All readers need a book from this publisher

February 22, 2026

Hi dearest reader,

One reason why I champion books until I’m hoarse in the throat is because growing up in school we’d read from a select few authors and were told that their stories were the singular voice of America and of English literature.

When I became an adult and realized I’d been missing out on scores of important stories that made up the human experience, I needed justice. I needed to scream from the rooftops, look at these books! Look what we’ve been missing! (Hence this newsletter.) And it hurts me to think through the last century and wonder about all the writers whose stories perhaps never got the recognition they deserved.

So, it’s no wonder why when I first discovered McNally Editions in 2024, the publishing arm of the beloved bookseller McNally Jackson in New York, I fell in love with them and their ethos. McNally Editions are an independent publisher “devoted to elevating unduly neglected books and authors.”

Aren't they gorgeous!

One day recently I noticed McNally’s substack (check it out here) were subscribed to my newsletter called Books & Banter and only mine and I was shocked and overcome with giddiness. I reached out to them to profess my gratitude and love for their books and they responded by asking for a list to send me a few. Little did they know I’d been scouring their website for months already with novels I desperately wanted to read. These are the titles I requested and received:

Sakina’s Kiss by Vivek Shanbhag: Published in 2025, originally published in the Kannada language in 2021, India.
A Domestic Animal by Francis King: Out today! Published Jan 13, 2026, I’m halfway through this novel and it’s simply sensational. If you like James Baldwin’s Giovanni’s Room you’d love A Domestic Animal. Those sexy, heart-breaking Italian men are back at it again!
Love Life of A Cheltenham Lady by Dinah Brooke: Published in 2025, originally published in 1971, England.
The Way to Colonos by Kay Cicellis: Published in 2025, originally published in 1960, England.
Ladies of the Rachmaninoff Eyes by Henry Van Dyke: Published in 2024, originally published in 1965, United States of America. Out of the six I’m most excited to read this novel.

Literary Hub wrote a great piece about Ladies, saying “What readers did not expect from a young Black novelist—certainly not one who was Black and gay—was that he should take his worth for granted, that he should shrug off the gay thing with nonchalance, or acknowledge racial hostility without a flash of rage, or that he’d choose the drawing room over the street, parody over satire, camp over tragedy, Rachmaninoff over the blues.”
Thereafter Johnnie by Carolivia Herron: Published in 2025, first published in 1991, United States of America. “Fascinating…belongs in the distinguished company of Alice Walker's The Color Purple [and'] Toni Morrison's Beloved.” — The New York Times.

What else is cool about McNally Editions is their inclusion of introductions to the novel that are actually good, written by relevant writers. The introduction to Love Life of A Cheltenham Lady by Emma Cline (author of The Guest) for example was also published on The Paris Review and it totally opened me up to read the novel, meanwhile enjoying Cline’s words in her own right. What a great bonus to the book.

Cline writes about Love Life of A Cheltenham Lady: “If we can’t have enlightenment just yet, I’ll take the bracing experience of this novel and the singular visions of its author, a harrowing, howling report from the disintegrated self.”

A rainy book store adventure

My trip to McNally Jackson Books Rockefeller Center

While in New York City over the summer I finally got to visit McNally Jackson’s famous book store in Manhattan and my god it was glorious. Next time I’ll plan to spend the whole day there (and with a bigger budget), I didn’t realize how large and marvelously organized it was. When I tell you my nerdy-fan-girl dreams were made real when I purchased a McNally Editions book in an actual McNally Jackson store, I’m underplaying it. While there I chose Lover Man by Alston Anderson to bring home with me, I’m halfway through these stories now and they really are special, and unexpectedly tongue-in-cheek.

The first book I read published by McNally Editions was They by Kay Dick and I recommended it a couple years ago on the newsletter here: “Fun facts: the author Kay Dick was a queer woman born in 1915, and was the first female director of an English publishing house!”

What I can tell so far about books published by McNally Editions, is that they seem to have a quiet subversiveness no matter the time they were written, a whisper of a challenge that resonates loudly in the heart, and well, that’s a bit of me. In an era of rampant censorship, McNally’s aim to publish overlooked writers is a noble and fruitful work.

In New York I ended my journey caught in the rain with a bag full of books. Stories to stand the test of time. A reader delighted to continue these conversations so brilliantly written decades ago.