Victim

values of our time. This is a simply stellar debut."
Patricia Engel, author of Infinite Country

Victim is an original, biting satire about the contradictions of class and race in America. This a deep dive into identity cynicism that somehow never loses its heart. Brave, unflinching as it is insightful, Victim launches Andrew Boryga as a new literary star.
Mat Johnson, author of Invisible Things and Pym

"A strivers tale for the digital age and our identity-obsessed culture, Victim had me laughing out loud with its depiction of what can happen when clout-chasing goes wrong. Javier's media misadventures are hilarious, yes, and breathless in pace, and yet still will leave you pondering big questions past the last page, about the complexity of our stories and the dangers of flattening them. A fantastic, fresh addition to the canon of satire."
Dawnie Walton, author of The Final Revival of Opal & Nev

"Victim is going to hurt some people's feelings. But that's exactly what smart, insightful social satire is meant to do. Andrew Boryga's dazzling debut novel is the story of a hustler whose game is to benefit from the struggles of other people. He's an identity politics confidence man. And yet he's also someone you come to care about, and worry for, as the stakes of his hustle grow and grow. This is a fearless and ambitious debut."
  Victor LaValle, author of Lone Women

"Boryga is a preternaturally gifted new voice for the aftertimes. Victim is a dazzling, triumphant debut that acerbically unpacks hard truths behind this post-truth era in which social media, personal branding, and the wants of others distort the lenses through which we see ourselves. And eventually distort the lens through which we see the world. An absolute scream of a debut novel. It lands like a comet of truth raw, brilliant, unstoppable."
Daniel Peña, author of Bang

Victim sizzles like Tito Puente on timbales.
Ernesto Quiñonez, author of Bodega Dreams

"Victim is bold, unforgettable, and wickedly funny. Andrew Boryga has written a pitch-perfect Stephen Glass cautionary tale for the 21st century and a scathing satire of the commodification of identity and experience in the attention economy. I absolutely loved it."
Leigh Stein, author of Self Care

"A pointed satire of the culture of victimhood... Boryga s experiences as a journalist making a name for himself just as society was grappling with diversity inform this razor-sharp satire of the ways race and class can be exploited."
Washington Post

"Victim pushes the bounds of what true diversity looks like.  
USA Today

"This scathing satire shows the lengths one is willing to go to earn recognition in the attention economy."
TIME

"A sharp and biting satire about the truths and lies we can hide behind in the digital age. The voice of the narration is wickedly perfect and propels this novel with ease. Boryga understands tone, pace, and voice better than most."
Debutiful

A satire of wokeness. . . Really funny. . . If you re looking for a slightly cerebral, elevated beach read, I would recommend it.
WIRED

"Victim is one of those rare outliers that manages to engage with the cliched polemic without getting trapped into it A buoyant read [Boryga s] raw, vivid, and affectionate depiction of city life is refreshingly unpretentious and down-to-earth his novel is more an examination of the human condition than a polemic, giving ample space to grey areas, and sincerely exploring profound and universal questions about morality and responsibility, fate and free will, social structures and the role we play in them as individuals."
The Critic Magazine

"Come for the diversity-media-bashing, stay for the actual diversity... Boryga s novel is quick-paced and tightly crafted, a hybrid that s both a fun-to-read entry in the how-to-make-it-in-Gotham genre and a serious engagement with cultural theory."
Compact Magazine

Victim highlights the hazards and moral dilemma of telling a truth that is not your own. . . Boryga s character development is exceptional. He draws the reader into Javi s psyche, experiencing his constant rationalizations, the fear of being caught, and the occasional pangs of guilt. The supporting characters are complex and nuanced. . . Victim is a compelling work with a flawed protagonist, a realistic storyline, and strong dramatic tension. Victim raises important questions about the choices we make and the price we pay for success. It shows us how we are all a combination of our authentic selves, the misimpressions of others, and, sometimes, the occasional fabrications we invent for the sake of being valued.
The Southern Review of Books

"[A] nonstop caricature of racial discourse. . . We laugh, until Boryga catches us red-handed in our own laughably paltry attempts at racial justice. . . And in case we look away, Boryga gazes at us directly in quiet, lucid beats. . . [Victim] critically embod[ies] the cannibalistic state of the identity narrative. . . The very conceit of Victim may be [the] pendulum-like trap between the political and personal: and how difficult it is for marginalized people to value one without sacrificing or being denounced by the other. With such unresolvable loops and ironies, Victim shrewdly reflects our era of superficial diversity discourse and how we cannibalize minoritized stories."
Harvard Advocate

"Victim is the rare novel that s both vital political commentary and unputdownable beach read Victim dramatizes a question that many have asked but few dare articulate: Does White liberal elites commodification of diversity and hardship encourage minorities to frame our lives, and art, to pander to their tastes?
Hyperallergic

"Scathing... Victim is Andrew Boryga s audacious, decidedly original debut novel, a satire that at once is guaranteed to both entertain and frighten... Andrew Boryga has created as reckless and as bold a character as we are likely to find in a contemporary novel."
The Anniston Star Review

"The satire in this novel comes in sharp and merciless, but the friendship at the story s center steals the show, rounding out all the complexities and contradictions of two young men on different sides of the truth. Boryga is a keen observer of culture and a storyteller with style to spare."
CrimeReads

"A cutting satire along the lines of Black Buck and Yellowface. . . Funny and heart-squeezing."
BookRiot

In the vein of satires such as Percival Everett s glorious Erasure, Paul Beatty s The Sellout, and Mithu Sanyal s Identitti. . . Superbly written, this is a darkly funny, searing exposé of the contemporary appetite for trauma narratives and the ill-informed responses of many institutions to issues of racial justice.
Booklist

"Part blistering satire, part earnest bildungsroman [in this] canny debut. . . Boryga plays his dynamic central duo against each other to striking effect. This foray into the uses and misuses of victimhood bears fruit."
Publishers Weekly