Makenna Goodman

Makenna Goodman is the author of two critically acclaimed novels, Helen of Nowhere and The Shame. Helen of Nowhere was named a Favorite Book of 2026 (The Times) a Best Book of 2025 (The Paris Review and Granta), and has been called “a perfect fairy tale for our times,” (The Guardian) and is a finalist for the Vermont Book Award.

Goodman has written literary criticism, essays, interviews, and short fiction for international publications including New York Review of Books, New York Times, Los Angeles Review of Books, Harvard Review, and many others and hase been interviewed in the Paris Review Daily, Guernica, The Rumpus, and on the BBC, NPR and the Commonplace Podcast, among others.

She has worked in publishing for two decades and books she has developed and edited have won awards including the CALIBA award, the James Beard Award, the American Horticultural Society Award, and the IACP award. She is currently executive editor at Timber Press. The Shame was named a Harvard Review Favorite Book of 2020.

Helen of Nowhere is a Vermont Book Awards finalist for 2026.