Vincent Yu is a sales manager at W. W. Norton/Liveright and the winner of the 2021 Ashley Bourne Prize for Fiction from Ploughshares. His work has been published in Prairie Schooner, StoryQuarterly, Ninth Letter, Able Muse, and elsewhere. He lives in Brooklyn.

A Most Anticipated Book (The Millions, WBUR, Los Angeles Daily News, Orange County Register, Our Culture)

"Achingly tender, invoking sympathy for even the most selfish of characters, Vincent Yu's triumphant debut asks can any of us really know who we are and what we truly value until it's a matter of life or death?"
--WBUR

"Residents of an Asian American community in Western Massachusetts respond in consequential ways to a false alert of a 'ballistic missile threat' in Yu's resonant debut."
--The Millions

"The novel twists and turns into the private and public lives of the characters, offering a quirky, often funny, and sharply rendered peek into small-town life and the moments, large and small, that ripple out beyond our horizon of perception...A quietly profound debut that asks what we would really do if we believed we would die within the next few seconds."
--Kirkus

"Resonant...Yu handily juggles and resolves the many story lines, exploring the ripple effects of snap decisions and fully developing his characters as they face various consequences. Reminiscent of the Twilight Zone episode 'The Shelter, ' this layered novel pays dividends."
--Publishers Weekly

"Propulsive and poetic, Vincent Yu's Seek Immediate Shelter explodes with characters at once sad and lonely, fierce and funny, selfish and selfless, all mirroring missiles themselves as they hurtle toward the consequences of their choices in the wake of a false missile alarm. This is a book that asks not so much what it means to be human, but to be a person--foibles, shame, desire, gluttony, and all. A masterful debut."
--Jenny Tinghui Zhang, author of Four Treasures of the Sky and Superfan

"Vincent Yu is a writer of incredible grace and insight who understands that the best fiction is about trusting characters to reveal themselves under the right pressure. In Seek Immediate Shelter, a single miscommunication shocks a community and shakes up the habitual lives of its myriad inhabitants, revealing both their individual stories and their shared humanity. It is a profound work about connection and disconnection that left me reeling and wanting more. A daring, prodigious debut."
--Brian Castleberry, author of The Californians and Nine Shiny Objects

"Compelling and cinematic . . . In the face of mutually assured destruction, given the choice to reach for grace and mercy or to hold on to hate and fear, can we forgive each other for what's been said and done when the world doesn't end? Yu's vivid and beautiful descriptions of these 'difficult to like but easy to empathize with' characters display the skillfulness of this storyteller in full force."
--Abraham Chang, author of 888 Love and the Divine Burden of Numbers

"Can we ever really change our lives? Vincent Yu's intriguing novel, exploring a wonderful array of responses to a terrifying moment, examines the many and varied ways we confront the possibilities of transformation within the confines of our familial bonds."
--Andrea Barrett, author of Ship Fever and Natural History

Publisher: Flatiron Books

Pub date: 2026-05-05

Length: 304 pages