With so many great books being published every month, some literary titles worth exploring can get lost in the mix. Page One offers the first lines of a dozen recently released books, including Indifferent Cities by Ángel García and The Age of Calamities by Senaa Ahmad.
“Wave goodbye to your brothers, my mother tells me, / five-hundred feet in the air.” Indifferent Cities (Tupelo Press, December 2025) by Ángel García. Second book, second poetry collection. Agent: None. Editor: Kristina Marie Darling. Publicist: Anna Zumbahlen.
“I feel compelled to give you an ending, a promise of hope” The Palace (Alice James Books, January 2026), by Andrés Cerpa. Third book, poetry collection. Agent: None. Editor: Carey Salerno. Publicist: Genevieve Hartman.
“The hands do not belong to me.” The Flower Bearers (Random House, January 2026) by Rachel Eliza Griffiths. Seventh book, first memoir. Agent: Jin Auh. Editor: Caitlin McKenna. Publicist: Gregory Kubie.
“Arousal’s unfaithful when played / back.” E (Nightboat Books, January 2026) by Noa Micaela Fields. First book, poetry collection. Agent: None. Editor: Gia Gonzales. Publicist: Dante Silva.
“He heard her crunching through the sand and then she dropped into the wash and came swaggering toward him in cutoffs, baggy white muscle shirt, and chuck taylors, carrying climbing shoes and an oversized hardbound lab notebook.” Crux (Riverhead Books, January 2026) by Gabriel Tallent. Second book, novel. Agent: Joy Harris. Editor: Sarah McGrath. Publicist: Bianca Flores.
“Because most nights during the final semester of my MFA at George Mason University, while recovering from a mild traumatic brain injury, I fell asleep watching Prison Break on my laptop in bed.” Fit Into Me: A Novel: A Memoir (Rose Metal Press, December 2025) by Molly Gaudry. Third book, first hybrid nonfiction. Agent: Sarah Bedingfield. Editors: Abigail Beckel and Kathleen Rooney. Publicist: Kathleen Rooney.
“She arrived at the cabin at night.” Hemlock (Little, Brown, January 2026) by Melissa Faliveno. Second book, first novel. Agent: Marya Spence. Editor: Vivian Lee. Publicist: Chloe Texier-Rose.
“A long-time confidante of the rain and snow, I am ninety years old.” The Last Quarter of the Moon (Milkweed Editions, January 2026) by Chi Zijian, translated from the Chinese by Bruce Humes. Eighth book, novel. Agent: None. Editor: Daniel Slager. Publicist: Morgan LaRocca.
“There’s always a snowstorm coming / and I’m always booked at a café / on the other side of the mountain / driving on bald tires to give another lecture / on Hegel’s vision / of the infinite whole / and at the last minute deciding to lecture on wind, / and snow, and their effects on discarded newspapers.” The Near and Distant World (Tin House, January 2026) by Bianca Stone. Seventh book, fourth poetry collection. Agent: None. Editor: Alyssa Ogi. Publicist: Becky Kraemer.
“There’s a snake of children wrapped around the theatre front to back.” One Aladdin Two Lamps (Grove Press, January 2026) by Jeanette Winterson. Twenty-third book, first hybrid. Agent: Caroline Michel. Editor: Elisabeth Schmitz. Publicist: Deb Seager.
“In autumn 2019 I was in a cold London playground, spinning my son on a lurid, primary-coloured roundabout.” Always Carry Salt: A Memoir of Preserving Language and Culture (Pegasus Books, January 2026) by Samantha Ellis. Third book, memoir. Agent: Aram Fox. Editor: Jessica Case. Publicist: Julia Romero.
“There was a man, let’s call him Henry VIII.” The Age of Calamities (Henry Holt, January 2026) by Senaa Ahmad. First book, story collection. Agent: Alexa Stark. Editor: Retha Powers. Publicist: Abigail Novak.
