Tiger's Mouth

A stunning story of friendship and family, love and belonging … I absolutely adored it * Chris Whitaker, author of All the Colours of the Dark *
A thrilling story about ambition and friendship that left me breathless. Chen and Owens are at once familiar and unlike any characters I’ve ever met, their decades-long dance between artifact and vulnerability slowly revealing the very nature of intimacy itself. Tiger’s Mouth dazzled me * Rachel Khong, author of Real Americans *
Tiger’s Mouth vividly captures the tumultuous beauty of growing up and growing into oneself, as ‘the Jacks’ tangle with each other, with the past, with a changing world, and with the peril of truly being seen. I loved this dazzling, incisive, and tender story of friendship * Emma Brodie, author of Into the Blue *
Sharp-edged … Tan brings the two friends to vivid life, showing how they define themselves in the other’s image * Rebecca Kauffman, award-winning author of The Gunners and The House on Fripp Island *
Brilliant … With its complex friendships and sharp observations, Tiger’s Mouth is a thoughtful portrait of the ways people reinvent themselves to find belonging—and the costs of doing so * Publishers Weekly, starred review *
Compelling … expertly examines class, privilege, and family duty through the unlikely relationship between two Jacks from wholly different worlds * Booklist, starred review *
Beautifully written and well-paced * Shelf Awareness *
A thoughtful and gratifying novel, suggesting class may be the most meaningful barrier to friendship * Library Journal *
A remarkable achievement: a novel whose deep attention to character is equaled by its propulsive plotting and incisive social commentary. Lucy Tan pairs a Sally Rooney–like eye for psychological nuance with a thoughtful exploration of 2020s America, from racial inequity to the paradoxes of healthcare and technology. The result is a wise, clear-eyed, and compassionate work of art * Kirkus Reviews *
A rare page-turner that is also compassionate, wise, and finely observed. Through a cast of characters who come to feel as familiar as family, Lucy Tan asks questions about the costs of power and privilege, friendship across class, and seemingly unalterable societal strictures. This is a novel—assured, propulsive, insightful—about what we inherit and what we create for ourselves, and the relationships that might transcend it all * Chloe Benjamin, author of The Immortalists *

Lucy Tan is the author of What We Were Promised, which was a Barnes and Noble Discover Pick, longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, and named a best book of the year by The Washington Post. Tan holds an MFA in creative writing from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she was the winner of the August Derleth Prize. A recipient of support from Kundiman and the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, Tan has published in journals such as American Short Fiction, McSweeney’s, and Ploughshares. She currently lives and writes in Seattle, where she is also a bookseller at Secret Garden Books.

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