A collection of the year’s best stories selected by celebrated two-time National Book Award winner Jesmyn WardIn her introduction to The Best American Short Stories 2021, guest editor JesmynWard says that the best fiction offers the reader a “sense of repair.”The stories in this year’s collection accomplish just that, immersing the reader in powerfully imagined worlds and allowing them to bring some of that power into their own lives. From a stirring portrait of Ro...

Co-written by a New York Times best-selling author, this moving story of a Muslim boy’s exile from war-torn Bosnia to the United States offers a riveting refugee saga.Kenan loves drawing and playing soccer with his friends. He wants to be a famous athlete, hates it when his classmates trash his buck teeth by calling him “Bugs Bunny,” and fights with his big brother, who’s too busy and cool for him lately. Sometimes his parents drive him crazy, but he feels...

This timely, moving debut novel follows a teen's efforts to keep his family together as his parents face deportation.Mateo Garcia and his younger sister, Sophie, have been taught to fear one word for as long as they can remember: deportation. Over the past few years, however, the fear that their undocumented immigrant parents could be sent back to Mexico started to fade. Ma and Pa have been in the United States for so long, they have American-born children, and the...

To All the Boys I've Loved Before meets Morgan Matson in this effervescent romance about childhood best friends reconnecting that's full of sunny days, warm nights, first kisses, and mended hearts.Luisa (Lou) Patterson grew up across the street from Sam Alvarez in the small, quirky town of Port Coral. They used to be inseparable—spending every holiday together, shooting silly YouTube videos, and rescuing stray cats. But then middle school ...

A moving middle-grade mystery about a boy dealing with long-repressed memories of his father as he learns about his Mexican and Haitian heritage while spying on a mysterious stranger during the first weeks of COVID lockdown.Lalo Lesperance lives with his older brother and Mexican American mother in a low-income apartment building in Fort Myers. They moved there from a subdivision after the family lost Lalo’s Haitian American father. At school, Lalo is known as the ...

A collection of the year’s best short stories, selected by Pulitzer Prize winner Andrew Sean Greer and series editor Heidi Pitlor.Andrew Sean Greer, “an exceptionally lovely writer, capable of mingling humor with sharp poignancy” (Washington Post), selects twenty stories out of thousands that represent the best examples of the form published the previous year.Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.

**"A sweetly charming love story that leaves the reader with a lasting sense of hope.” —Nicola Yoon, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Everything, Everything and The Sun Is Also a Star"The perfect novel to snuggle up with.” —Emily Henry, New York Times bestselling author of Beach Read**A heartwarming and thoughtful enemies-to-lovers rom-com about two teens—one trying to save his family's failing pinball arcade, the ...

The best science fiction and fantasy stories of 2021, selected by series editor John Joseph Adams and guest editor Veronica Roth.This year’s selection of science fiction and fantasy stories, chosen by series editor John Joseph Adams and bestselling author of the Divergent series Veronica Roth, showcases a crop of authors that are willing to experiment and tantalize readers with new takes on classic themes and by exchanging the ordinary for the avant-garde. Folktale...

A pair of fierce foes are forced to work together to save the arts at their school in this “enemies-to-lovers rom-com of my dreams” (Rachel Lynn Solomon, author of Today Tonight Tomorrow) that fans of Jenny Han and Morgan Matson are sure to adore.Lifelong rivals Natalie and Reid have never been on the same team. So when their school’s art budget faces cutbacks, of course Natalie finds herself up against her nemesis once more. She’s fighting to dir...

A heartfelt, witty, and thought-provoking YA love story about two teens who fall for each other while forced apart during quarantine, written by two New York Times bestselling authors, and for fans of Five Feet Apart, Anna and the French Kiss, and My Life Next DoorMaxine and Jonah meet in the canned goods aisle just as California is going into lockdown. Max’s part-time job as a personal grocery shopper is about to transform into ...

“To read their stories felt to me the way I suspect other people feel hearing jazz for the first time,” recalls Curtis Sittenfeld of her initial encounter with the Best American Short Stories series. “They were windows into emotions I had and hadn’t had, into other settings and circumstances and observations and relationships.” Decades later, Sittenfeld was met by the same feeling selecting the stories for this year’s edition. The result is a striking and nuanced collection, bring...

From the New York Times bestselling author of In Five Years comes a darkly seductive and “lyrical” (Publishers Weekly) novel about the dangers of obsessive love as a wealthy, Upper East Side teen gets involved with the mysterious new boy at school.Caggie never wanted to be a hero, but some things are decided for us. Growing up among Manhattan’s social elite, Caggie always had everything she could want, including a storied last name. But a...