SCORCH ATLAS 09/09/09 from Featherproof Books

So, it's been a bit in the making, but finally the good news unfolds: SCORCH ATLAS, my novel in stories written mostly in the fall of last year, has been accepted for publication in Fall 09 (projected date 09/09/09) from Featherproof Books. My excitement is past languaging at this point, and only semi-palpable in my forehead. We've already been talking a lot about the design and layout of what the book will be, and already I know this thing is going to be fucking insane as an object, if not also as words.



Here's a copy-style press release from the Featherproof site:

Coming Fall 2009! SCORCH ATLAS is a novel of 14 interlocking stories set in ruined American locales where birds speak gibberish, the sky rains gravel, and millions starve, disappear or grow coats of mold. In 'The Disappeared,' a father is arrested for missing free throws, leaving his son to search alone for his lost mother. In 'The Ruined Child,' a boy swells to fill his parents' ransacked attic. Rendered in a variety of narrative forms, from a psychedelic fable to a skewed insurance claim questionnaire, Blake Butler's full-length fiction debut paints a gorgeously grotesque version of America, bringing to mind both Kelly Link and William Gass, yet turned with Butler's own eye for the apocalyptic and bizarre.



The contents of the book as it stands now contains many stories that have been around in magazines or are about to come out, including the ones from /nor, Ninth Letter, Willow Springs, New York Tyrant, Diagram, Phoebe, Harpur Palate, Barrelhouse, LIT, and several others, though several in altered forms, as well as unpublished stories and other appending craziness forthcoming.




Massive thanks to Zach and Jonathan @ F-Proof for their faith in taking on a wild book of weird stories, and to everyone else who helped this book continue to be something that is now, in another sense, becoming 'real.'

I went the other day to Borders and looked at where the book will sit, that moment felt like warm mold and pudding, in a good way.



Maybe in the mind of Shane Jones's post about the becoming of LIGHT BOXES I will later post my experience of sending this book around, and the process of submitting to small presses, but for now I am going to go for a run in the cold.