Sameer Pandya is the author of the novel Members Only, a finalist for the California Book Award and an NPR "Books We Love" of 2020, and the story collection The Blind Writer, longlisted for the PEN/Open Book Award. His cultural criticism has appeared in a range of publications, including the Los Angeles Review of Books, The Atlantic, Salon, and Sports Illustrated. A recipient of the PEN/Civitella Fellowship, he is currently an associate professor of Asian American studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

"Timely and timeless . . . Pandya presents flawed but understandable people trying to navigate a murky situation with high stakes: the futures of these boys. Above all else, [it] is a book about the lies we knowingly or unwittingly tell ourselves."--The New York Times Book Review

"Absorbing and timely."-- San Francisco Chronicle

"Pandya reveals not just the secret heart of adolescence but also the fragile veneer of an adult world striving--and often failing--to guide it."--UCSB, The Current

"Our Beautiful Boys is a gift arriving in bookstores, coming in like a lion, as approachable as a lamb. The novel's prose is pellucid, straightforward, enveloping the reader, insinuating in the way serious fiction turns us in the culture, facets our seeing, our understanding."--Zyzzyva

"In Pandya's riveting latest, a Southern California high school is roiled when three football players are accused of assaulting a classmate . . . As tensions ignite between the families along class and racial lines, the boys' pact breaks down and the plot ramps up . . . This is a stunner."--Publishers Weekly, starred review

"Compassionate and propulsive, Our Beautiful Boys imbues a page-turning thriller mystery with moral force. . . . A deftly woven tale of fraying loyalties and family secrets."--Tania James, National Book Award longlisted author of Loot

"A kaleidoscopic marvel, at once sweeping in scope and intimately detailed.Sameer Pandya delivers a blazing portrait of the contemporary American family."--Kirstin Chen, New York Times bestselling author of Counterfeit

"Flat-out remarkable . . . A sports story--sure. But one that reaches deep into the souls of its characters to excavate complicated and necessary revelations about race, loyalty, and the complexity of masculine identity."--Ivy Pochoda, author of These Women

"Our Beautiful Boys is such a tight spiral, knitting together themes of identity, sports, and what-would-I-do? moral ambiguity. . . . A triumph, by turns, of literature, sports writing, cultural criticism, and ethical philosophy."--L. Jon Wertheim, 60 Minutes correspondent and author of Strokes of Genius

"Engrossing and suspenseful . . . Pandya deftly reveals the vulnerability beneath the swagger of not just our teen football players but their parents. . . . A compulsive read that explores the fragility of trust and how bad decisions set off a chain of irreversible consequences."--Marjan Kamali, national bestselling author of The Lion Women of Tehran

"Tense and tender . . . I would have read it in one sitting, but I had to set it down to call my son."--Sonora Jha, author of The Laughter

"Investigating masculinity, ethnicity, education, privilege and social standing, Pandya has delivered an incisive and thoughtful novel that not only speaks to our contemporary culture."--BookPage

"Our Beautiful Boys is a moving, suspenseful portrayal of young men pushing past the bounds of 'all the people that had come before him' on the complicated playing field of American identity."--Booklist, starred review

Publisher: Ballantine Books

Pub date: 2026-03-17

Length: 416 pages