Sophie McManus is the author of the critically acclaimed novel, The Unfortunates, which is a Barnes & Noble 2015 Great Writers Discover Award Finalist, was shortlisted for the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize, long listed for the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Prize, and named a notable book or must-read by The Washington Post, Entertainment Weekly, Time, Paste, and Time Out (New York) among others. Her work has appeared in American Short Fiction, O, Tin House, The Washington Post, and elsewhere. She is a recipient of fellowships from the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, the Saltonstall Foundation, and the Jentel Foundation. She was born and raised in New York City and teaches writing in Brooklyn, New York. 

Praise for The Unfortunates

"Just often enough, some unknown writer darts from the forest of little magazines to publish a novel that blows away the gathering shades of cultural despair...brilliant social satire...I moved through with a slowly accruing sense of awe as these characters grew simultaneously more outrageous and more sympathetic."
— Ron Charles, THE WASHINGTON POST

“The real surprise, though, is CeCe, who emerges as sharp, wise — and eventually, even truly generous. She’s the one who gives the novel its remarkable maturity and heft.”
— Britt Peterson, THE NEW YORK TIMES

“…wonderfully precise and subtle—not to mention unexpectedly moving…Sophie McManus, young as she is, is a truly dexterous writer, one who eyes the insular world she has chosen to crack open for us with as much wisdom as wit. One wonders where her formidable gift for social satire will take her next.”
— Daphne Merkin, THE NEW YORKER