Zakiya Dalila Harris spent nearly three years in editorial at Knopf/Doubleday after receiving her MFA in creative writing from The New School. Her essays and book reviews have appeared in Cosmopolitan, Guernica, and The Rumpus. The Other Black Girl (Atria Books) is her debut novel, a story of 26-year-old editorial assistant Nella Rogers, who’s tired of being the only Black staffer at Wagner Books. Fed up with the isolation and microaggressions, she’s thrilled when Harlem-born-and-bred Hazel starts working in the cubicle beside hers. They’ve only just started comparing natural hair care regimens, though, when a string of uncomfortable events elevates Hazel to Office Darling, and Nella is left in the dust. Then notes begin to appear on Nella’s desk: LEAVE WAGNER. NOW. It’s hard to believe Hazel is behind these messages, but as Nella starts to spiral and obsess over the sinister forces at play, she soon realizes that there’s a lot more at stake than just her career. A smart, dynamic thriller and sly social commentary at once, The New York Times called the book a “funny, sometimes creepy indictment of the book business.”
