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Ordinary New Yorkers are brought together in a story of betrayal, race, what connects us to each other – and what sets us apart

***A ROXANE GAY BOOK CLUB 2024 SELECTION***

‘A marvel… A masterpiece’ PAUL HARDING

‘Prescient and profound’ BRYAN WASHINGTON

Brooklyn, 2020. Theo Harper and his blonde, blue-eyed, pregnant wife Darla head upstate to their summer cottage to wait out the lockdown. Not everyone in their fancy apartment building has this privilege: not Xavier, the restless teenager in the Cardi B t-shirt, nor Darla’s black best friend Ruby and her partner Katsumi, who stay behind to save their restaurant.

During an upstate hike, Theo lets slip a long-held secret about his mixed-up ancestry – and when Darla disappears after the ensuing argument, he suddenly finds himself the prime suspect at the centre of a front-page police search for the perfect missing woman.

‘A lush study’ RAVEN LEILANI

‘Riveting and original’ CHARMAINE WILKERSON

Publisher Review

Regina Porter has written another marvel of a novel. The Rich People Have Gone Away gives the reader a spiraling cross-section of richly drawn, impeccably observed New Yorkers… A kind of masterpiece of human portraiture that simultaneously renders quintessential depictions of the city, of America, and of the whole world in these first fraught decades of the 21st century — Paul Harding, author of This Other Eden Affecting, astounding and wholly humbling… Porter weaves beauty and humor with pathos, in prose that is winding, prescient and profound. She shows us worlds inside of worlds – of queerness, of love and relationships, of who we are and who we’re told to be – crafting a narrative that is both precise and thunderous. The Rich People Have Gone Away moves and transcends. We’re so lucky to have it — Bryan Washington, author of Family Meal Riveting and original. The Rich People Have Gone Away mines the delicate and treacherous terrain in which human relationships and social divisions are rooted — Charmaine Wilkerson, author of Black Cake A lush study of relationships, keen on the particulars of vast human catastrophes — Raven Leilani, author of Luster Regina Porter’s wit and astute eye for detail made me want to both underline and inhale every line in the same breath. An immersive examination of the human condition in the face of tragedy and triumph — Zakiya Dalila Harris, author of The Other Black Girl Exquisitely drawn characters, scenes that jump off the page, and international locales that’ll make you want to pack a bag and go, The Rich People Have Gone Away is a novel that fearlessly defies conventions to deliver a satiating, five-star experience. A keen observer of people and class, Regina Porter has crafted an inventive, hilarious, and wholly unpredictable work full of vibrant prose and genuine tenderness. A seven-course meal that gets better and better — Mateo Askaripour, author of Black Buck A glorious jambalaya of word, thought and feeling, Regina Porter’s prose positively howls from the page. Just when you thought you didn’t need another novel set in New York, you suddenly, desperately do — Gary Shteyngart, author of Our Country Friends Almost uncomfortably apt in its depiction of human behaviour, impeccably accurate in its exploration of how easily we’re divided and incredibly funny even in the most un-funny moments, The Rich People Have Gone Away makes light and dark of one of the strangest times in human history and pulls you mercilessly along for a highly intelligent and thrilling ride — Ore Agbaje-Williams, author of The Three of Us Wildly intelligent, brilliantly crafted, prismatic, living and breathing – a remarkable feat of sensation and humanity. Regina Porter is a marvel — Claire Lombardo, author of The Most Fun We Ever Had A delight… Regina Porter is a writer of such wit, warmth and profound intelligence. Her indelible characters leap from her imagination to ours — Margot Livesey, author of The Road to Belhaven