The New Naturals

Rio is a young Black woman in Western Massachusetts who has lost her newborn child. On a hill off the highway stands an abandoned restaurant that nobody would look at twice, and she sees in it a place to begin again.

She persuades her husband to help her build a society underground, a place where everyone can feel safe, loved and accepted. As the plan takes shape, it draws in people without homes, people who have lost their faith in things, and people searching for some kind of spiritual footing.

All of them want shelter from the dread of life above ground. The book keeps asking whether a community built on that hope can actually hold together, or whether it will fail under its own weight.

This is a literary novel with a darkly funny tone, and it also carries real grief. The humor comes from the absurdity of contemporary life, and the setup is odd enough to feel like satire while the characters stay sincere. It is a good fit for readers who like comic, inventive fiction about people trying to make a different kind of world.