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  The Novices of Lerna

  Angel Bonomini

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  The Novices of Lerna introduces the enigmatic fictions of Ángel Bonomini to English listeners for the first time. Shot through with wry humor and tender absurdity, these meditations on identity, surveillance, and isolation remain eerily prescient. The collection's central novella follows Ramón Beltra, an unambitious scholar who receives a mysterious invitation to a lucrative six-month fellowship at the University of Lerna in Switzerland. After he reluctantly complies with the unusual qualifying paperwork requiring several pages of detailed measurements and photographs of his entire body, Beltra soon finds himself in the deserted university town of Lerna, together with twenty-three other "novices" subject to the same undisclosed project—all of them doppelgangers of Beltra himself. At first, Beltra is the only one to bristle at the school's dizzying array of rules and regulations, but this all changes with the onset of an uncontrollable epidemic, and the fellows begin dying off one by one . . . 
   
   
   
  An overlooked master of Argentine fantastic literature, Ángel Bonomini garnered praise among peers and contemporaries like Jorge Luis Borges, before slipping mysteriously into obscurity. Bonomini was forty-three years old in 1972 when he published The Novices of Lerna, the first of four books of short stories he released before his death at age sixty-four.

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  Night of the Living Rez

  Morgan Talty

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  Set in a Native community in Maine, Night of the Living Rez is a riveting debut collection about what it means to be Penobscot in the twenty-first century and what it means to live, to survive, and to persevere after tragedy. 
   
  In twelve striking, luminescent stories, author Morgan Talty—with searing humor, abiding compassion, and deep insight—breathes life into tales of family and a community as they struggle with a painful past and an uncertain future. A boy  
  unearths a jar that holds an old curse, which sets into motion his family’s unraveling; a man, while trying to swindle some pot from a dealer, discovers a friend passed out in the woods, his hair frozen into the snow; a grandmother  
  suffering from Alzheimer’s projects the past onto her grandson; and two friends, inspired by Antiques Roadshow, attempt to rob the tribal museum for valuable root clubs. 
   
  A collection that examines the consequences and merits of inheritance, Night of the Living Rez is an unforgettable portrayal of an Indigenous community and marks the arrival of a standout talent in contemporary fiction.

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  Eastmouth and Other Stories

  Alison Moore

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  Alison Moore's debut collection, The Pre-War House and Other Stories, gathered together stories written prior to the publication of her first novel.
  'The tales collected in The Pre-War House… pick at psychological scabs in a register both wistful and brutal.' —Anthony Cummins, The Times Literary Supplement
  'Moore's writing is surprising and exact and culminates in the title story, the novella which brings the collection to a powerful crescendo' —The Arkansas International
  'just as uncompromising and unsettling as The Lighthouse… Moore's distinctive voice commands exceptional power' —Dinah Birch, The Guardian
  Eastmouth and Other Stories is her second collection, featuring stories published in the subsequent decade, including stories that have appeared in Best British Short Stories, Best British Horror and Best New Horror, as well as new, unpublished work.

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  I Hear You're Rich

  Diane Williams

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  Diane Williams, "godmother of flash fiction" (The Paris Review), returns with thirty-three short, brilliant stories. 
   
   
   
  In Williams's stories, life is newly alive and dangerous; whether she is writing about an affair, a request for money, an afternoon in a garden, or the simple act of carrying a cake from one room to the next, she offers us beautiful and unsettling new ways of seeing everyday life. In perfectly honed sentences, with a sly and occasionally wild wit, Williams shows us how any moment of any day can open onto disappointment, pleasure, and possibility.

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  How To Burn This Book

  Evan Witmer

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  Step one of burning a book is finding a disagreeable premise within. To simplify this process, each story is followed by a reason it should be immolated, opined by the author’s critics. 
  "Lucky Girl Noir" is about a cop solving the murder of a ‘Lucky Girl,’ a woman born with probability consistently in her favor. Burning this story would be a win against plagiarism. 
  "Three Days West" is an acid-Western about cowboys exploiting their otherworldly connection in frontier Colorado. This story deserves burning for ruining pulp heroes. 
  "Zantar" is Tarzan with aliens and raccoons. Burning seems appropriate, as it continues the author’s insatiable bloodlust. 
  "Sea Creatures" is a sapphic love story between a siren and a mermaid. The story deserves burning for suggesting bras are an art form. 
  "Lizard People Take Orlando" tells the story of Zaffre Davis, a student running for mayor while keeping his life as a scalie secret. Burning should be considered due to its depictions of furries as Democrats. 
  "The Spirit Realm" is about the survivor of a mass poisoning who wakes up to find he can talk to alcohol. No character represents absinthe, a crime best punished by burning. 
  "The Pimp That Slapped the Ripper" is about the fall of Jack the Ripper at the hands of a procurer who will protect her property at any cost. The author’s softness has robbed the story of graphic detail; their omission begets burning. 
  "Washed" is the story of a man who loses his memory when he showers. Burn this one to eliminate the author’s ugly past. 
  "An American Weekend" is about a boy visited by the human embodiments of Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, who guide him out of his funk. Turn it to ashes; this interpretation of the weekend reeks of privilege. 
  "Roadwork" is about a lemurtologist, an exorcist for the DMV who removes ghosts from road accidents. Tossing this story in the fire could wound a hateful author, smudging the name of the DMV.

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  Blood - From their pens to your...

  Hanns Heinz Ewers

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  Hanns Heinz Ewers was born on 3rd November 1871 in Düsseldorf, Germany. 
  His first published poem was at 17 on the death, after a reign of only 99 days, of the German Emperor Frederick III. 
  A stint in the German military was cut short after only 44 days because of his myopia.  Writing was to be the way forward for him with a book of satiric verse published in 1901. At the same time he co-founded a literary vaudeville troupe that toured central and eastern Europe before censors and expenses forced its closure.  An inveterate traveller he was in South America when the Great War enveloped Europe and he relocated to New York. 
  From here his story darkens. Although by now a successful and admired author he was arrested in the U S in 1918 as a German Agent on the pretext of his travels and a falsified Swiss passport. Interned, he was released in 1921 and returned to Germany.  He claimed only to be raising money for the German Red Cross. 
  His literary fame is decidedly easier to clarify. His novels beginning with ‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice’ in 1910 are dark, they bristle with evil intent and are littered with characters who have a dubious moral compass and yet, along with his short stories, are brazen, brilliant feats of literary narrative. 
  He also wrote and published plays, fairy tales, opera librettos, critical essays and lectured for many years on ‘The Religion of Satan’ and was one of the first to write scripts for the cinema, which he considered a legitimate art form. 
  As the Weimar republic began its chaotic death throes Ewers became attracted to the rising Nazi Party.  At first he was warmly received despite disagreeing with its anti-semitism (his most famed literary character had a Jewish mistress) and he was even commissioned by Hitler to write a biography of the Nazi martyr Horst Wessel.  This together with his own homosexuality culminated with his works being banned in 1934 and his assets and property seized.  It took him many years to have the ban lifted.  This association rightfully clouds his personal reputation but has meant his literary contributions are also overlooked and neglected. 
  Hanns Heinz Ewers died of tuberculosis on 12th June 1943 in his Berlin apartment.

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