By clicking “Accept,” you agree to the use of cookies and similar technologies on your device as set forth in our Cookie Policy and our Privacy Policy. Please note that certain cookies are essential for this website to function properly and do not require user consent to be deployed.
Wolf Bells
A Novel
Contributors
By Leni Zumas
Formats and Prices
- On Sale
- Sep 16, 2025
- Page Count
- 224 pages
- Publisher
- Algonquin Books
- ISBN-13
- 9781643756578
Price
$28.00Price
$37.00 CADFormat
Format:
- Hardcover $28.00 $37.00 CAD
- ebook $14.99 $19.99 CAD
- Audiobook Download (Unabridged) $18.99
Buy from Other Retailers:
On a bluff above a river rises The House, where elderly and disabled residents live alongside young people who help out in exchange for free rent. The community is led by a former punk singer who never wanted to be responsible for anyone yet now finds herself the caretaker of this precarious collection of lives. It’s not a family, exactly, but it’s got the complicated, sometimes painful, sometimes hilarious, dynamics of kinship.
When two kids—Nola and her little cousin James—show up on The House’s back porch in need of refuge, the whole experiment is thrown into question. All are welcome here, or that was the idea. But the authorities are looking for these children, and The House’s finances are teetering on the edge.
Zumas’s long-anticipated third novel wrestles with America’s crisis of care in a taut, aching, polyphonic tale that moves as fast as the crackling comebacks that fly between The House’s residents over breakfast. As the rules of the outside world start to press in on this safe haven, readers will find themselves asking, what would the world look like if everyone had a place to belong?
-
A Publishers Lunch Buzz Book, and a Most Antipicated Book by LitHub, Ms. Magazine, Alta, and InsideHook
-
“Unflinching, hilarious, and radical. In Wolf Bells, Leni Zumas has written the most humane of books; an essential and audacious novel that we need, urgently, in these fearful, fearsome times. Wolf Bells challenges us to imagine a new way of living; in true community, mutually caring and compassionate and free to speak our dissent. I would love to live in The House, the fictional residence Zumas has created, with all its aches and pains and complications and tender, precarious solidarity.”Miriam Toews, bestselling author of Fight Night and Women Talking
-
“From the first sentence, you know you’re in the hands of a novelist with the ear of a very good poet… A delight to read. It stands out as a book that features the interior voices of children, middle-aged women, and an elderly woman with equal verve… A tender and well-told story about the meaning of family.”Kirkus Reviews
-
“Leni Zumas writes the truths we pretend we don’t know, in a country determined to cultivate hyper individuality as the pinnacle of success. Wolf Bells insists that you ask why empathy and compassion are considered the lesser currencies. With the precision of a cartographer of the human heart, her novel navigates the ways the oldest and the youngest, the queer and the marginalized are forced to live along the fault lines of precarity. And with the tenderness of an attentive and honest lover, she guides us towards a world that is not only better but possible.”Mona Eltahawy, author of The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls
-
“At once a fable, a cautionary tale, a sitcom, an elegy, and a no-frills utopian roadmap, Wolf Bells howls with the thrill of life and death intertwined. This is a brave book about trauma and persistence, aging and intergenerational kinship, and the frustration, conflict, and connection in caring for one another. Reshaping the world out of a broken history, Leni Zumas shows us how to dream.”Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore, author of Touching the Art
-
“Wolf Bells is an urgent novel about protecting the vulnerable...Zumas’s compassion shines through... All the more poignant for being so wholly at odds with our current ruling politics... This novel strikes just the right notes... [An] urgent outrcy.”Ron Charles, Washington Post
-
“A tense, devastating novel about ‘semi-radical hospitality’ and people trying to do the best they can for each other.”W Magazine
-
Emme Lund, author of The Boy with a Bird in His Chest
“Wolf Bells will make you weep, I promise. Weep for radical possibilities of community. Weep for the cruelty of systems. Weep for the deep, fully human characters present in these pages. This novel is a kaleidoscope of place, characters, histories, and emotional connections so truly rendered that finishing it feels like saying goodbye to lifelong friends. I am always blown away by Leni Zumas, who is, hands down, one of the finest novelists writing today. This is a novel that will be read for generations.” -
“A spirited, hilarious, and tender study of intergenerational living. A nonverbal poet glows at the center of Portlander Leni Zumas’s big-hearted novel Wolf Bells. James is 8, and he is the most gorgeously rendered character I can remember reading... With poetic efficiency and beguiling shifts in tone, Zumas… animates [Wolf Bells’s] many protagonists in a quick and hilarious 211 pages.”Portland Monthly
-
"The thing about Red Clocks, Zumas’ previous novel, is that every cool writing professor I’ve ever known has a copy of it prominently displayed in their office. So I’m extremely looking forward to her new book, Wolf Bells... Wolf Bells is the newest entry in the socialist gothic canon."LitHub's Most Anticipated Books of 2025
-
“Raw and gritty and real… Part of Wolf Bells’ allure lies in that it is implicitly political and socially aware without being polemical and trite. Wolf Bells is as radical as the society-shifting housing practices it explores—completely unflinching in its boldness and bravery.”Everybody’s Reviewing
-
“Wolf Bells incorporates punk rock even as it also tells a compelling tale of the search for community”InsideHook
-
“Shared homes bring hope and chaos in Wolf Bells. Leni Zumas’ new novel is a nice (and quietly subversive) story about a multigenerational, intentional community… [Wolf Bells] employs her ultra readable, highly-effective form—the merry-go-round of characters whirs to life… the method of Zumas’ storytelling may be the whole point… The device shines even brighter in Wolf Bells… It all works.”Portland Mercury
-
“Funny as hell… Zumas charmed me [with] vividly realistic scenes of cohabitation gone awry––alongside moments of radical patience, poignant self-awareness, and goofy authenticity... [Zumas] reminded me that in this political age, we might be each other’s only refuge from the circling wolves.”Staff Picks (Emma Staffaroni Blog)
-
“Leni Zumas’s third novel explores America’s crisis of care in a sharp story about belonging, responsibility, and the limits of a haven in a world that often refuses it. Wolf Bells asks important questions about what the world could look like if everyone had a place to belong.”Geek Girl Authority
-
Praise for Leni Zumas:---
"[A] lyrical and beautifully observed reflection on women's lives...Highly absorbing...Zumas is a skillful writer, expertly keeping each of her characters in balanced motion." /I>Naomi Alderman, New York Times Book Review
"Leni Zumas here proves she can do almost anything. Her tale feels part Melvillian, part Lydia Davis, part Octavia Butler-but really Zumas's vision is entirely her own. Red Clocks is funny, mordant, political, poetic, alarming, and inspiring-not to mention a way forward for fiction now." /I>Maggie Nelson
"Strange and lovely and luminous. I loved Red Clocks with my whole heart." /I>Kelly Link, author of Magic for Beginners
"Complex and heartbreaking…a fascinating and unsettling exploration of the limits society can place on women's bodies." /I>Samantha Irby, Marie Claire
"This provocative exploration of female longing, frustration and determination couldn't be more timely, and yet there's nothing fleeting about it. With Red Clocks, Zumas has written a novel that's political without being doctrinaire, that expands the dimensions of our most pressing social debate." /I>Ron Charles, Washington Post
"Chillingly relevant." —People
"Leni creates worlds so vivid and fever-bright that you forget you're reading words on a page." /I>Karen Russell
You May Also Like
Newsletter Signup
By clicking ‘Sign Up,’ I acknowledge that I have read and agree to Hachette Book Group’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Use
