One of Literary Hub's Most Anticipated Books of 2025
One of The Millions' Most Anticipated Books of Winter 2025

A young woman’s seasonal job working a sugar beet harvest takes a surreal turn in this surprising and vivid debut.

Elise and her boyfriend, Tom, set off for Minnesota, hoping the paycheck from the sugar beet harvest will cover the rent on their Brooklyn apartment. Amidst the grueling work and familiar anxieties about her finances, Elise starts noticing strange things: threatening phone calls, a mysterious rash, and snatches of an ominous voice coming from the beet pile.

When Tom and other coworkers begin to vanish, Elise is left alone to confront the weight of her past, the horrors of her uncertain future, and the menacing but enticing siren song of the beets. Biting, eerie, and confidently told, Beta Vulgaris harnesses a distinct voice and audacious premise to undermine straightforward narratives of class, trauma, consumption, and redemption.

Praise for beta vulgaris

[An] ambitious, impressive debut… [Elise's] depth and honesty give this story a lot of power.

Gabino Iglesias, New York Times

Thank you Margie Sarsfield for your contribution to the “vegetable gothic” canon.

McKayla Coyle, Literary Hub

Whispering beets and inner surrealism illuminate a haunting exploration of agricultural exploitation, eating disorders, and the terrifying fulfillment of desire.

Meghan Racklin, Bomb Magazine

[An] ambitious and delightfully bizarre debut…This is a knockout.

Publishers Weekly, starred review

Beta Vulgaris is disturbing [and] beautiful in its insistence on that old saw, “Nothing human is alien.” Sarsfield gives us privileged access to a heart that is hurting.

Chris Hewitt, Minneapolis Star Tribune

A promising and well-written quasi-speculative story.

Kirkus Reviews

Beta Vulgaris announces the arrival of a singular talent: Margie Sarsfield's debut novel will burrow into your very soul. I couldn't put it down.

Nick White, author of How To Survive a Summer

Uncanny and electric and quietly harrowing. . . . Margie Sarsfield dazzles us and challenges us, delivering a novel so vivid and memorable, I’ll be thinking of beet pilers for years to come.

Danya Kukafka, author of Notes on an Execution

Sharp and atmospheric eco-horror that slices into the gruesome strangeness of industrialized agriculture. With Margie Sarsfield’s compelling cast and heady, urgent prose, Beta Vulgaris is a fever dream hungry to consume you.

Kathryn Harlan, author of Fruiting Bodies