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Start giftingEllipses
A Novel
Narrator
Annie Q
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Length
8 hours 55 minutes
Language
English
Set in the glossy world of New York City media, this sharp and witty debut novel follows a young woman caught in a toxic mentorship with an older, powerful executive as she grapples with career, belonging, and the complexity of modern relationships in the digital age.
Named a Best Book of 2024 So Far by Vogue, Elle, and Electric Lit
One of Autostraddle's Most Anticipated Queer Books for Spring 2024
One of Chill Subs's 38 Books We Can't Wait to Read
When cosmetics mogul Billie rolls down her town car window and offers Lily a ride home from a glitzy Manhattan gala, Lily figures this could be a useful professional connection. She’s heard of Billie’s storied rise as a business titan, the product of white New England privilege and one of the few queer women in a corner suite. Billie could be just the jolt Lily needs to manifest her next step.
A magazine writer, Lily interviews influencers, actresses, and fashion designers for her publication’s stylish pages, all while navigating office microaggressions. Stalled at work, she worries that her dream print career will soon succumb to the rise of social media. She is at a standstill, too, in her relationship with her girlfriend Alison. And Lily feels unable to voice her authenticity when others’ sliding perceptions of her mixed race and bisexual identity repeatedly drown her out.
Charming and hyperconfident, Billie seems invested in mentoring Lily out of her slump, from the screen of her phone. But their text exchanges and Billie’s relentless worldview begin to consume Lily’s life. Eager to impress her powerful guide, Lily is perpetually suspended in an ellipsis, waiting for those three gray dots to bloom into a new message from Billie.
Ellipses explores one woman’s struggle for wholeness, in a world shaped by digital half-lives and aspirational fantasies. In the end, this stunning debut novel reveals the rewards and challenges of forging an uncharted path on one’s own terms.
Vanessa Lawrence is a writer, editor, and native New Yorker. For nearly two decades she covered the arts, fashion, beauty, design, and New York society as a staff writer for publications including Women’s Wear Daily and W Magazine. She has a BA in history from Yale University and an MFA in creative writing from Sarah Lawrence College. Ellipses is her debut novel.
Reviews
“A wry and winning debut from Vanessa Lawrence, ELLIPSES charts the course of a mentor-mentee relationship as toxic as it is intoxicating… [Lawrence] deploys her insider fluency with aplomb, describing the microaggressions of office politics as deftly as nepobaby influencers turned vegan caterers.”—Vogue, “The Best Books of 2024 So Far”
“Vanessa Lawrence’s Ellipses… navigates a nuanced conversation about power imbalances; our infatuations with so-called ‘accomplished’ women; and why society seems so incapable of holding intersectional identities in both hands.”
—Elle, "The Best and Most Anticipated Fiction Books of 2024, So Far"
“Gracious and insightful.”
—Women's Wear Daily
“Make no mistake about Vanessa Lawrence’s immersive debut novel, Ellipses, as being relevant to all women, young and old… Lawrence has crafted fiction that exposes truths without banging them over your head… The novel is a bundle of emotional complexities.”
—Lorraine Kleinwaks, Enchanted Prose
“Wildly entertaining and sharply observed, Ellipses is an astonishing and riveting debut novel. Vanessa Lawrence astutely portrays a young woman’s journey of survival in the magazine industry—and New York City—as she navigates the shifting power dynamics among women and charts her own path.”
—Sanaë Lemoine, author of NYTimes Editor’s Choice The Margot Affair
“An unflinchingly honest debut about the dizzying stakes of finding selfhood in a society that constantly threatens total consumption. Lawrence’s writing is as lyrical as it is incisive, exposing the bravery it takes to not be complicit in your own oppression. I couldn’t put this down.”
—Ling Ling Huang, author of Natural Beauty
“Vanessa Lawrence’s masterful debut deftly explores the stakes facing a young, queer, Asian female writer navigating the scary waters of the New York magazine world. Every page is a prose treasure, eloquently nailing the pulse of an often ruthless milieu while managing to make us laugh at its excesses and failures.”
—Carolyn Ferrell, author of the PEN/Faulkner Award finalist Dear Miss Metropolitan
“In Ellipses, Vanessa Lawrence captures the spirit of a bygone fashion era, whose heady halcyon days she and I were lucky enough to witness as young adults coming up in New York City.”
—Victor Glemaud, fashion designer
“A fresh take on power, manipulation, and self-discovery.”
—Kirkus Expand reviews