The Virgin Suicides meets The Florida Project in this wildly original debut—a coming-of-age story about the crucible of girlhood, from a writer of rare and startling talent We would not be born out of sweetness, we were born out of rage, we felt it in our bones. In Falls Landing, Florida—a place built of theme parks, swampy lakes, and scorched bougainvillea flowers—something sinister lurks in the deep. A gang of thirteen-year-old girls obsessively orbit around the local preacher's daughter, Sammy. She is mesmerizing, older, and in love with Eddie. But suddenly, Sammy goes missing. Where is she? Watching from a distance, they edge ever closer to discovering a dark secret about their fame-hungry town and the cruel cost of a ticket out. What they see will continue to haunt them for the rest of their lives. Through a darkly beautiful and brutally compelling lens, Dizz Tate captures the violence, horrors, and manic joys of girlhood. Brutes is a novel about the seemingly unbreakable bonds in the "we" of young friendship, and the moment it is broken forever. NPR, A Best Book of the Year GQ , A Best Debut Novel of the Year A Belletrist Book Pick Named a Most Anticipated Book by Time , Nylon , Literary Hub , CrimeReads , Our Culture Magazine , and more Goodreads, A Buzziest Debut Novel of the Year “Elegant . . . Tate’s work takes a sanctioned vision of suburbia and transforms it . . . The mystery is waylaid in favor of something more arresting, more sinister, more enthralling. By the end, Brutes feels wonderfully untethered, wild and unpredictable. The novel is an exploration of adolescent trauma and its otherworldly manifestations rather than a retelling of a trope.” —Danya Kukafka, The New York Times Book Review "An original and stylistically ambitious take on the well-trodden subject matter of girls in peril . . . Tate perfectly captures the simultaneous impatience and mercurial swings of girlhood." —Kristen Martin, NPR "This season’s most-anticipated first outing." — Vogue "With easily one of the most cinematic covers of the year’s new release slate, Dizz Tate’s Brutes is marketed as The Virgin Suicides meets The Florida Project . That’s an apt comparison, considering the violent, dangerous pleasures lurking in this coming-of-age story, which follows a group of young girls who flock around the radiant local televangelist’s daughter—until she one day disappears. This is a riveting tale, one that refuses to sacrifice nuance nor insight for the sake of its propulsive narrative." — Elle , A Most Anticipated Title of the Year "Spellbinding . . . Brutes is astonishing, unnerving, cinematic, and slyly hideous." —Patrick Rapa, The Philadelphia Inqurer [A] magic realist, warped Florid a fairy tale, a Lynchian reinterpretation of The Virgin Suicides . . . Tate acutely captures the precariousness of girlhood, its growing pains and what it is to be “born out of rage.”' — The Observer [UK] "An astonishing debut that will burrow under your skin." — The Sunday Times (London) "[A] much-heralded debut . . . Brutes contains many high-calibre ingredients, not least Tate’s linguistic flair and acute visual sense." —Madeleine Feeny, The Guardian “Narrated by an intense voice—the crowded 'we'— Brutes uses an imagistic, unnerving language to tell the story of these girls and their young, 'hatching hearts.'” — Bustle , A Most Anticipated Book of the Year "Dizz Tate captures the sticky, grabby feeling of puberty in her addictive, haunting debut novel." —Sophia June, Nylon "Florida is a place of extremes—extreme heat, extreme weather, extreme people. It’s hard to put into words what growing up there is like, but with her debut novel, Dizz Tate combines the intensity of the state with the dramatic, emotional turbulence of young adulthood . . . A portrait of a state unlike any other—a car crash that’s impossible to look away from." —Sam Franzini, Our Culture "Told from a perspective reminiscent of The Virgins Suicides and the unflinching style of The Florida Project , Dizz Tate immediately makes her mark with her debut novel Brutes ." — Chicago Review of Books "Each of their binocular-spied revelations uncovers a darker, more uncomfortable truth about how girls are perceived and consumed, a truth about predation, abuse, and desire. Brutes is a girl-church novel that inherits a desecrated sanctuary." —Maggie Nye, Literary Hub "A surreal and ambitious debut novel . . . Brutes ’s adolescent cast, time-jumping narrative, and promise of violence evoke the hit show Yellowjackets." — The Millions , A Most Anticipated Read "Dark and beautiful instantly come to mind when thinking about how to describe the teenage girl friendship in this book. Dark and beautiful also describes Tate’s writing. It explores coming-of-age in such new and unique ways. Brutes will mesmerize you and catch you off guard with how accurate yet unpredictable it is." — Debutiful "Through a darkly be