Maggie Stiefvater

From Collinsville to Bevo: The Lynching of Robert Prager How fear and anti-immigrant hysteria can turn deadly

A reader sent me this article they wrote on a bit of history I used in THE LISTENERS—the story of Robert Prager. In my novel, one character is obsessed with Prager’s story; so was I. Feels like a lesson Americans need to learn and relearn each decade. unseenstlouis.substack.com/p/from-colli...

The comments on this thread have single-handedly restored my faith in readers and humanity.

There are really lovely strange illustrations inside this edition, too.

I love how many of the comments are things like this.

These is the last batch of the dachshunds I drew to countdown to THE LISTENERS' release: if you want 'em, today's the last day to bid on one.

Look, Coates, when Kublai asked Marco why he didn't ever mention Venice, I put the book down and told my husband, "This is so good I'm going to puke."

I want to live in even the ugliest of sentences in it.

Yesterday, I met up with @onemorepagebooks.bsky.social to pick up the last of my bookplates and give them this lil guy I drew, as a thanks for 5 years of boxing up my books.

Next year, you'll be able to order signed backlist from @parnassusbooks.bsky.social.

I'm a literary omnivore, I'll hunt down "The City and Stars."

I'm doing it the other way around—starting Traveller this week.

It definitely requires your entire mind.

Oh, I bet this was strange and wonderful.

Doerr's work is connected to this one in the same way, and the journey across the bridge, although windy and a little difficult, was worth it to get a closer look at the winding structures beneath them both.

A bonus: the forward, by Anthony Doerr, was wonderful, contextualizing both this work and his for me. In INVISIBLE CITIES, Marco Polo describes an ephemeral floating city connected via hanging bridges, draped ropes, endless strings.

In that novel, Piranesi hithers and thithers purposefully through a labyrinth of mysterious structures, never fully understanding what he's looking at but loving it nonetheless.

Reading INVISIBLE CITIES is not like reading PIRANESI, it's like *being* Piranesi.

It is a book to wander through.

framed as a dialog between Marco Polo and Kublai Khan, and that wouldn't be incorrect.

But it's probably more useful to talk about it as a pairing with another novel I really loved, PIRANESI, by Susannah Clarke.

Every novel is a game the reader and the writer agree to play together, but some novels require more agreement than others. INVISIBLE CITIES really asks you to buy in. How to describe it?

I could tell you, I suppose, that it's a dreamy travelogue of invented cities—

Come seem me at a special Nashville event to celebrate Friends of Fantasy Day—every ticket includes a signed, doodled copy of The Scorpio Races. Because of the doodles, space IS very limited! parnassusbooks.net/event/2026-0...

Over on the substack: open.substack.com/pub/maggiest...

Okay! If you want to snag one of the original pieces of art from my Dachshunds of the Old Masters project, I finally got the rest of them listed: www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?i...

A portion of sales go to a charity that rescues old dogs.

Find someone who loves you as much as J.D. Salinger loved italics.

thanks, Enzo, very helpful in the editing process as always

Cats have an instinct for redundant scenework.

i have another cocktail party tonight. i am ready

I can feel the novel I'm writing terraforming my personality.

Me? In a d r e s s? It could happen, especially at a literary gala in Texas. I've been in more heels this year than in the past decade.

I'll be in Miami this weekend and St.Louis two weeks-ish after that—come see me (I will not be in a dress).

Do you mean Will Patton? His narration is pretty treasured for the series, actually, but he's a very specific choice, which means some people will love it and some hate it!

I hope you enjoy the end of the series! (it goes on to the Dreamer Trilogy, as well).

Hey! The Raven Boys graphic novel Kindle edition is on sale for $1.99 (and you can still grab the special sprayed edges edition in Walmart and Target).

Over on the ol' blog, I've written a small celebration of drudgery: open.substack.com/pub/maggiest...

The Listeners by Maggie Stiefvater: Review by Colleen Mondor The Listeners, Maggie Stiefvater (Viking 978-0-593-65550-4, $30.00, 360pp, hc) June 2025. Oddly enough, I read two books set in large hotels this month. (And even stranger, I have at least two more…

Explore @chasingray.bsky.social’s review of THE LISTENERS by @maggiestiefvater.bsky.social: “Fans of historical fiction will love this book, and... Stiefvater’s smart YA fans should embrace it as well.”

We all saw this fella, right? Coming next August?