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Garth Greenwell’s third novel, SMALL RAIN, is a look into the inner thoughts of nearly anyone who’s dealt with a major medical issue: the unknowns they face, the bureaucracy they’re thrust into, and the kindness of strangers that look after them when they’re most vulnerable.
Winner of the 2025 Pen/Faulkner award for fiction, the novel follows a poet and college professor who’s forced into the dysfunction of the American healthcare system when faced with an unknown medical condition. Taking place entirely in a hospital, the book captures one person’s experience within those walls, and speaks broadly to memory, sympathy, and the glimpses of beauty that keep us going in uncertain times.
–Recommended by Stephen