Those Beyond the Wall

A searing sci-fi thriller about a woman reckoning with her past to solve a series of sudden and inexplicable deaths in the face of a coming apocalypse—from the Compton Crook Award–winning author of The Space Between Worlds.

“A bold, beautiful, gut-punch of a story, at turns ferocious and poetic—and sometimes both at once.”—Veronica Roth, New York Times bestselling author of Chosen Ones

“[Those Beyond the Wall] reads like Mad Max: Fury Road was written by Phillip K. Dick and N.K. Jemisin.”—CrimeReads

SHORTLISTED FOR THE URSULA K. LE GUIN PRIZE FOR FICTION • A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, NPR, Elle

In Ashtown, a rough-and-tumble desert community, the Emperor rules with poisoned claws and an iron fist. He can’t show any sign of weakness, as the neighboring Wiley City has spent lifetimes beating down the people of Ashtown and would love nothing more than its downfall. There’s only one person in the desert the Emperor can fully trust—and her name is Scales.

Scales is the best at what she does: keeping everyone and everything in line. As a skilled mechanic—and an even more skilled fighter, when she needs to be—Scales is a respected member of the Emperor’s crew, who’s able to keep things running smoothly. But the fragile peace Scales helps to maintain is fractured when a woman is mangled and killed before her eyes. Even more incomprehensible: There doesn’t seem to be a murderer.

When more bodies start to turn up, both in Ashtown and in the wealthier, walled-off Wiley City, Scales is tasked with finding the cause—and putting an end to it by any means necessary. To protect the people she loves, she teams up with a frustratingly by-the-books partner from Ashtown and a brusque-but-brilliant scientist from the City, delving into both worlds to track down an invisible killer.

But the answers Scales finds are bigger than she ever could have imagined, leading her into the brutal heart beneath Wiley City’s pristine façade and dredging up secrets from her own past that she would rather keep hidden. If she wants to save the world from the earth-shattering truths she uncovers, she can no longer remain silent—even if speaking up costs her everything.

Micaiah Johnson is the Compton Crook Award–winning author of The Space Between Worlds. Her debut novel was an Editors’ Choice of The New York Times and named one of best books of 2020 and one of the best science-fiction books of the last decade by NPR. She was raised in California’s Mojave Desert, surrounded by trees named Joshua and women who told stories. She received a bachelor of arts in creative writing from the University of California, Riverside, and a master of fine arts in fiction from Rutgers University–Camden. She now studies American literature at Vanderbilt University, where she focuses on critical race theory and automatons.