ONE OF THE MOST ANTICIPATED BOOKS OF 2022 - BuzzFeed, LitHub, Electric Literature, LGBTQ Reads, Latinx in Publishing"A gay Latinx man reckons with his past when he returns home for his 20th high school class reunion in Varela’s dazzling debut...an incandescent bildungsroman"—Starred review, Publisher's Weekly"Varela’s debut novel shimmers with tension, navigating the personal and political with practiced ease. Treading the waters of adolescence and adulthood, The Town of Babylon navigates the complexities of home, queerness, and messy histories with measure and empathy. Weaving together histories of immigration, economic unease, and the health complications of racism in America, Varela troubles ideas of community and shared experience amidst a polarizing landscape."—Kaitlynn Cassady, Seminary Co-op Bookstores "[An] intense, astute meditation on race, family, class, love, and...

"A searing collection about gentrification, racism, and sexuality. [...] Varela provides invaluable insight on the ways stress impacts the characters’ lives, and how they persevere. Readers will be floored."—Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)"Alejandro Varela is one of my favorite short story writers . . . An iconoclast of tenderness, a compass in the storm this life always is." —Alexander Chee, author of How to Write an Autobiographical Novel"The People Who Report More Stress dissects the minutiae of relationships to self, city, space, and sensibility so we don’t numbly succumb to the 'structured order of things.'"—Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore, author of The Freezer DoorThe People Who Report More Stress is a collection of interconnected stories brimming with the anxieties of people who retreat into themselves while living in the margins, acutely aware of the stresses that modern...