Seems like as good a time as any.

Truth is, I like my kids, and being outside, and teaching, and watching the Swedish “Wallander” DVDs, too much to blog consistently with my non-writing time. Always have. I never wanted this space to become a desperate collection of every nice thing someone said somewhere about The Book of Bunk (apparently, we all have Facebook for that), or a place to answer criticisms. I’m already halfway through the next book, as close to a flat-out, messy, wicked, gleeful B as this b is ever likely to try, and I’m having a blast, even if that book is already mutating into yet another something else. One more Glen book. Then there’s the half-finished YA trilogy about domestic terrorism. That ghost story novel that’s most of the way done, and needs to be got right once for all. The teaching novel I’m told I’m uniquely poised to produce, for which I have a damn good title, anyway. More stories, of course.

So. Not necessarily or even probably the last post on this site. But the last Bunk post. At least for a long while.

So where does that leave us?

At the moment, The Book of Bunk seems to have set up camp in a slightly disappointing but curiously appropriate netherworld. The few people who’ve read it seem to like it. A lot. It apparently launched in a uniquely timeless week that assures it will never qualify for any Year’s Best or Notable Books list, even if someone wanted to put it there, because everyone’s already rushed to print their 2010 selections, and it isn’t 2011. Except maybe in your Bunk County. As exemplified in the post below, a couple major websites and publications have decided not to review the book based on its limited run. The major presses are, at least for now, balking at publishing a bigger paperback run because there aren’t enough reviews. 22 and Catch. Amazon.com currently has it listed as Temporarily Out of Stock, even though I’ve been assured both by them and by my publishers that it isn’t. There’s one lovely customer review up (thanks, Kay). 0 of 1 people so far have found it useful.

But it exists. I’ve seen it. I’ve held it in my hands, and I’ve seen it in others’ hands. It’s there if you want it, and are willing to hunt just a little.

For this incarnation of the blog, I wanted to tell at least a bit of the story of this book’s creation. Or create its myth. Because for this book, the book is its own creation myth. Or the creation myth’s the story. And I thought it might be useful (and maybe a little cathartic) to share it.

I’m going to leave this blog up. As a crude, hand-drawn map, if you will, to Bunk County, if you ever want to mount a search. A road trip guide–like the Federal Writers’ Project guides themselves–to a county that was never there. Unless you find it.

You won’t find me there. But if you do go looking for Bunk County, and if you locate it…

Send me a postcard, okay?

Amazon.com’s official review, by S. Kay Murphy, of The Book of Bunk, which should appear on the book’s order page sometime around the moment it becomes officially available:

“Those familiar with Glen Hirshberg’s other works know that he is the consummate storyteller. The Book of Bunk, however, transcends anything he has accomplished previously. Part Great Gatsby, part Grapes of Wrath, and even a tiny bit One Hundred Years of Solitude, this novel exists in a genre of its own. It is a complex and rich piece of story-telling, lovingly rendered. In an age of plot-driven work, Hirshberg offers a richness in these characters that enables us to fall in love with them easily, then mourn the loss of their companionship at the book’s end.

My only criticism of this book is its brevity; at 236 pages, the experience of it is over far too quickly. I loved reading it, and I hated finishing it. Superb and highly recommended. ”

I’ll, um, take that…

Word from Earthling is that copies of The Book of Bunk should ship on or right around December 6th.

If you just can’t wait that long…well, that makes me happy. And since I exist to serve, I offer the following:

The last copies of the 2010 Rolling Darkness Revue chapbook are now available through my website at the link below. The chapbook features all-new stories by Peter Atkins, James Moran, and me (mine is called “Shomer,” and is easily the most Jewish ghost story I have written–even more so, I think, than “The Muldoon,” reprinted next month in Prime Books’ People of the Book anthology of Jewish fantastic fiction), as well as the complete text of the play from this year’s stage show.

Get ‘em here:

http://www.glenhirshberg.com/buy/index.html#rdr-2010-chapbook

And let me know what you think.

Still trying to make sense of this one. And doing so by substituting frustrated rationality instead of despair, because it isn’t worth despair–none of it is–and because frustrated rationality tastes better. Like a freshly unwrapped peppermint. Isn’t that what your frustrated rationality tastes like?

The very fine book review and discussion website TheRumpus.net has apparently turned down a reviewer who wanted to write a piece about The Book of Bunk on the grounds that the edition is limited.

This, frankly, boggles the mind. Because:

1. All editions are limited. That is, all publishers decide on an initial number of copies in advance, and then–if the books, you know, get good reviews and sell out the run–the publishers print more.

In this case, the whole point of going with Earthling, a fine and well-established and award-winning small press, for the initial printing of Bunk was to generate enough reviews and press and public response to convince the crazies in New York (any hints there of the Crazies in John Carpenter’s “Escape From New York” are almost entirely unintentional) that this book might have a chance to sell lots of copies after all.

2. The above rejection occurred in the very week that this article appeared in Publishers’ Weekly:

http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/print/20101108/45082-smaller-presses-bigger-authors.html?page=1

Followed shortly afterward by PW’s very favorable review of The Book of Bunk.

In other words, at the very moment when more and more prize-winning, celebrated, and just plain worthy writers are turning, either by choice or necessity, to smaller presses–all of whom do limited editions–and at the moment in history where more books worth reading are being buried by what’s left of the Guardians of Industry in New York, theRumpus, which defines itself as being interested in “culture as opposed to pop culture,” and which claims to have “no interest in ‘art’ created by marketing executives,” has decided to do its part to ensure that any art not directly endorsed by marketing executives stays buried.

The good news is that there are still presses and review sites and publications with a firmer grasp of their own purpose. The aforementioned review will apparently run in the January edition of Open Letters Monthly. And there are other reviews coming, some even from organizations considerably more establishment than theRumpus.

So I’ll look forward to those. And most of all, I’ll look forward to getting the book in your hands, you happy few (or maybe not so few) who float by here. So you can decide for yourselves. Pub date above.

Won’t post all of these. But it’s the first. And it’s pretty kind. And it certainly sounds like the book I meant to write. So…

“In this lyrical meditation on the sustaining power of the imagination, an officer of the WPA’s Federal Writers’ Project taps Okie hobo Paul Dent to contribute to the guide series documenting the American way of life in each of the 48 states. Off-loaded to Trampleton, N.C., in March 1936, Paul immerses himself in the local culture and becomes privy to fascinating oral anecdotes of the town’s social and racial history. He also takes part in the Buncombe (”Bunk”) County masquerade, a townwide indulgence in make-believe sponsored by a thinly disguised F. Scott Fitzgerald, whose skill at mythmaking clearly inspired Hirshberg (American Morons). Tragedy intervenes at the instigation of Paul’s older brother, Lewis, a political opportunist, but not before this vivid re-creation of smalltown Depression-era America enchants with its well-drawn characters, eloquent repartee, and poignant fantasia on a social experiment, which, if it didn’t play out this way, should have.” — Publishers’ Weekly

This will appear in two parts, on the back of the book and then the inside flap, amid quotes about this book and/or my work in general–for which I’m forever grateful–from Lucius Shepard, Peter Straub, Sharon Pomerantz, Aimee Bender, Jeff Vandermeer, and others.

The Copy (back of book):

Paul Dent, penniless and recently orphaned, hops a train in deepest Dust Bowl Oklahoma in the Spring of 1936, and winds up attached to the Federal Writers’ Project, one of the least understood, shortest-lived, and most impossibly ambitious government undertakings in the history of the country. He is assigned to capture the essence of the mountain towns of eastern North Carolina for a series of travel books no one believes will ever be published. There, among writers and cheats, arsonists and Reconstructionists, blind deaf children and disease-ridden Senators, Paul will meet the love of his life and her lover, witness the awakening of one great novelist and the possible resurrection of another, discover more than one America that could have been, and confront the truth about his relationship with his unpredictable, brilliant, and Machiavellian older brother.

There are echoes here of Laurel and Hardy, Bonnie and Clyde, Powell and Loy, Cane and Abel. It’s a book of bunk, in other words. A collection of lies. A creation myth about a vanished country that may or may not have existed, and the very real, conflicted nation that has sprung from it.

The Book of Bunk: the latest unclassifiable explosion of storytelling from Glen Hirshberg, the Shirley Jackson and International Horror Guild Award winning author of American Morons, The Two Sams, and The Snowman’s Children.

Inside Flap Copy:

Exactly what sort of bunk is this?

Well…

It’s an old-school adventure tale, for starters, complete with multiple romances, three separate fires, a Scott who isn’t quite Fitzgerald, railroad tramps, orphans, a haunted forest, Communists, a (possibly) imaginary country of shadows, and at least one murder. It’s told by a narrator who thinks he’s an impostor (but isn’t) to the brother he believes is also an impostor (and might or might not be). It’s a fairy tale with no magic. And a page-turning thriller about sitting around telling stories. It’s a tale our narrator doesn’t want to write about the creation of the very real series of books no one wanted to write that just may have created the myth of modern America.

The process of getting The Book of Bunk into the hands of those of you who might actually want to read it is revving up at long (and in this case, as perusers of this occasional blog know, I do mean long) last. Over the next weeks and months, I’ll be sharing the news as I get it.

Right now, I just thought I’d update you on the blurb process. This is the awkward, painstaking, occasionally painful stage in which authors hound other authors in the hopes they’ll somehow find enough time, enthusiasm, and passion about the work to say something lovely and enticing for the book jacket. I’ve sent manuscripts of Bunk to three writers for whom I have considerable admiration so far…and all three have been generous enough to blurb the book. There are more coming, hopefully. But for now, in the hopes of whetting appetites further, here’s what people are saying:

“In The Book of Bunk, Glen Hirshberg takes us on a journey through Depression-era, small-town America that is, in turns, whimsical and tragic, romantic and true. Hirshberg has an eye for the details of the 1930s that will put readers in mind of Sara Gruen’s Water for Elephants, while the riveting sibling rivalry that plays out between the brothers Dent is nothing short of biblical. Bunk County is a place where many of us already live, if only we could admit it.” — Sharon Pomerantz, author of Rich Boy.

(If you don’t know Sharon yet, you’re about to. Rich Boy is set to make quite a splash upon release this summer. She’s already a major and award-winning short story writer.)

“The Book of Bunk is anything but, by turns powerful, sad, ecstatic, and, above all, a clear sign that the uniquely American novel is alive and well. I loved it.” — Jeff Vandermeer, author of Finch

And…

“Glen Hirshberg’s The Book of Bunk is a miracle of narrative diversity and drive: Stories begetting stories begetting other stories yet that, after several hundred pages, confabulate a lyrical history. It’s as if Woody Guthrie and Gabriel Garcia Marquez had co-authored a 90000-word folk song about an obscure WPA project.”
– Lucius Shepard, author of Softspoken and Dagger Key.

Thanks so much, Lucius, Jeff, and Sharon, for taking the time not just to contribute some positive words but to provide keys to help future readers sort some of my Bunk out.

Coming soon: more blurbs (I hope), some cover art, and anything else worth noting as this 14 year-project finally spins toward the shelves.

That is, none, of course. And I’m sorry it took so long. I’m going to post about that shortly, and about a lot of other things about this process, as the Book of The Book of Bunk continues.

But for today, let’s just leave the announcement stark and simple.

The Book of Bunk will see its first publication in a beautiful edition from Earthling Publications, the same people who did such a terrific job with American Morons, late in 2010.

Thanks for waiting, those of you who aren’t video poker spambots and are still surfing by this site.

Woo.

And hoo.

And phew.

We interrupt this blog for a brief commercial announcement:

The 2009 Rolling Darkness Revue chapbook, featuring new stories by Pete Atkins, the unjustly neglected Edwardian near-genius Thomas St. John Bartlett, and me, is now available through my website at:

http://www.glenhirshberg.com/buy/index.html#rdr-2009-chapbook

The book also includes a fascinating, scholarly introduction by Barbara Roden about Bartlett’s life and work, plus commentary from Mike Ashley and other noted genre scholars.

More on the Bunk news as soon as I’m allowed to say anything. But I can probably hint that this time next year, there’ll be a different sort of commercial interruption/shopping suggestion on this site. And if I’m not allowed even to hint, well, too late now…

Nope, that’s not a critical comment, either by or about me.

It’s an announcement.

Or, the closest I can come to one today.

Okay, I’ll go a little closer:

Groundbreaking. As in breaking ground. In Bunk County.

As in, thanks for your patience, those of you still surfing by this occasionally derelict spot. It looks as though you will soon be rewarded.

More as soon as I’m allowed.