The Collective: A Novel

"Riveting, moving, and—most impressive—agile and resourceful in its approach to race. Don Lee explores that issue from every conceivable angle, raising a thousand questions and undercutting easy answers." —Jennifer Egan

Joshua Yoon, Eric Cho, and Jessica Tsai arrive at Macalester College with different baggage but a singular and overpowering ambition—to become artists. As the years progress, their resolve is tested first by an act of campus racism and later, while they’re living together as adults in Cambridge, by a set of real-world demands and distractions that ultimately drive them in vastly different directions. A dazzling exploration of racial identity and the queasy position of the artist in contemporary America, Don Lee’s latest is a landmark achievement—his most funny, tragic, and revealing book yet.

Winner of the 2013 Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature

© 2025 W. W. Norton & Company (Ebook): 9780393083958

Release date

Ebook: April 25, 2025