Maura Cheeks books

Maura Cheeks is a debut novelist whose writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, and The Paris Review. Her first novel, Acts of Forgiveness, was published in 2024.
Author · Literary Fiction · Contemporary Fiction · Family Drama

Standalone Novels

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Acts of Forgiveness 2024 Buy

Maura Cheeks is a Philadelphia-based writer whose work has appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Paris Review, and Tin House. In 2019, she received a masthead reporting residency at The Atlantic, where she produced a feature-length article that later inspired her debut novel.

Acts of Forgiveness (2024) imagines a near-future America where the government passes legislation allowing Black families to claim up to $175,000 if they can prove descent from enslaved people. The story centers on the Revel family and the tensions that surface when one member pushes to apply while others would rather leave their history alone. Cheeks uses this premise to tell a grounded, personal story about family obligations, identity, and what forgiveness actually costs.

Frequently Asked Questions

How many books has Maura Cheeks written?

Maura Cheeks has written one books in one series.

What was Maura Cheeks's first book?

Maura Cheeks’s first book is Acts of Forgiveness, published in 2024.

What is Acts of Forgiveness about?

Acts of Forgiveness follows Willie Revel, a single mother in Philadelphia who gave up her journalism career to run her father’s construction company. After the passage of a fictional Forgiveness Act offering reparations to descendants of enslaved people, Willie tries to prove her family’s eligibility, but the rest of the Revels are not eager to dig up the past.

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