Florida Palms

A New York Times Editor’s Choice
One of CrimeReads’s, Sun Sentinel’s, and Library Journal’s Best Books of 2025

“A musky, Florida-specific stew of sweat, blood, swamp gas and amphetamine addiction.”—The New York Times

“Award-winning poet Joe Pan confidently delivers an uncompromising look at the criminal underworld of Central Florida…Florida Palms ushers in a new talent.”—Sun Sentinel

“Transfixing…A must-read. Pan’s intense drama has a Sons of Anarchy vibe but with a greater pathos.”—Library Journal (starred)

“If Florida is purgatory with a sun, Florida Palms exposes what happens to the young men who grow up in the shadows—a tightly plotted page-turner filled with gangsters, brotherhood, and betrayal. Joe Pan is an extraordinarily skilled writer, but his genius is his empathy, understanding that good people sometimes do bad things. What if you turned eighteen in the wrong neighborhood and found yourself surrounded by drug dealers, bikers, and eccentric hitmen? These are characters no reader will forget.”—Alexander Boldizar, author of The Man Who Saw Seconds

“Florida Palms offers up a crew of freewheeling philosophers on bikes, whose cynicism and violence—and the bizarre, hilarious screeds by which they justify themselves—are counterbalanced by the naive, heartbreaking humanity of the young men swept along in their wake. Pan’s love for Florida and its rougher, neglected corners is evident and intoxicating.”—Stephanie Soileau, author of Last One Out Shut Off the Lights

“Thrilling, suspenseful, and intricately plotted, Florida Palms shines an unsparing light on the tenuous, violent lives of young men trying to survive in a world that does not want—or see—them. Joe Pan, writing with urgency, vision, and uncommon empathy, does not turn away from these fractured and fragile lives, and neither should we.”—Elizabeth Wetmore, New York Times Bestselling author of Valentine

Joe Pan is the author of five poetry books and founder of Brooklyn Arts Press, one of the smallest independent houses ever honored with a National Book Award in Poetry, and publisher of Augury Books, honored with a Lambda Literary Award in Lesbian Poetry. His writing has appeared in the Boston Review, Hyperallergic, The New York Times, and Poets & Writers, and he’s been profiled by Publishers Weekly, The Rumpus, and The Wall Street Journal. He grew up along the Space Coast of Florida and now lives in Los Angeles. With his wife he cofounded BAH, an activist group that serves unhoused populations with sleeping bags and goods. Florida Palms is his debut novel.

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