Endpapers

"Achingly evocative and thoroughly satisfying, Jennifer Savran Kelly's Endpapers follows a genderqueer bookbinder through post-9/11 New York as she searches the city for answers about a long-hidden love letter and the outlines of her own identity. Part historical mystery, part meditation on the shifting nature of creativity and self, Endpapers is a story that bursts with warmth, community, and the sometimes-heartbreaking decisions we make when we begin to stitch together the spine of our lives."
-- Katy Hays, author of The Cloisters

"Jennifer Savran Kelly's Endpapers is an accomplished, moving novel where the search for answers to a literary mystery doubles as the search for queer authenticity in a world of bindings: book bindings, artistic bindings, social bindings. With humor, tenderness, and honesty, Savran Kelly lays bare the struggle to find our brilliant, beautiful selves--and the courage to go forth boldly with them."

-- Zak Salih, author of Let's Get Back to the Party

It's 2003, and artist Dawn Levit is stuck. A bookbinder who works at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, she spends all day repairing old books but hasn't created anything of her own in years--and with nothing ready to show at her major gallery debut in six weeks, time is of the essence. What's more, although she doesn't have a word for it yet, Dawn is genderqueer and she's struggling to feel safe expressing herself.

One day at work, Dawn discovers something hidden under the endpapers of an old book: the torn-off corner of a 1950s lesbian pulp novel, with an illustration of a woman looking into a mirror and seeing a man's face. Even more intriguing is the queer love letter written on the back. Dawn becomes obsessed with tracking down the author of the letter, convinced the mysterious writer can help her find a place in the world and also solve the trickiest puzzle of all: how she truly wants to live her life.

A sharply written, evocative debut, Endpapers is both a page-turning bookish mystery and an unforgettable story about the journey toward authenticity and the hard conversations we owe ourselves in pursuit of a world where no one has to hide.