When the townspeople of an eighteenth-century English village decide that a quiet, reclusive family of five sisters is hiding a magical secret, their fervor ignites into a terrifying fury. What gives them the right, and, moreover, what are the townspeople going to do about it? The Hounding is an incisive exploration of how hard times and herd mentality can transform prejudice and small-town gossip into real-life violence. What could happen then still happens now. Consider Pruvis’s haunting novel a primer on how not to treat your neighbor.

If Daisy Jones brought you to Taylor Jenkins Reid and Evelyn Hugo made you love her, then Atmosphere can only be described as Taylor Jenkins Reid at her very best. It’s a romance and a character study, exploring what life was like during a particular moment for a very particular set of people: queer women working on the space shuttle program at NASA in the 1970s and 80s. It’s beautiful, moving, and, at times, heart-stopping. Whether describing moments of Joan’s life in triumph or disaster, Reid will have you wrapped around her finger. You won’t be able to look away—and you’d never want to. —Rachel Brittain

On the third day of reading Jones’ latest horror novel, I had a nightmare, but it might not be why you think. The monsters here are supernatural and all-consuming, but the true horror is the very real story that’s told of the Marias Massacre, where around 200 Blackfeet were murdered in the dead of winter. The story is told through a journal found in 2012, which was written in 1912 by a Lutheran pastor. The pastor records his time with a Blackfeet man named Good Stab, a man with peculiar eating habits and seemingly superhuman abilities… and revenge on his mind. —Erica Ezeifedi

This Harlem-set, Jazz Age historical novel tells the story of the nearly forgotten Jessie Redmon Fauset, who changed the course of Black American literature and American literature as a whole. She made history as the first Black woman Editor of The Crisis, the oldest Black magazine in the world, and became known as “The Midwife of the Harlem Renaissance” because of her discovery and mentoring of writers like Langston Hughes and Nella Larsen. She wasn’t without her drama, though—it was well-known that she and her very married boss, W.E.B. Du Bois, were carrying on in the Biblical sense. And this book dives headfirst into the mess. —Erica Ezeifedi

Literary fiction of the highest order from a Nobel Prize-winning novelist. Not much happens in this quiet, dream-like novel that asks rich questions about history, memory, connection, and pain. It’s the rare book that can be equally subtle and unsettling, and that’s evidence of a masterful writer working at the height of her powers. You always know you’re in good hands with Kang, and that makes it a pleasure to follow her wherever she wants to go. —Rebecca Joines Schinsky