To God
by Esther Yi
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Pub Date Sep 15 2026 | Archive Date Sep 01 2026
Astra Publishing House | Astra House
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Description
From the author of the acclaimed debut novel Y/N comes a daring collection of fiction about alienation, sex, and spiritual inquiry.
The cityscape of To God is in decay. One won’t find any fancy flaneurs here. As for happiness? Out of the question. Instead, one encounters drifters with nowhere to go and nothing to do, boxers with dreams of making it big (they won’t), artists who never get a chance to make art, women who frighten the men they love, and children who are more adult than the adults. Nothing goes right for these people—but what does going right mean anyway? After all, in the world of To God, it’s the loser who wins, the faceless who expresses, the atheist who truly believes, and the geriatric who’s reborn . . .
At the heart of To God is a formidable voice, a beam of light that cuts through the entire collection to rearrange and reincarnate the world wherever it falls. Navigating the daily vicissitudes of work, love, and ideology, this voice asks: How do I know myself, and how do I know others? What does it feel like to know at all? What if I believe in nothing? Then what makes me live? Responsive to and born out of absence, this voice experiments with presence: a body, a personality, a set of relationships. Absence fuels the imagination, a kind of unbridled prayer, and this ritual becomes a stairway that the reader is invited to ascend, armed with an ever intensifying question to God, until the entire material world recedes out of view—only to reappear with greater urgency than before, openly necrotic and broken, itself a plane of mystery we can never call home, and its stakes all the more real for it.
At the atomic level of language, the infrastructural level of genre play, and the cosmic level of existential threat, Esther Yi’s vision radiates, illuminating the increasingly confused coordinates of contemporary life, its absurd contradictions, and our growing disconnectedness not only from each other but from our own selves.
Marketing Plan
MARKETING AND PUBLICITY PLANS • Pitch early excerpt to New Yorker • National media campaign including print, radio, and online coverage • Pitch for feature stories and profile of the enigmatic and important author • Limited author events • Target outreach to publications focused on literary fiction, short fiction, Asian-American authors, contemporary religion and spirituality, formally inventive prose and the craft of writing, and essential contemporary voices • Target outreach to publications and reviewers that were transfixed by Yi’s debut novel • Robust awards campaign • Bookseller and librarian outreach, including galley placement at Winter Institute and regional bookseller shows • Targeted academic campaign focused on creative writing departments • Social media and email marketing campaigns • Influencer outreach and giveaways • Preorder campaign
Available Editions
| EDITION | Other Format |
| ISBN | 9781662603617 |
| PRICE | $28.00 (USD) |
| PAGES | 256 |
Available on NetGalley
Average rating from 13 members
Featured Reviews
reviewer 0, Media/Journalist
In To God, Esther Yi delivers a collection that pulses with electricity. The writing is sharp as we have grown to expect from this talented author. Here we are plunged into a decaying cityscape where alienation, spiritual hunger, and desire converge in surprising ways. If this sounds bleak, rest assured we are in capable hands. The voice is fearless, and the philosophical questions are thought-provoking. At once intimate and playful, this is a collection to be savored.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an advance e-galley; all opinions in my review are 100% my own.
Grace M, Bookseller
To God by Esther Yi is a gorgeous, abstract collection of stories which reflect a philosophical exploration of our modern, absurdist world. My personal favourite of the collection was Lazarus City, with poignant lines such as "it brought me unexpected joy to have been scared about being punched in the face and to be punched anyway. The fear hadn't protected me at all. This was miraculous to learn."
Yi's work is dense with meaning and beauty; her collection is one which I will be thinking about for a very long time. As someone who has not read Yi's work previously, I am eager to delve into her body of work, and will gladly read everything which she puts out in the future.
Daphne R, Reviewer
The structure of this book was something I didn’t expect when I first started reading it. I wasn’t sure what I was getting into, but that actually made it more interesting. It felt different from most books I’ve picked up recently, and I really liked that surprise element.
I love that it’s all short stories. There’s something about a collection like this that makes it easy to get lost in each story individually. I felt very connected to one of them in particular, though I won’t name which one just in case, but it really stuck with me. The stories are good overall, and I really appreciate the mix of dark and slightly absurd vibes. That kind of storytelling really stands out compared to a lot of what’s currently out there.
Even though it’s a short story collection, it felt cohesive in its own way.
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