NATIONAL BESTSELLER Named a Best Book of the Year by: Time * Kirkus Reviews * USA Today *
Entertainment Weekly * Garden & Gun * Vox * Atlanta Journal-Constitution A Most Anticipated
Book of Fall from: Associated Press * Atlanta Journal-Constitution * BookPage * Book Riot * The
Boston Globe * Entertainment Weekly * Esquire * Garden & Gun * LitHub * St. Louis Post-Dispatch
* Sunset Magazine * Time * Town & Country * The Millions * USA Today * Vogue * Vulture * The
Week An exuberant bighearted novel about two teenage misfits who spectacularly collide one
fateful summer and the art they make that changes their lives forever Sixteen-year-old Frankie
Budge?aspiring writer indifferent student offbeat loner?is determined to make it through yet
another summer in Coalfield Tennessee when she meets Zeke a talented artist who has just
moved into his grandmother's house and who is as awkward as Frankie is. Romantic and creative
sparks begin to fly and when the two jointly make an unsigned poster shot through with an
enigmatic phrase it becomes unforgettable to anyone who sees it. The edge is a shantytown
filled with gold seekers. We are fugitives and the law is skinny with hunger for us. When the
posters begin appearing everywhere people wonder who is behind them and start to panic.
Satanists? Kidnappers? The rumors won't stop and soon the mystery has dangerous repercussions
that spread far beyond the town. Twenty years later Frances Eleanor Budge gets a call that
threatens to upend her carefully built life: a journalist named Mazzy Brower is writing a story
about the Coalfield Panic of 1996. Might Frances know something about that? A bold
coming-of-age story written with Kevin Wilson's trademark wit and blazing prose Now Is Not
the Time to Panic is a nuanced exploration of young love identity and the power of art. It's
also about the secrets that haunt us?and ultimately what the truth will set free.
