Ply by Diaz, Hernan

"Ply is majestic. A cracked mirror world, a lot like ours; peopled by survivors, a lot like us; sentences so fine they break the skin; a plot that swerves through loss, love, trust, betrayal, art, science, society and control." --David Mitchell

"A testament to the surpassing importance of the human voice, artistic fecundity, improvisation, and ingenuity." --Boston Globe

The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Trust turns to the future with a novel that examines the place of technology in the American imagination

Centuries from now, at the dawn of a historical epoch filled with both uncertainty and promise, an orphan is adrift in a city on the brink of a great transformation. The state has been dismantled, and humans are reinventing social bonds and learning new ways to coexist with nature. Following a childhood defined by loss, survival, and found family, the orphan grows up to become a "pincher," someone who steals electricity from the grid to sell it on the black market. It's a high-risk life, one that brings her into a rich art and music scene where she powers underground concerts. It also leads her to a colossal scientific invention that could change the very fabric of reality.

After rewriting America's past with his two previous novels, Hernan Diaz defies expectations with his third and gives us a breathtaking glimpse into the future. A major achievement from a major contemporary writer, Ply questions the place of technology in the American experiment with a plot that grabs both heart and mind. It is a novel of ideas built from a story of people. Combining Dickensian odyssey, family drama, and scientific thriller, Ply poignantly charts the tenuous boundaries of selfhood and the distance that inevitably stands between us and those we love.

Author: Hernan Diaz
Publisher: Riverhead Books
Published: 09/29/2026
Pages: 464
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.38lbs
Size: 9.28h x 6.32w x 1.47d
ISBN: 9780593719541

Review Citation(s):
Library Journal 06/01/2026 pg. 78
Booklist 07/01/2026
Kirkus Reviews 07/15/2026
Shelf Awareness 01/01/0001
Publishers Weekly 08/24/2026

About the Author
Hernan Diaz is the Pulitzer Prize-winning and New York Times bestselling author of Trust, one of The New York Times's 100 Best Books of the Century. His previous novel, In the Distance, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the PEN/Faulkner Award. He has received the John Updike Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Kirkus Prize, a Whiting Award, and a fellowship from the New York Public Library's Cullman Center. His work has been translated into thirty-seven languages.