The year 2020 may not have had a lot of bright spots, but speaking strictly in literary terms, it wasn’t all that bad.

Not only did the year that no one wants to remember offer a lot of extra time to read, but it brought us a number of great new novels to enjoy.

We were enthralled with Brit Bennett’s The Vanishing Half and could not get enough of Maggie O’Farrell’s Hamnet. Not to mention the rollercoaster ride Lydia Millet took us on with The Children’s Bible.

But it wasn’t just novels by seasoned authors that had us hoping for just a little more time in lockdown. There were also a number of notable debuts made in 2020–many of which left us wanting a whole lot more.

Here is our list of the best novels of 2020 written by breakout authors.

The Ten Best Novels of 2020 by Debut Authors

The Girl with the Louding Voice by Abi Daré

Debut author, Abi Daré, returns to the land of her childhood in this inspiring story of triumph. Shortlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize and already a New York Times bestseller, you don’t want to miss this one.

The unforgettable, inspiring story of a teenage girl growing up in a rural Nigerian village who longs to get an education so that she can find her “louding voice” and speak up for herself, The Girl with the Louding Voice is a simultaneously heartbreaking and triumphant tale about the power of fighting for your dreams… read more

Real Life by Brandon Taylor

A powerful coming of age tale from breakout author, Brandon Taylor, this book delves deep into how relationships–with family, friends, and those we call friends–can shape the person we become.

Almost everything about Wallace is at odds with the Midwestern university town where he is working uneasily toward a biochem degree. An introverted young man from Alabama, black and queer, he has left behind his family without escaping the long shadows of his childhood. For reasons of self-preservation… read more

All My Mother’s Lovers by Ilana Masad

Ilana Masad’s break out novel explores the complexities of family, grief, and identity with gripping prose and astonishing clarity. This highly anticipated debut does not disappoint.

Intimacy has always eluded twenty-seven-year-old Maggie Krause—despite being brought up by married parents, models of domestic bliss—until, that is, Lucia came into her life. But when Maggie’s mom, Iris, dies in a car crash, Maggie returns home only to discover a withdrawn dad, an angry brother, and, along with Iris’s will, five sealed… read more

God Shot by Chelsea Bieker

Harrowing, haunting, and absolutely brilliant, this debut novel from Chelsea Bieker brings you straight into her native Central Valley of California to experience firsthand just how far desperation can drive a person.

Drought has settled on the town of Peaches, California. The area of the Central Valley where fourteen–year–old Lacey May and her alcoholic mother live was once an agricultural paradise. Now it’s an environmental disaster, a place of cracked earth and barren raisin farms… read more

If I Had Your Face by Frances Cha

Frances Cha split her time growing up between the US, Hong Kong, and South Korea. In her debut novel, she takes us back to Seoul to examine the strength and resilience of the female spirit.

Kyuri is an achingly beautiful woman with a hard-won job at a Seoul “room salon,” an exclusive underground bar where she entertains businessmen while they drink. Though she prides herself on her cold, clear-eyed approach to life, an impulsive mistake threatens her livelihood... read more

The Unsuitable by Molly Pohlig

This gothic Victorian from debut author Molly Pohlig is not a story for the squeamish. But it’s those dark details and bloody scenes that give this book the power to transport you from our current circumstances while somehow mirroring the exact state were in.

Iseult Wince is a Victorian woman perilously close to spinsterhood whose distinctly unpleasant father is trying to marry her off. She is awkward, plain, and most pertinently, believes that her mother, who died in childbirth, lives in the scar on her neck. Iseult’s father parades… read more

These Ghosts Are Family by Maisy Card

From colonial Jamaica to present-day Harlem, Maisy Card’s first novel takes you on a vivid journey that examines the relationship between the individual and the family and how the ghosts of each can have lasting effects on the other.

Stanford Solomon’s shocking, thirty-year-old secret is about to change the lives of everyone around him. Stanford has done something no one could ever imagine. He is a man who faked his own death and stole the identity of his best friend. Stanford Solomon is actually Abel Paisley… read more

The Seep by Chana Porter

If you enjoy deep, character-driven speculative fiction, you’ll love this debut from Chana Porter. In this mesmerizing, unorthodox take on alien invasion stories, you’ll get a heaping dose of social commentary and an uncompromising look at love, loss, and the human condition.

Trina FastHorse Goldberg-Oneka is a fifty-year-old trans woman whose life is irreversibly altered in the wake of a gentle—but nonetheless world-changing—invasion by an alien entity called The Seep. Through The Seep, everything is connected… read more

The Lost Book of Adana Moreau by Michael Zapata

This celebrated novel by new author, Michael Zapata, won the Chicago Review of Books award for fiction and was nominated and honored for many other achievements. It is a poignant tale about the power of storytelling that will have you believing in parallel worlds.

In 1929 in New Orleans, a Dominican immigrant named Adana Moreau writes a science fiction novel. The novel earns rave reviews, and Adana begins a sequel. Then she falls gravely ill. Just before she dies, she destroys the only copy of the manuscript. Decades later in Chicago, Saul Drower… read more

Sharks in the Time of Saviors by Kawai Strong Washburn

Lyrical and engrossing, this genre-bending debut from Kawai Strong Washburn is as painful as it is healing. A family saga that extends over decades and across states, this story will leave you feeling everything.

In 1995 Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, on a rare family vacation, seven-year-old Nainoa Flores falls overboard a cruise ship into the Pacific Ocean. When a shiver of sharks appears in the water, everyone fears for the worst. But instead, Noa is gingerly delivered to his mother in the jaws of a shark… read more

Looking for more great reads? Check out our author interviews portal to learn more about recently published authors and their books.