McSweeney's, the nonprofit publisher at 849 Valencia, published Matthew — a nearly 500-page fantasy novel by teenage author Alex Aguirre — as a Make-A-Wish Greater Bay Area project, on a timeline measured in weeks. Alex did not live to see it in print.

On the shelf at 849 Valencia Street, between the quarterly concerns and the humor anthologies, McSweeney's has added a title unlike anything else it will publish this year: Matthew, a nearly 500-page fantasy novel, $20, by a teenage author named Alex Aguirre. It did not come to the Mission District publisher the usual way.

In early May 2025, according to McSweeney's own account, the nonprofit's editors were approached by Make-A-Wish Greater Bay Area, the Oakland-based chapter that grants wishes to children with critical illnesses. A gifted young writer was eligible for a wish. Alex — who the year before, at eleven, had already written and printed copies of an earlier book — had just finished a new adventure manuscript before falling ill. The wish was not a trip or a meeting. It was to be published for real: an ISBN, an editorial pass, a professionally designed cover, and a way for readers to actually find the book out in the world.

McSweeney's, which says most of its titles take roughly eighteen months from manuscript to shelf, had weeks. The editors describe a quicker-than-usual editorial pass and "lightning fast" design work, and say they left Alex's writing largely untouched — falling, in their words, for the voice. The result runs to almost 500 pages: twelve-year-old Luna, who can see the ghost of her brother Matthew; her youngest brother Additya; middle-school birthday parties and a class called Civilizaciones Antiguas; and a quest to confront a nobleman-turned-monster called Flaith, and Death himself.

The book carries jacket praise the publisher printed on its store page — from Rick Riordan of the Percy Jackson series ("A fantastic fantasy adventure!"), from Lemony Snicket, and from Adventure Time creator Pendleton Ward. Alex did not live to see the reception. "It's heartbreaking that Alex is not here to enjoy the reception this book is receiving in the world," the McSweeney's note reads. A portion of each sale is directed to the Trevor Project, chosen by Alex's family.

Rather than let Matthew stay a private keepsake, McSweeney's and the family say they've committed to putting it in circulation — donating copies to public and school libraries and selling it in select stores and on the publisher's own site. That is the part a neighbor might notice: a book that began as one child's wish, filed on Valencia Street on a clock measured in weeks, now working its way onto Bay Area library shelves, checked out one hold at a time.