Mayor’s Book Club
The Mayor’s Book Club is an annual citywide reading initiative we present in partnership with the Mayor’s Office and the Austin Public Library to encourage a community experience through reading, discussion, and exploration of current topics and compelling ideas.
The library hosts discussions and events to explore the book and foster dialogue within the community. Most years the book club culminates with an event featuring the selected book's author.
2026
Jason Mott’s novel People Like Us is not memoir, yet it has deeply personal connections to Jason’s life — a sequel to his National Book Award-winning novel, Hell of a Book.
And while rooted in reality, it explodes with dreamlike experiences from the ability to time travel to sightings of sea monsters and peacocks, and feelings of love and memory so real they hurt.
In People Like Us, two Black writers are trying to find peace and belonging in a world that is riven with gun violence. One is on a global book tour after a big prize win; the other is set to give a speech at a school that has suffered a shooting. As their two storylines merge, truths and antics abound in equal measure: characters drink booze out of an award trophy; menaces lurk in the shadows; tiny French cars putter around the countryside; handguns seem to hover in the air; and dreams endure against all odds
Q-and-A with Jason Mott
New York Times and USA Today Bestselling author Jason Mott lives in southeastern North Carolina. He has a BFA in Fiction and an MFA in Poetry from UNC Wilmington. His debut, The Returned, was adapted by Brad Pitt’s Plan B Entertainment and aired on ABC as Resurrection. His fourth novel, Hell of a Book, won the 2021 National Book Award for Fiction. His poetry and fiction have appeared in various literary journals.
Magical realism allows me to focus less on the details of an event and to focus more on the feeling of an event or an idea in a story. I compare it to how memory works. Over time, the details of specific memories become harder and harder to retain, while the feeling associated with that memory can often times grow in intensity. I like to think that is what magical realism allows me to mimic in my writing.
People Like Us asks readers to hold multiple realities at once. Do you think this challenge can help readers shift perspectives and find greater understanding of the lived experiences of other Americans?
I hope so! People Like Us and the other book in this series, Hell of a Book, are both trying to portray different perspectives at once. The topics and issues they discuss are attempting to tackle issues from as many angles as possible. So, hopefully, readers will encounter the structure of People Like Us and feel as though it adds to their ability to understand the point of view of complete strangers.
In previous interviews, you’ve mentioned that People Like Us was originally intended to be a memoir. Are you still tempted to pursue that format?
Not right now. At this point, I’m very happy with the autofiction approach that People Like Us and Hell of a Book exist within. So, for now, no true memoir is planned.
What’s your favorite Nicholas Cage movie?
“Raising Arizona” or “Lord of War.”
2025
The 2025 Mayor’s Book Club featured two books that explore our place in the natural world.
"We Loved It All" is a personal memoir by New York Times best-selling author and Pulitzer Prize finalist, Lydia Millet, who shares a poetic and informed assessment of nature’s inspiration and how we may enhance our relationship with the natural world.
“You Are Here: Poetry in the Natural World,” edited by U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón, features 50 new poems by some of the country’s most accomplished poets that reflect upon our essential connection with the natural world. The anthology includes work by Austin poets Carrie Fountain, Cecily Parks and Roger Reeves.
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Got a library card?
Check out the Mayor’s Book Club selection from this year and selections from past years
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