Once again, I’m sorry that I had to take a break in February. March got me mostly back on track, aside from a mental health episode that’s stalled a whole bunch of things. But, in the best news, I’m done with my novella, Ice Upon a Pier, and it’s coming out with a paperback edition for those who don’t want to read it on a Kindle or in digital. All links have been updated in the press kit, including some indie bookstores for those who want to support those venues.
Read an eARC from the publisher Trigger warnings: graphic depictions of gun violence in the workplace, gore, death by bludgeoning, suicidal ideation. A portion of all sales goes to the Sandy Hook Foundation.
Two office workers channel their worst impulses in casual conversation in a twisted friendship that makes those daydreams a reality through a loophole that acts almost like Groundhog Day for the unhinged. Violent, mind-bending, with a breathtaking ending that hasn’t stopped bouncing within my brain since I finished.
This is one of those books where the main characters are absolutely repulsive. They’re in jobs that pay the bills and, on the surface, seem relatively adjusted, until you, the reader, get insight into their conversations, mostly revolving around how great the break in routine in the form of tragedy would be. This novella definitely serves as a character study of the worst type of white collar worker: someone with lots of ideas but who fundamentally does not contribute much to society or culture. They’re so realistic, I found myself getting mad at them like actual people and not people within a work of fiction.
The writing and development of these two is something incredible, especially given the book’s length. I will not spoil the journey, but the amount of self-awareness that emerges is masterful, especially following the restraint-less self-indulgence of the Tide – the unreality that strikes our main characters like a cyclical storm. It’s Office Space for the twenty-first century in ways both painfully true and deeply upsetting.
Intense and horrifying in its mundanity; absolutely proceed with caution give the subject matter.
Jo Writes Fantasy 