In Waiting on a Friend, it is New York City, East Village, 1984, and a young woman with the power to see the ghosts of her friends is haunted by the one who refuses to return.
LitStackers! Line up for this one. In presale now, Hogarth | Penguin Random House will release Waiting on a Friend by Natalie Adler on May 26, 2026. Early word suggests an immersive and exciting novel. While details remain scarce, the publisher’s description and the cover art hint at a reading experience that will linger long after you turn the last page. Here’s the scoop and early praise on this next must-read. Dip into the book fund for this one!
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In This Spotlight On Waiting on a Friend
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About Waiting on a Friend
Renata is a young dyke-about-town who can see ghosts, something she’s doing more and more of lately as too many of her friends are dying of a new, terrifying disease. When Renata’s best friend Mark dies of complications from AIDS, Renata is devastated by the loss of the person she loved most in the world. And to her disappointment and increasing despair, Mark seems unwilling or unable to return for the proper goodbye they both were denied.
While Renata waits anxiously for Mark, she must stay vigilant: a mysterious, police-like force has begun ridding their East Village neighborhood of anything abnormal or inexplicable. What first seems like a scam reveals itself to be far more sinister, targeting the soul of Renata’s community. With her band of lovably eccentric pals and lovers, Renata is determined to fight back against the erasure of her friends’ memories and the sanitizing of her beloved New York. But haunting her every step is Mark, the one ghost who stubbornly refuses to reappear.
Both heartbreaking and healing, tragic and triumphant, Waiting on a Friend is a magical retelling of queer history and a celebration of youth and camaraderie. With pathos and humor, empathy and an edge, Natalie Adler freshly reimagines the past for a new generation, reclaiming the spirit of resistance and determination that would become one of the era’s defining legacies.
Praise for Waiting on a Friend
“A wildly inventive and moving novel that walks a tightrope of emotion with grace and humor . . . an astonishingly brilliant debut.”—Patrick Ryan, New York Times bestselling author of Buckeye
“Fresh and refreshing, both heartbreaking and uplifting . . . Natalie Adler has given us a gem.”—Rabih Alameddine, author of The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother), winner of the National Book Award
“A fun, sexy, heartbreaking, inventive whirl of a novel.”—Ann Napolitano, New York Times bestselling author of Hello Beautiful
“Quirky, queer, poignant, and funny, this book shines with spirit and hope.”—Julia Glass, author of Three Junes, winner of the National Book Award
“A perfect ghost story . . . beautiful, quietly radical, and so heartfelt it hurts.”—Gretchen Felker-Martin, author of Manhunt
“Adler gets the feeling of the time more right than almost any historical fiction I’ve read about the early-middle height of AIDS in NYC.”—Andrea Lawlor, author of Paul Takes the Form of a Mortal Girl
“Natalie Adler is bringing one incarnation of the AIDS experience into the present where it all belongs. Someone is listening.”—Sarah Schulman, author of Let the Record Show: A Political History of ACT UP
“A riveting debut by a writer of tremendous compassion and insight.”—Helen Phillips, author of The Need
“A breathtaking novel . . . I absolutely loved it and could not stop reading.”—Jiaming Tang, author of Cinema Love
“This book will linger long after the last page.”—Garrard Conley, author of Boy Erased
“Tender, funny, insightful . . . These characters and this world stayed in my heart long after I finished the book.”—Carter Sickels, author of The Prettiest Star
“At turns funny and wise, sexy and sad, paranormal and devastatingly real—this book made me feel more human.”—Molly McGhee, author of Jonathan Abernathy You Are Kind“By turns biting and generous, funny and devastating, Waiting on a Friend evokes friendship in all its complexity—its resentments, tender obsessions, marvelous intimacies, and supernatural power.”—Beth Morgan, author of A Touch of Jen
About Natalie Adler, Author of Waiting on a Friend
Natalie Adler has an MFA in Fiction from Brooklyn College and a PhD in Comparative Literature from Brown University. She was a Susan Kamil Emerging Writer Fellow at the Center for Fiction and is an editor at Lux magazine. She is from New Jersey and lives in New York City.
You can connect with Natalie Adler on her website, and on Instagram.
Source: Publisher
Publisher: Hogarth | Penguin Random House
ISBN Hardcover 9780593734025
Pub Date: May 26, 2026
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