Come and Get It

elevator is super slow," she said. "Are you okay with stairs?"
 
Millie wore black cotton shorts and an oversized red polo with University of Arkansas Residence Life embroidered in white. She had rosy brown skin, a pear-shaped form, and an expanse of dark wavy hair in a lopsided bun at the front of her skull. Millie was cute with bright eyes and large, lightly freckled cheeks. From the neck down, she looked like an adult poking fun at campus life, someone dressing like an RA for Halloween. In one arm she held a clipboard and pen. A dated cell phone was behind her waistband at her hip. In a two-finger hold was the plastic loop on a wide-mouth Nalgene bottle. It was covered in overlapping stickers; one said Save the Buffalo River . . . Again! As Agatha followed her up three flights of stairs, she decided that Millie was probably twenty-two years old. She was the type of student that college student service centers swept up for pictures and profiles. Students paid parsimoniously to give brief campus tours.
 
Millie bent to use the fob on her lanyard to open the stairwell door. She looked back and asked, "So you just moved here for the school year?"
 
"I did," Agatha said. "Are you from Arkansas?"
 
"No, I'm from Joplin. But I used to camp here when I was little."
 
"Did you go to Devil's Den?"
 
"Yeah. Many times."
 
"It's lovely over there."
 
Millie dipped her chin. "You've been camping already? That's impressive."
 
"No no, long time ago. But I should go again."
 
Agatha followed her down a long, bright hallway past several doorways that had pool-themed cutouts taped above the peepholes. Written in Sharpie on paper sunglasses and palm trees were names like Sophia, Molly, and Jade. Agatha had lived in a residence hall for her freshman year at Amherst, but then she moved into one of the Amherst Houses, which felt more like a boardinghou

under the skin, the characters staying for days."  BUST Magazine

"Reid s skillful storytelling and vibrant characters are sure to give you a great time."  BookRiot

"Reid really shines. The dialogue and personalities she created for each dorm resident, each classmate and each parent are so complete, it's like tuning into a juicy reality show already in progress. . . . Consumerism, race, desire, grief and growth are key themes in Reid's novel, but connection might be the thread through them all." USA Today
 
"Amuses and captivates from the first page. . . . Reid crafts a witty and moving vignette of college life, the challenges it poses, and the women who endure them. . . . A clever, accurate portrayal of the immaturity and growth of young adulthood." The Harvard Crimson

"Reid s novels are interested in recognizing the pervasiveness of this economic approach to life, exploring its consequences, and trying to think past it. . . . Another opportunity to think about important social issues from a welcome new angle." Chicago Review of Books
 
"Reid creates a story with real weight. Her ear for dialogue [is] finely tuned. It feels like you re reading great gossip, but the characters come across as genuine, with real problems. Come and Get It is a fun, propulsive read that puts readers in a world most of them will have long since graduated from, but which provides an ideal window to explore deeper themes from relationships to class and privilege to racism." Associated Press

"The story unfurls like a magic trick, its breeziness disguising an incisive and damning exploration of economics and ethics in America. . . . Reid is a social observer of the highest order, knowing exactly when a small detail or beat of dialogue will resonate beyond the confines of the scene. . . . It s a testament to Reid s gifts that . . . she never judges her characters. Her world, like the real one, is populated by people whose shortsightedness lives alongside good intentions. . . . With her perceptive eye and ear, Reid imbues her novel with the stuff, literally and figuratively, of life. . . . Her characters feel unique, often lovable and always human. Money drives them in the way it drives us all, and that s the beauty (and the terror) of Reid s point. With her remarkable examination of American monoculture from fast food to pop culture to handed-down ideals she tells a story about economics that s neither poverty porn nor finance fantasy. Instead, it s about the hows and whys of everyday consumerism and the insidious toll it takes on our lives. . . . As I read Come and Get It, I found myself thinking of certain writers who have, over the years, elected themselves as capital C Chroniclers of contemporary America. With this book, Reid demonstrates that she deserves a place in the running." The New York Times Book Review

"Reid nails the anxiety about the future (and the present) for some students and the unperturbed overconfidence for others, depending largely on who has needed to develop defenses and who has not. That, of course, means taking into account the contexts of race and class and sexuality, as well as social skills and trauma history. She nails the heightened interpersonal conflicts that grow in cramped shared rooms like mildew on the walls. She burrows deeply into one young woman's pain and the lessons she learns about what it means to have other people invited into that pain to be spectators." NPR

"A thrilling, delectable look at wealth, privilege, and desire." People Magazine

"Clever . . . Beginning with an interview of these young women could easily have felt like the laziest kind of exposition, but in Reid s hands it serves as a brilliant demonstration of her own approach as a novelist: Listen. . . . The key is Reid s exquisitely calibrated tone . . . She s so good at capturing both the syrupy support and catty criticism these young women swap, and yet she also demonstrates a profound understanding of their fears and anxieties. Not to mention she gathers accents and verbal quirks like she s picking delicate fruit. . . . You re in the presence of a master plotter who s engineering a spectacular intersection of class, racism, academic politics and journalistic ethics. Reid spots all the grains of irritation and deceit that get caught in the machinery of social life until the whole contraption suddenly lurches to a calamitous halt. Come and get it, indeed!"  The Washington Post

"Masterfully captures the quiet misalignments that stem from a varying sense of what s at stake. . . . [A] novel of manners that acutely captures the modern moment." Vogue

"Juicy naturally but poignant, this highly anticipated return from the Such a Fun Age author is sure to get tongues wagging." Elle

"Reid employs her signature sharp eye and sardonic wit to spear academia in Come and Get It, a biting comedy of manners. Entertainment Weekly

"Such A Fun Age still occupies space in my brain for its incisive brilliance. Reid s highly-anticipated second novel Come and Get It tackles themes of consumption and reckless abandon." Nylon
 
"Reid makes a strong return with her biting and smart new novel." Shondaland

"Come and Get It is a page-turning read filled with vengeful pranks and intrigue, but at its heart, it is a fascinating portrait of our obsession with material wealth." Chicago Review of Books
 
"Clear and artfully expressed . . . [Reid] is very good at sketching a scene." The Wall Street Journal

"This new book promises all the same ability at depth and poignancy through a fun, plotty story... It s a perfect recipe for a great January read: in a college setting, about discretion and desire, about money, want, and, most importantly, it s by Kiley Reid." LitHub

"Kiley Reid is a great writer. Full stop. Her observations and point of view make even the most mundane moments, like a few students meeting for a focus group in college, feel reexamined and truly original .[A] captivating read that fans will gobble up.   GoodMorningAmerica.com

"Kiley Reid, author of Such a Fun Age, returns with another incisive novel everyone will be talking about. . . . A riveting and fascinating tale." Town & Country

"The story gets its hooks in with such subtlety, the reader doesn t realize how far she s been pulled in until Come & Get It is well under the skin, the characters staying for days." BUST Magazine

"Entertaining gems of insight . . . [A] meaningful cultural analysis and critique of young Black and white women s financial and consumer lives." Minneapolis Star Tribune

"[An] edgy and fiercely funny social novel . . . A virtuoso of adept observation, Reid once again delivers fiction with a sharp eye for social commentary, all while efficaciously mesmerizing the reader with her sublime sardonic wit from beginning to end." Stylecaster

"[A] wild romp . . . offering up a comically horrifying climax." Ebony Magazine

"A sharp, fascinating story . . . Another sharply written coming-of-age story about a group of women living in and around a college campus and the micro- and macro-aggressions that inform their relationships and conflicts.   Woman s World
 
"Stellar commentary on class, astute social observation, and lots of wit."  Scary Mommy

"The vibrant and brilliantly written coming-of-age story about money, indiscretion, and bad behavior. . . . A page-turner."  Essence Magazine

"Another incisive novel everyone will be talking about. . . A riveting and fascinating tale."  Town & Country

"A story of indiscretions and gray areas, power dynamics, and privilege that s wound as tight as a violin string." Good Housekeeping

"Beautifully told through the eyes of multiple characters, this intimate and revealing story from the critically acclaimed New York Times bestselling author of Such a Fun Age is not to be missed."  BookBub

"[A] sharp, edgy social novel. . . Reid has the very same obsessions she gives her character Agatha, and the guilty pleasure of the book is the way she nails the characters speech styles, Southern accents, and behavior and her unerring choice of products and other accoutrements to surround them with. . . . Reid is a genius of mimicry and social observation.   Kirkus Reviews

"Reid returns after her smash hit Such a Fun Age with a sardonic and no-holds-barred comedy of manners .Reid is a keen observer­ every page sparkles with sharp analysis of her characters. This blistering send-up of academia is interlaced with piercing moral clarity." Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"A deft exploration of how microaggressions can lead to macro consequences, Reid's second outing will appeal to readers who enjoy slow-burn, character-driven novels. . . . Reid has a ready and eager audience for her second novel, and the word is out." Booklist

"Reid offers an illuminating study of power, responsibility, and the bad choices we sometimes make, written in the fresh, bright language for which she s known. . . . What s most remarkable here is the grace and understanding the author shows her characters. . . . An emotionally intense exploration of power dynamics within relationships that doesn t settle for easy villains and victims."  Library Journal

"Kiley Reid is an expert at teasing apart the messy, complicated, nuanced layers of social dynamics, and has a rare gift for making the unknown feel intimately familiar and the familiar feel brand-new. In Come and Get It, she's crafted a story that moves with the momentum and inevitability of a snowball rolling down a mountain. I couldn't put it down, and I didn't want to either." Emily Henry, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Happy Place

"Reading a Kiley Reid novel is like watching a docuseries designed exactly for you. She captures those exceedingly awkward and real human interactions with such precision and specificity that you re fully invested by the first page. Come and Get It is genius. It s perfect." Liz Moore, author of Long Bright River

"Wonderfully immersive, propulsive, and beautifully paced. On page one, there is a story that is already happening, and you re plunged right into the novel s world, already up and running, full of real people, and complicated that is, substantive as all hell. Just great. Paul Harding, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of This Other Eden and Tinkers

"Come and Get It is an engrossing novel full of intimately portrayed characters and the seemingly innocuous choices that lead to life-altering mistakes." Elizabeth Acevedo, author of Family Lore and The Poet X