautiful, razor-sharp and slyly comic, sexually charged and utterly absorbing, Raven Leilani’s Luster is a portrait of a young woman trying to make sense of her life - her hunger, her anger - in a tumultuous era. It is also a haunting, aching description of how hard it is to believe in your own talent, and the unexpected influences that bring us into ourselves along the way.
