Mateo

Askaripour

New York Times bestselling author of BLACK BUCK & THIS GREAT HEMISPHERE (Out Now!) Order here!

ABOUT Mateo

Mateo Askaripour wants people to feel seen. His first novel, Black Buck, takes on racism in corporate America with humor and wit. It was an instant New York Times bestseller and a Read with Jenna Today show book club pick. Askaripour was chosen as one of Entertainment Weekly’s “10 rising stars to make waves” and was named as a recipient of the National Book Foundation’s “5 Under 35” prize. This Great Hemisphere is his second novel. He lives in Brooklyn.

From the bestselling author of Black Buck comes a speculative novel about a young woman—invisible by birth and relegated to second-class citizenship—who sets off on a mission to find her older brother, whom she had presumed dead but who is now the primary suspect in a high-profile political murder.

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Despite the odds, Sweetmint, a young invisible woman, has done everything right her entire life—school, university, and now a highly sought-after apprenticeship with the Northwestern Hemisphere’s premier inventor, a non-invisible man belonging to the Dominant Population who is as eccentric as he is enigmatic. But the world she has fought so hard to build after the disappearance of her older brother comes crashing down when authorities claim that not only is he well and alive, he’s also the main suspect in the murder of the Chief Executive of the Northwestern Hemisphere. 

A manhunt ensues, and Sweetmint, armed with courage, intellect, and unwavering love for her brother, sets off on a mission to find him before it’s too late. With five days until the hemisphere’s big election, Sweetmint must dodge a relentless law officer who’s determined to maintain order and an ambitious politician with sights set on becoming the next Chief Executive by any means necessary.

 With the captivating worldbuilding of N.K. Jemisin’s novels and blazing defiance of Naomi Alderman’s work, This Great Hemisphere is a novel that brilliantly illustrates the degree to which reality can be shaped by non-truths and vicious manipulations, while shining a light on our ability to surprise ourselves when we stop giving in to the narratives others have written for us.

A New York Times Bestseller

National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 
A Read with Jenna Today Show Book Club Pick!
Longlisted for the Center for Fiction's First Novel Prize

Finalist for New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award

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For fans of Sorry to Bother You and The Wolf of Wall Street—a crackling, satirical debut novel about a young man given a shot at stardom as the lone Black salesman at a mysterious, cult-like, and wildly successful startup where nothing is as it seems.

There’s nothing like a Black salesman on a mission.

An unambitious twenty-two-year-old, Darren lives in a Bed-Stuy brownstone with his mother, who wants nothing more than to see him live up to his potential as the valedictorian of Bronx Science. But Darren is content working at Starbucks in the lobby of a Midtown office building, hanging out with his girlfriend, Soraya, and eating his mother’s home-cooked meals. All that changes when a chance encounter with Rhett Daniels, the silver-tongued CEO of Sumwun, NYC’s hottest tech startup, results in an exclusive invitation for Darren to join an elite sales team on the thirty-sixth floor.

After enduring a “hell week” of training, Darren, the only Black person in the company, reimagines himself as “Buck,” a ruthless salesman unrecognizable to his friends and family. But when things turn tragic at home and Buck feels he’s hit rock bottom, he begins to hatch a plan to help young people of color infiltrate America’s sales force, setting off a chain of events that forever changes the game.

Black Buck is a hilarious, razor-sharp skewering of America’s workforce; it is a propulsive, crackling debut that explores ambition and race, and makes way for a necessary new vision of the American dream.

PHILOSOPHY

Mateo believes that we all have stories within us worth telling, and that it’s our duty to speak our truths far and wide. No matter the form––novels, collections, film/TV, speaking engagements––Mateo is dedicated to working to give form to ideas that positively impact others. Read more here.

SERVICES

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“One of the surest ways of creating change––for ourselves and others––is through giving people the tools to thrive, with literacy, like a hammer, being both the most basic and one of the strongest.”

Excerpted from National Celebration of Reading keynote

Let's turn our dreams to reality

Let's turn our dreams to reality