Flat Earth

A Novel

By: Anika Jade Levy

Narrated by: Ellie Gossage

A young woman struggles with the artistic success of her more privileged, beautiful best friend in this ruthless portrait of the New York art scene in which relationships are transactional, men are vampiric, and women have limited time to trade on their youth, beauty, and talent—it’s Renata Adler’s Speedboat for the Adderall generation.

"I read this book in a night, breathless and enraptured; wanting to save everyone in it, and wanting to watch them burn forever.”—Leslie Jamison

Avery is a grad student in New York working on a collection of cultural reports and flailing financially and emotionally. She dates older men for money, and others for the oblivion their egos offer. In an act of desperation, Avery takes a job at a right-wing dating app. The "white-paper" she is tasked to write for the startup eventually merges with her dissertation, resulting in a metafictional text that reveals itself over the course of the novel.

Meanwhile, her best friend, Frances, an effortlessly chic emerging filmmaker from a wealthy Southern family, drops out of grad school, gets married, and somehow still manages to finish her first feature documentary. Frances's triumphant return to New York as the toast of the art world sends Avery into a final tailspin, pushing her to make a series of devastating decisions.

In this generational portrait, attention spans are at an all-time low and dopamine tolerance is at an all-time high. Flat Earth is a story of coming of age in America, a novel about commodification, conspiracy theories, mimetic desire, and the difficulties of female friendship that’s as sharp and sardonic as it is heartbreaking.

©2025 by Anika Jade Levy. (P)2025 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.

Critic reviews

“This provocative debut audiobook about the lives of two women is enhanced by the pitch-perfect narration of Ellie Gossage.… Gossage employs a detached tone to powerful effect in conveying Avery's many disturbing encounters as she struggles to find her footing with little emotional support. Gossage brings forth the story's disturbing exploration of the patriarchy's view of women, one that revolves around their youth, reproductive potential, and homemaking capacities. While this audiobook is light on plot, it will leave listeners with plenty to ponder.”—AudioFile Magazine

"Levy debuts with a darkly funny work of hyperrealism . . . Pitch-perfect humor . . . The novel never loses the fierceness of its gaze. It’s an astute and audacious satire."—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Witty and poignant . . . Funny and sharp . . . The book effectively portrays the psychology of young women who are chronically online . . . There is a layer of sadness under the flat surface, not quite accessible. This tension is ultimately where the novel succeeds in being beautiful. Levy is good at keeping the feeling out of reach."—Erin Somers, The New York Times Book Review

Have you ever been a young artist who is depressed and wandering around NYC? I have.

"You're not as young as you think you are."

A caustic, distressing, borderline dystopic portrait of a woman trying to be a writer in New York City.

This book feels like clinical depression. The atonal sameness that author Anika Jade Levy achieves in both the low and high-stakes moments is as impressive as it is upsetting.

Avery is miserable and doesn't feel enough to know it. She's apathetic and impersonal. There are many characters in this novel, and only 5 of them receive names instead of work or status-related titles. She sees everything in terms of commodity, considers all work to be sex work, and yearns for the kind of fame and status that a younger version of herself would have enjoyed while denying its existence.

This spiraling character portrait is so couched in Avery's malaise that it's hard not to feel the way she does the whole book, something that will turn off a lot of readers, which is too bad. I found this novel gripping. Even when I wanted it to loosen its hold on me, it didn't, it wouldn't, it couldn't.

The audiobook is an excellent experience, clocking in at just under 4 hours. Ellie Gossage, the narrator, finds nuance in the book's waterfall of jagged thoughts and muted feelings while never losing the professional pace fans of her work will recognize.

If you need something to shake up your reading, give this a go. It's short but packs a big punch.