You First

A Joe Goldberg Prequel

By: Caroline Kepnes

ISBN: 9780399591464

Publisher: Random House

Publication Date: 06/09/2026

Format: Other

My Rating: TBR (ARC

JUN 2026 MUST-READ BOOKS

“The most distinctive voice in thrillers is back.”—Lucy Foley, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Guest List and The Midnight Feast

How did Joe Goldberg become Joe Goldberg? What led to his first love . . . first obsession . . . first kill? Find out in the highly anticipated prequel to New York Times bestselling author Caroline Kepnes’s hit You series, which inspired the blockbuster Netflix show.

Joe Goldberg is ready for his life to start. He’s seventeen years old, working in Mr. Mooney’s bookshop, falling in love with every girl on the subway all while wondering who will be the one. He knows what he needs: A woman who will force him to get his GED, go to night school, and make something of himself. But who would ever fall in love with him?

Then he spots it: MISSED CONNECTION, NYC Bookstore Babe.

Someone is looking for Joe. And that someone is Vail Gunderson, a production assistant with a passion for rom-coms. The only catch: she’s twenty-four, which means that Joe has no choice but to lie about his age…and, naturally, nearly everything else in his life. Joe thinks he’s found true love, but when Vail needs more convincing that Joe is her happily ever after, he’s determined to convince her…no matter what it takes…

With her incisive and darkly comedic prose, Caroline Kepnes captures Joe poised on the edge of manhood, entering the vicious, dog-eat-dog New York dating scene for the very first time, and buffeted by forces that will determine what kind of man he will become—and how he will write his own twisted love story.

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Praise

“The most distinctive voice in thrillers is back with a master class in tone and tension. A deliciously dark treat—Caroline Kepnes is in a league of her own.”

—Lucy Foley, New York Times bestselling author of The Midnight Feast

“Joe Goldberg at his most raw and vulnerable before love curdled into violence . . . Caroline Kepnes delivers a dark, disturbing, and utterly compelling origin story that feels chillingly authentic, with writing so sharp and character work so precise it makes every turn feel inevitable.”

—Liv Constantine, New York Times bestselling author of The Last Mrs. Parrish

“A Y2K setting, adolescent anxiety, laugh-out-loud details, and a drum-tight, propulsive plot: This book is everything you ever wanted in a You novel and then some. Buckle up, because Teen Joe’s mind is a dark, dark place—and I loved every second of my visit.”

—Andrea Bartz, New York Times bestselling author of The Last Ferry Out

“At last, we have the answers to who Joe is. . . . Caroline Kepnes has created an unnerving, astounding psychological portrait, a book you can’t close until the last page is turned. Deep, dark, twisted and beautifully written.”

—Catriona Ward, USA Today bestselling author of Nowhere Burning

“American Psycho meets You’ve Got Mail in this scathing, brilliantly written antihero origin story that asks, When it comes to love, are we all monsters?”

—Sarah Langan, author of Good Neighbors

“Unsettling, intimate, and oddly hot, darkly seductive and impossible to put down, You First creeps under your skin.”

—Lukas Gage, author of I Wrote This for Attention

About the Author

Caroline Kepnes is the New York Times bestselling author of You, Hidden Bodies, Providence and You Love Me. Her work has been translated into a multitude of languages and inspired a television series adaptation of You, currently on Netflix. Kepnes graduated from Brown University and then worked as a pop culture journalist for Entertainment Weekly and a TV writer for 7th Heaven and The Secret Life of the American Teenager. She grew up in Cape Cod, and now lives in Los Angeles. WEBSITE