31 2009 debut novels

After the Fire, A Still Small Voice is the debut novel by author Evie Wyld published in August 2009 by Jonathan Cape in the UK and Pantheon Books in the US. It won the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and a Betty Trask Award. and was also shortlisted for both the Orange Award for New Writers and International Dublin Literary Award.

American Rust is American writer Philipp Meyer's debut novel, published in 2009. Set in the 2000s, American Rust takes place in the fictional town of Buell in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, which is in a rural region referred to as "the Valley" of dilapidated steel towns. American Rust focuses on the decline of the American middle class, good-paying manufacturing jobs, and the general sense of economic and social malaise of what has become known as the New Gilded Age. Meyer's novel received rave reviews from book critics; many publications ranked it one of the best novels of 2009.

The Badlands Saloon is a novel by Jonathan Twingley, an American artist and illustrator. Published by Scribner in 2009, the 224-page hardcover tells the story of Oliver Clay, and his life-changing summer in a small North Dakota town.

A Beautiful Place to Die is the debut novel of award-winning filmmaker Malla Nunn. It was a recipient of the 2009 Davitt Award.

Breathers: A Zombie’s Lament is a romantic zombie comedy novel by first-time author S. G. Browne, published in 2009. The story is told from the point of view of Andy Warner, a newly revived zombie who lives in his parents' basement, attends Undead Anonymous meetings, and is in love with another zombie, Rita, who killed herself by slashing her own throat. As he seeks to survive in a world that hates zombies, Andy must regularly consume formaldehyde while all he and every zombie really wants is to eat human flesh, which is forbidden.

Carter Finally Gets It is a 2009 young adult novel by Brent Crawford. The novel follows the misadventures of William Carter, who suffers from ADD as he enters his first year of high school. He must face bullies, rejection, and going to the same school as his sister. It won't be easy, especially when his friends start having more fun than him. But he makes it through eventually.

Cutting for Stone (2009) is a novel written by Ethiopian-born Indian-American medical doctor and author Abraham Verghese. It is a saga of twin brothers, orphaned by their mother's death at their births and forsaken by their father. The book includes both a deep description of medical procedures and an exploration of the human side of medical practices.

Dracula the Un-dead is a 2009 sequel to Bram Stoker's classic 1897 novel Dracula. The book was written by Bram Stoker's great grand-nephew Dacre Stoker and Ian Holt. Previously, Holt had been a direct-to-DVD horror screenwriter, and Stoker a track and field coach.

Dust and Shadow: An Account of the Ripper Killings by Dr. John H. Watson is a Sherlock Holmes pastiche novel by Lyndsay Faye which pits Sherlock Holmes against Jack the Ripper.

The Forest of Hands and Teeth is a New York Times best-selling post-apocalyptic zombie novel by first-time author Carrie Ryan that is marketed to young adults. It was published in 2009 by Random House Delacorte Press in the United States, and by Hachette Gollancz in Australia and the United Kingdom. This is the first volume of a trilogy; the second book in the series, The Dead-Tossed Waves, was released on March 9, 2010 and The Dark and Hollow Places followed in March 2011. As the story opens, an unexplained disaster has turned much of the human race into mindless, cannibalistic undead. They roam the forest of the title, seeking to destroy a band of survivors barricaded inside a walled village deep in the woods. However, the fence that protects these villagers also imprisons them within a dystopian society marked by violence, secrecy, and repression. The forest thus profoundly influences all the action of the novel.

Free Agent is a 2009 spy thriller novel written by Jeremy Duns. It is the first in a trilogy of spy thrillers featuring MI6 agent Paul Dark and is set at the height of the Cold War in 1969. The novel is set in London and Nigeria during the Nigerian Civil War. Duns has said he was influenced by the novels A Dandy in Aspic, by Derek Marlowe and The Human Factor by Graham Greene.

The Gray Man is the debut novel by Mark Greaney, first published in 2009 by Jove Books. It is also the first novel to feature the Gray Man, freelance assassin and former CIA operative Court Gentry.

Hate List is a young adult novel written by Jennifer Brown and published in 2009 by Little, Brown Books for Young Readers. Jennifer Brown, who wrote a newspaper humor column for four years, switched to a more serious side for her debut novel, Hate List. The novel is set after a shooting incident at an American high school and deals with themes of hatred, bullying, family tension, and suicide.

The Help is a 2009 novel by American author, Kathryn Stockett. The story is about African Americans working in white households in Jackson, Mississippi during the early 1960s.

The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared, also known as The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared in the US, is a 2009 comic novel by the Swedish author Jonas Jonasson. The Swedish version was first published on 9 September 2009, and the English version on 12 July 2012.

The Lace Reader (2006) is a novel by Brunonia Barry. The novel is set in Salem, Massachusetts, the American town famous for the Salem witch trials.

Outlaw is the first novel of the eight-part Outlaw Chronicles series by British writer of historical fiction, Angus Donald, released on 10 July 2009 through Little, Brown and Company. The début novel was relatively well received.

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane (2009) is the first novel of American author Katherine Howe. It was published by VOICE, an imprint of Hyperion (publisher). It debuted at number two on the New York Times Hardcover Fiction Bestseller list on June 20, 2009.

The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet is the debut novel by American author Reif Larsen, first published in 2009. The book follows the exploits of a 12-year-old mapmaker named T.S. Spivet, who lives on a ranch near Divide, Montana, as he receives a prestigious award and accepts it, hitch-hiking on a freight train for the acceptance speech in Washington D.C.. The book is noteworthy for its unique design; the plot-line is illustrated with images which further the narrative by providing charts, lists, sketches, and maps accompanying each page, mirroring T.S.'s cartographic interests and his minute attention to detail.

Slights is a 2009 horror novel by Australian writer Kaaron Warren. It is her debut novel and is about a woman who withdraws from society and has near-death experiences in which she enters a dark room where she is tormented by people she had previously slighted. It was first published as a paperback original and e-book in the United Kingdom and Australia in July 2009 by Angry Robot, an offshoot of HarperCollins, and in the United States by Angry Robot in September 2010.

STAR Academy is a 2009 comedic sci-fi children's novel by Canadian author Edward Kay, who is also the co-creator of the animated series, Jimmy Two-Shoes. The book was published in September 2009, by Random House / Doubleday Canada. (ISBN 978-0-385-66706-7)

Stolen is the debut novel of author Lucy Christopher. It was published in the UK in 2009 and is the story of Gemma Toombs, a 16-year-old girl who is kidnapped by a 24-year-old man named Ty and taken to the middle of the Great Sandy Desert in the Australian Outback. Subtitled A Letter to My Captor, the book is told in second person narrative as a letter from Gemma to Ty.

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie is a mystery by Alan Bradley published in 2009. Set in the English countryside in 1950, it features Flavia de Luce, an 11-year-old amateur sleuth who pulls herself away from her beloved chemistry lab in order to clear her father in a murder investigation. Bradley, a first-time novelist, wrote the book after winning the 2007 Debut Dagger Award and selling the publishing rights in three countries, based on the first chapter and a synopsis. Well received by critics as an old-fashioned mystery featuring an unforgettable protagonist, the novel has won multiple awards and is the first in a proposed 10-book series.

Sweets and Other Stories is the 2009 debut novel by soul singer Andre Williams. It features an introduction by author Nick Tosches and an editor's note by Miriam Linna of Kicks Books.

The Gray House is the first novel of Armenian writer Mariam Petrosyan. Written in Russian, it tells a story of a boarding school for disabled children and was published in Russian in 2009, becoming a bestseller. The novel was nominated for the Russian Booker Prize in 2010 and received several awards and nominations, among them the 2009 Russian Prize for the best book in Russian by an author living abroad.

Tinkers (2009) is the first novel by American author, Paul Harding. The novel tells the stories of George Washington Crosby, an elderly clock repairman, and of his father, Howard. On his deathbed, George remembers his father, who was a tinker selling household goods from a donkey-drawn cart and who struggled with epilepsy. The novel was published by Bellevue Literary Press, a sister organization of the Bellevue Literary Review.

The Unincorporated Man is a science fiction novel by Dani Kollin and Eytan Kollin, published in 2009.

The Very Thought of You is a 2009 novel by film producer Rosie Alison. Set on the brink of World War II, the novel centres on eight-year-old Anna Sands, a child relocated to a Yorkshire estate. She is quickly drawn into the lives of the couple who have set up their estate as a school.

The Windup Girl is a biopunk science fiction novel by American writer Paolo Bacigalupi. It was his debut novel and was published by Night Shade Books on September 1, 2009. The novel is set in a future Thailand and covers a number of contemporary issues such as global warming and biotechnology.

Wings is the debut, young-adult faerie novel by author Aprilynne Pike. It is the first of four books about a fifteen-year-old girl who discovers she is a faerie sent among humans to guard the gateway to Avalon.

The Wish Maker is the first novel by Pakistani author Ali Sethi. Published in 2009 by Riverhead Books, it tells the story of Zaki Shirazi, a young boy from United States who returned to Lahore, Pakistan after finishing his studies to celebrate the wedding of his childhood friend Samar Api and observe a completely new Pakistan. The story is set against the backdrop of tumultuous events, from the Zia-ul-Haq reign to Zulfiqar Bhutto's execution and Benazir Bhutto elections, it also dictates United States help to Afghan mujahideen during the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan.