Makenna Goodman is an editor and a writer.

She is the author of two novels: Helen of Nowhere published in the US by Coffee House, 2025; in the UK by Fitzcarraldo, 2026; and in Spain by Mutatis Mutandis Editorial. Her first novel, The Shame (Milkweed Editions, 2020), was named a Harvard Review Favorite Book of 2020, a White Review Best Book of the Year, a Refinery29 Best New Book, a Literary Hub Recommended Read, a Bustle Most Anticipated Book, a Boston.com Book Club Pick, and more, and has been translated into Farsi.

Goodman has written literary criticism, essays, interviews, and short fiction for international publications including the New York Review of Books, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Electric Literature, Literary Hub, Catapult, Harvard Review, the White Review, BOMB, The Common, ASTRA Magazine, and MOUSSE. She has been interviewed in the Paris Review Daily, Guernica, The Rumpus, The Millions, EcoTheo, and on NPR and the Commonplace Podcast, among others.

She has worked in publishing for two decades as an editor with gardeners, horticulturalists, artists, farmers, essayists, cultural critics, designers, scientists, composters, seed savers, foragers, and fermenters, and books she has developed and edited have won awards including the James Beard Award, the American Horticultural Society Award, and the IACP award. She is currently executive editor at Timber Press.

She was interviewed by Alexander Chee in the Paris Review Daily, which you can read here. She was in conversation with Booker Prize finalist Rachel Cusk for the launch of her book Second Place here, and interviewed Booker Prize finalist Mieko Kawakami for BOMB here. She interviewed Celia Paul for ASTRA Magazine here, and National Book Award Winner Vigdis Hjorth here. Read her short fiction in the White Review here and in MOUSSE Magazine here. Read her essay in the New York Review of Books here.

Please direct all literary inquiries to Sarah Bowlin, Aevitas Creative Management, sbowlin@aevitascreative.com