Books
Edge of the World
The first inclusive LGBTQ+ travel anthology of its kind, Edge of the World features essays by Edmund White, Putsata Reang, Alexander Chee, Zoë Sprankle, Calvin Gimpelevich, KB Brookins, Alex Marzano-Lesnevitch, Daisy Hernández, Garrard Conley, Denne Michele Norris, Andrew Ellis Evans, Sara Orozco, Genevieve Hudson, and Nicole Shawan Junior, with an introduction by award-winning travel writer and memoirist Alden Jones.
"Edge of the World brings readers to the cusp of longing. At the heart of this collection of travel essays is a queering of narrative, of point of view, of relationships between people as well as the relationship queer humans have to the nonhuman world around them. Underneath tourism an entire universe exists that teaches us how to see each other and the planet differently. This book will open eyes and hearts in the most astonishing, beautiful ways." —Lidia Yuknavitch, author of Reading the Waves
The Wanting Was A Wilderness
"Smart and personal and profound, The Wanting Was a Wilderness is the work of a devoted and thoughtful reader...not only lit-crit, but also how-to — a kind of manual for writing a successful literary memoir. Her compound agenda resolves in a long-form essay that is intimate, instructive, and entertaining — all you might want from the genre.” —Los Angeles Review of Books
Lambda Literary Award Nominee
Watch the Center for Fiction event with Alden Jones and Cheryl Strayed
The Blind Masseuse
"Travel memoirs can be adventure tales or stories about personal transformation. Alden Jones combines both in The Blind Masseuse...More than a simple travelogue, Jones chronicles her experiences in each culture while pondering her place as a citizen of the world." ―The Boston Globe
“Rather than moralize about the right and wrong ways to travel, Jones celebrates the impulse to wander and recognizes the value in savoring vagabondage for the gift it is in this engaging travel memoir.” —Kirkus
Longlisted, PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay
Named a Top 10 travel title by Publishers Weekly, National Geographic, and the Huffington Post
Unaccompanied Minors
“These seven stories introduce us to young people who are alone or feel that way, some middle class, some poor, all trying to navigate the world to which they belong or, more often, don’t fully belong. Jones writes beautifully and often painfully of young people who are looking for others with whom to belong and with great subtlety of the way that queer and burgeoning sexual desire often complicates this search. These stories are bound by a perfect triangle: humor and insight and compassion.” —Judges’ Citation, Edmund White Award
Winner of the New American Fiction Prize
Winner of the Lascaux Book Prize
Finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in LGBTQ+ Debut
Finalist for the Edmund White Award in Debut Fiction