Awards & Recognition — Kimberly King Parsons
We Were the Universe
- The New York Times, Her Sister Is Dead, but Life, and Libido, Carry On
- Editors’ Choice at The New York Times, 6 New Books We Recommend This Week
- #2 on TIME Magazine’s Best Books of 2024
- ☆ A Dakota Johnson × TeaTime Productions Book Club Pick ☆
- A USA Today National Bestseller
- A TIME 100 Must-Read Book of 2024
- One of Oprah’s Favorite Things; an Oprah Daily Best Book of 2024
- Winner of the 2025 Oregon Book Award Ken Kesey Fiction Prize
- Finalist for the 2025 LAMBDA Literary Award in Bisexual Fiction
- Longlisted for the 2025 Joyce Carol Oates Prize
- Finalist for the Texas Book Award
- Finalist for the 2025 Pacific Northwest Book Award
- A Debutiful Best Debut of 2024
- them, 16 Best LGBTQ+ Books of 2024
- Finalist for the Pacific Northwest Book Awards
- Finalist for The Bridge Award
- The Boston Globe, In the Sad and Funny We Were the Universe, Kimberly King Parsons Hits All the Right Notes
- Vanity Fair, Kimberly King Parsons Wanted to Read Books About Queer Parenthood, So She Wrote One
- Oprah Daily, O Magazine, The Best Summer Books to Read on Vacation
- Elle, The Best Literary Fiction of 2024
- Marie Claire, 36 Best LGBTQ+ Books
- Marie Claire UK, We’ve Found the Best Books of 2024
- The New Yorker, Is the End of Marriage the Beginning of Self-Knowledge?
- Vogue, From Laufey to Dua Lipa—All the Celebrity Book Clubs to Join Now
- Nylon, 10 Best New Book Releases of May 2024
- Nylon, The It Girl’s Summer Reading List
- The Daily Mail (UK), “Explosion of Family Secrets and Lies: 3 New Books” (Sunday print edition)
- The Daily Mail (UK), First Chapters: An Extract from We Were the Universe
- Texas Monthly, Horny Moms and Lost Souls: How Kimberly King Parsons Crafted a Modern, Hallucinatory Texas Novel
- Dallas Morning News, Author Debuts First Novel About ‘Texas, Motherhood and Psychedelics’
- Columbia University, Kimberly King Parsons Wins 2025 Oregon Book Award
- Southwest Review, 10 Must-Read Books of 2024
- Otherppl Podcast, Book Club Pick
- KBOO, Oregon Book Awards Winner, Kimberly King Parsons
- Autostraddle, In We Were the Universe, Grief and Motherhood Are Horny
- Autostraddle, 75 Books for Every Pride Vibe
- The Rumpus, Gilded: Kimberly King Parsons’s We Were the Universe
- Texas Highways, Novel Ideas
- Telegraph India, Dakota Johnson to Reese Witherspoon: 7 Celebrities Who Run Book Clubs
- Publishers Weekly, Celebrity Book Club Picks for 2024
- Romper, 12 New Books on Our Summer Reading List
- Lit Hub, Vacation Mode: On the Literary Relationship Between Travel and Madness
- Lit Hub, Most Anticipated Books of 2024
- Lit Hub, 5 Book Reviews You Need to Read This Week
- Lit Hub, Kimberly King Parsons on a Mother’s Right to Disassociate
- Electric Lit, 42 Queer Books You Need to Read in 2024
- Juicy Pink Box, The 10 Saddest, Queerest Books of Summer
- Brit + Co, 27 Best New Books of 2024
- Vol. 1 Brooklyn, Best Books of May
- Psychedelic Press, The Psychedelic Experience in We Were the Universe
- City Cast Nashville, Novelette Booksellers Recommends We Were the Universe
- Columbia Magazine, Kimberly King Parsons ’10 Releases New Novel We Were the Universe
- Mashable, These Books Will Be TikTok Famous This Year
- Book Riot, 7 Must-Read New LGBTQ Books
- Pacific University, Oregon Book Awards Honor Authors with Pacific MFA Ties
- Goodreads, Editors’ Picks for May
- Goodreads, Buzzy Novels from the First Half of 2024
- Goodreads, Debut Novels to Check Out This Season
- Debutiful, The Most Anticipated Debut Books of 2024
- Debutiful, 15 Noteworthy Debut Books to Read This May
- Bibliolifestyle, Discover Vibrant Queer Books of 2024
- Booklist
- Kirkus Reviews, ☆ Starred ☆
Black Light
- Longlisted for the 2019 National Book Award
- Finalist for the 2020 Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction
- 2020 National Magazine Award in Fiction for The Paris Review (for the story “Foxes”)
- Finalist for the 2020 Oregon Book Award / Ken Kesey Award for Fiction
- Finalist for the 2020 Texas Institute of Letters Best Work of First Fiction Award
- Longlisted for the 2019 Story Prize
- The Paris Review, The Paris Review Staff’s Favorite Books of 2019
- The Paris Review, Contributors’ Favorite Books of 2019
- The Today Show, 5 Books to Read If You Enjoyed Valentine by Elizabeth Wetmore
- The New York Times, In the Running for National Book Awards
- Reader’s Digest, The 25 Best, Most Iconic Short Stories of All Time
- Electric Lit, 8 Books About Coming into Queer Selfhood
- Electric Lit, 15 Best Short Story Collections of 2019
- Texas Observer, The 30 Best Texas Books of the Decade
- Literary Arts, Reading Recommendations: Pride Reads
- Powell’s, Best Fiction of 2019
- Powell’s Staff’s Top 5 Books of 2019
- Lit Hub, Best Queer Debuts of 2019
- Lit Hub, If They Gave Oscars to Books, Our 2019 Nominees
- Jezebel, The Best Books the Jezebel Staff Read in 2019
- Penguin Random House Staff Best of 2019
- Electric Literature, 10 Stories About Self-Destructive Women
- Southwest Review, 10 Must-Read Books of 2019
- The Millions, Books Are Magic Staff Pick 2019
- Texas Monthly, The Best Things in Texas 2020
- Harvard Bookstore, 2019 Staff Favorites
- Largehearted Boy’s Favorite Short Story Collections of 2019
- Write or Die Tribe’s Favorite Books of 2019
- The Millions, Year in Reading 2019
- Debutiful, Favorite Debuts of 2019
- Oprah Magazine, 23 of the Best LGBTQ Books That’ll Change the Literary Landscape in 2019
- The Paris Review, Staff Pick
- Oprah Magazine, 10 August Books You Should Read Right Now
- Publishers Weekly, Writers to Watch Fall 2019: Anticipated Debuts
- LAMBDA Literary, New in August: Kimberly King Parsons, Caleb Crain, and Elissa Altman
- The Millions, 10 Writers to Watch in 2019
- PDX Monthly, 10 Great Books by Oregon Writers
- BookPeople’s Favorite Fiction Reads of 2019
- Bennington Banner, The One Book You Should Give This Season
- Electric Lit, The 20 Best Debuts of the Second Half of 2019
- Portland Monthly, 2019’s Best Oregon-Born Culture
- The Advocate, 20 LGBTQ Collections of Poetry, Short Stories, and Essays
- Rewire, 13 Books by LGBTQ Writers to Read This Fall
- Lit Hub, The 12 Best Book Covers of August
- The Millions, Most Anticipated: The Great Second-Half 2019 Book Preview
- Lit Hub, New Books Tuesday
- CRAFT Literary, New Books: August 2019
- The Rumpus, What to Read When You’ve Made It More Than Halfway Through 2019
- Lit Reactor, Books That Are Feminist AF
- Paperback Paris, The 60 Best Books of 2019
- Paperback Paris, Four Women with Mind-Blowingly Original Debuts Out This Month
- Bustle, 20 New Books to Read This Summer, According to Authors
- Autostraddle, 15 New LGBT Books to Make Your Summer Hot Hot Hot
- Vol. 1 Brooklyn, August 2019 Book Preview
- Portland Monthly, 2019’s Best Oregon-Born Culture
- Local Profile, 10 Books by Texans to Read This Spring
- Logo, 11 Queer Books You Need to Read Before Summer Ends
- BUST, Week of Women: August 9–15, 2019
- Alma, Alma’s Favorite Books for Summer 2019
- Debutiful, 6 Debut Books to Read This August
- Paste, The Best Audiobooks of August 2019
- Publishers Weekly, ☆ Starred ☆ Review
- Kirkus, ☆ Starred ☆ Review
