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List of All Possible Desires: A Novel in Stories
Win a free print copy of this book!
8 days and 11:30:48
30 copies available
U.S. only
A dazzling novel in stories following Rainey Royal—a young artist coming of age through the tumult of New York City in the ’70s and ’80s—and her family across generations of obsession, betrayal, and reinvention, written with the trademark beauty and precision of Dylan Landis. For fans of Mary Gaitskill and Lauren Groff.
In postwar Paris, over the course of one fateful day, a boy’s crush on his nanny ignites into a destructive passion that burns into his memory and reveals to him the disquieting world of adult secrets. In 1950s New York City, a naïve caretaker struggles to protect her charge, a married woman paralyzed by her recent stroke, as new bruises appear each day on her body. In the 1970s, a fragile cousin wanders into the Royal family’s chaotic jazz-filled townhouse, where music, sex, and ruin intertwine. And at the heart of these stories is Rainey Royal herself, coming of age in Greenwich Village, inventing herself as an artist through the tumult of the ’70s and ’80s.
By turns shocking, erotic, and deeply humane, List of All Possible Desires is a haunting portrait of family and history. It is joined by the expanded re-issues of the novel Rainey Royal and the novel in stories Normal People Don’t Live Like This to create the Rainey Royal Cycle. Each book stands on its own, yet together they echo and amplify each other, creating a world of almost unbearable richness and intensity.
In postwar Paris, over the course of one fateful day, a boy’s crush on his nanny ignites into a destructive passion that burns into his memory and reveals to him the disquieting world of adult secrets. In 1950s New York City, a naïve caretaker struggles to protect her charge, a married woman paralyzed by her recent stroke, as new bruises appear each day on her body. In the 1970s, a fragile cousin wanders into the Royal family’s chaotic jazz-filled townhouse, where music, sex, and ruin intertwine. And at the heart of these stories is Rainey Royal herself, coming of age in Greenwich Village, inventing herself as an artist through the tumult of the ’70s and ’80s.
By turns shocking, erotic, and deeply humane, List of All Possible Desires is a haunting portrait of family and history. It is joined by the expanded re-issues of the novel Rainey Royal and the novel in stories Normal People Don’t Live Like This to create the Rainey Royal Cycle. Each book stands on its own, yet together they echo and amplify each other, creating a world of almost unbearable richness and intensity.
- GenresFiction
304 pages, Hardcover
Published May 5, 2026
1813 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
May 5, 2026
5⭐️
What an absolute gem of a novel! Dylan Landis is my new favorite author and I am on the hunt for the other Rainey Royal book. She is a delicate sledgehammer, an iron fist wrapped in a velvet - and yes I speak of both Rainey and Dylan. The talent in this book is extraordinary. Gorgeous prose in a spiderwebbed plot draping across generations that vibrates throughout the book with all that the family has to share with the reader. Secrets, stories, art, music, family drama, zeitgeist, teen angst all wrapped up in a bow of New York City. I could not love it more. 5 shining gold stars from me.
Thank you!!! to Soho Press and NetGalley for this beautiful book.
What an absolute gem of a novel! Dylan Landis is my new favorite author and I am on the hunt for the other Rainey Royal book. She is a delicate sledgehammer, an iron fist wrapped in a velvet - and yes I speak of both Rainey and Dylan. The talent in this book is extraordinary. Gorgeous prose in a spiderwebbed plot draping across generations that vibrates throughout the book with all that the family has to share with the reader. Secrets, stories, art, music, family drama, zeitgeist, teen angst all wrapped up in a bow of New York City. I could not love it more. 5 shining gold stars from me.
Thank you!!! to Soho Press and NetGalley for this beautiful book.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
This one just wasn't for me. There is actually a convoluted story behind how I actually ended up reading this book but that is a story for another day. But I thought that I would still give this book a read. Sometimes you are surprised by a book you normally wouldn't read.
The writing itself is perfectly fine. But the story just wasn't for me so I didn't connect with it. I kept waiting for that moment where I'd get pulled in and start caring about what was happening... unfortunately it never arrived.
In the end, I set it aside before reaching the finish line, which is always disappointing. There's definitely an audience for this style of storytelling, but I wasn't it.
Thank you to Netgalley and Soho Press for the ARC in exchange for my review.
The writing itself is perfectly fine. But the story just wasn't for me so I didn't connect with it. I kept waiting for that moment where I'd get pulled in and start caring about what was happening... unfortunately it never arrived.
In the end, I set it aside before reaching the finish line, which is always disappointing. There's definitely an audience for this style of storytelling, but I wasn't it.
Thank you to Netgalley and Soho Press for the ARC in exchange for my review.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews