Nikki Ervice is the winner of the VQR Emily Clark Balch Prize for fiction, whose work has also appeared in The VQR, The Iowa Review, Colorado Review, Washington Square Review, and Passages North. Her debut novel, Roadshow, is set to be released on November 10, 2026, by Astra House.
Roadshow follows Annie, a burned-out New York performer who leaves behind her life of bartending and burlesque to drive cross-country to Alaska after receiving a letter from her mother, who abandoned her at birth. As her journey grows increasingly desperate and dangerous, Annie confronts questions of identity, inheritance, and survival while being pulled toward a final reckoning with her past. Blending grit and intimacy, the novel explores the cost of passion and the fragile ties between family, class, and selfhood.
Roadshow is available for pre-order now.
Debutiful is excited to reveal the cover, designed by Eli Mock, along with a Q&A with Ervice about how it was created.
While writing the book, did you have any ideas for what you wanted the cover to look like?
I did! I love old pulp fiction covers, something a little campy and fun, that also has a touch of grittiness and danger. I knew I didn’t want anything that skewed Alaskana, so I was very specific about that. I love Alaska, but I simply cannot abide our pervasive aesthetic.
Can you explain what the design process was like once you started working with your publishing team?
Astra House had me fill out a pretty detailed questionnaire about my specific vision, even going so far as to ask: what would your ideal cover look like? I didn’t want to be too didactic because having an artist’s interpretation of a “vibe” felt so fun and special. I was also asked to provide reference materials, any existing book covers or art of any kind that spoke to the general aesthetic. Once Eli provided an array of covers (I think he did five) to choose from, we identified the one we loved best, and asked for a small tweak. I think it was just to add the Buick LeSabre.
What was it like seeing your finalized cover for the first time?
Surreal! I have yet to hold the physical book in my hand, but so far seeing the finalized cover has been the single most gut-punch (in a good way) moment. There’s something really beautiful about seeing a translation of your narrative into a piece of art. It looked almost exactly how I imagined, but also completely different. I have to admit I cried a little. Writing can be so solitary. It’s wild when you get to experience this whole apparatus of care and attention that begins to move around your book when you publish.
How does the cover work to convey what the book is all about?
There’s definitely representational literalism to it: the protagonist is a dancer who wears a dog mask. She drives a Buick LeSabre across Canada, to Alaska. Her mother was a wannabe movie star, hence the film. There are repeating images that reflect the machine-like repetition of rehearsal and performance. But there’s also an element of movement to the cover. I think my agent, Duvall, was the one who said “it looks fast.” And the story is fast and a little perilous.