Clear a shelf. Taylor Jenkins Reid has announced her tenth novel, and the woman who made everyone care deeply about a fictional rock band, a retired tennis champion and a NASA astronaut has now set her sights on the smoky world of pool halls. The Last Days of Vic & Coco arrives on March 2, 2027 from Atria Books, and the premise alone justifies the wait. Victoria Lucchese and Colette Wilson run a con across America in the 1970s, driving from town to town and separating overconfident men from their money. The mechanics are elegant. Coco, magnetic and fearless, charms a mark into playing against her quiet friend. Vic then clears the table with surgical precision. Around the circuit they go by Crown Vic and Baby Blue, and here sits the detail that will wreck everyone. These two are the closest thing to family either woman has ever had, and each of them stays unaware of the other’s real name.

The Setup: Summer 1974, and the Walls Closing In

The novel lands in a very specific moment. Nixon teeters on the edge of impeachment, an oil crisis is squeezing the country, prices climb and work disappears. Word has spread about two women worth avoiding, so the map of available marks keeps shrinking. So Vic and Coco do what desperate hustlers do, meaning they plan one enormous final score. They also settle for a while in a small Arizona town called Canyonville, where Vic falls in love and Coco starts lying about what she has been up to. Both developments push the pair toward a reckoning, since the arrangement that held them together for years has begun to buckle. Expect long desert highways, seedy motels, dive bars at closing time and that particular seventies light Reid renders so well.

Why This One Feels Different

Reid has said the story arrived as a shower thought, which is a wonderfully mundane origin for a book destined to dominate BookTok for a full calendar year. She had planned a proper break after Atmosphere, her 2025 space epic, then the image of two female pool sharks refused to leave her alone. The research approach reveals the real subject. She skipped the deep technical dive she usually undertakes, because the pool table functions as a stage rather than a topic. What interests her here is female friendship, specifically the way women love each other platonically with an intensity that leaves room for genuine devastation. Which makes this a companion piece to everything she does best. Daisy Jones & The Six dissected creative partnership, Carrie Soto Is Back examined ambition, and this one examines the person who knows all your secrets except your actual name. Preorders are open. Your 2027 reading year has already been decided.