Montrone, Sofia: Nymph

A STYLIST BEST QUEER FICTION BOOK TO LOOK OUT FOR IN 2026
A VOGUE and ELLE SUMMER READ 2026

'Immersive, queer and atmospheric. The perfect summer read' EMILY AUSTIN
'Montrone perfectly captures the Homeric, mythic power of childhood's edge, the paradox of days that feel like they last forever, while somehow always being much too short. Every sentence is a heartbreak' HILARY LEICHTER
'A dazzling debut that captures the dizzying intensity of first love' ADAM WILSON
'Transcendent' HEIDI JULAVITS
'This shimmering gem of a novel invites you to re-experience that gut-punch feeling of youthful summer romance. Suffused with moody sunsets, lush summer heat and confused yearning' ANELISE CHEN
'Luscious and transporting' GRACE FLAHIVE

Ten-year-old Leo spends her mornings tidying the rooms of her nonna's time-worn Italian hotel, quietly accumulating the junk and treasures left behind by guests - a pearl earring, a lock of hair. Her nights are suffused with her father's liquor-spun tales of his childhood, mingled with stories of Greek heroes of old.

Years later, over another hot, endless Italian summer, the hotel is one of the only things in Leo's life that has remained constant. An accident has knocked her family sideways; her brother Max is distant and Nonna has grown frail. But then she meets Dolores, an American girl who sets something alight in Leo that she didn't know existed.

Heat-soaked, sensual and steeped in an exquisite longing, Nymph traverses the extraordinary pains, soaring pleasures and many metamorphoses it takes to finally grow up.