Category: novel

Go off the beaten path this summer…

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These hot new releases are ideal summer reading. Alain Arias-Misson‘s experimental novel COMIC BOOK subverts the comic book formula and turns it inside-out. Indeed, the sex & violence spins off the page and into your head—right where it belongs. Talk about fun!

THE DOUG SKINNER DOSSIER is a biblical picnic—complete with ants in your pants. This lavish (imitation leather) compendium is loaded with black humor, absurdism, and sheer nonsense—a delightful divertissement for the beach or hammock.

Come on,  dive in and READ DIFFERENT!

KAPOW!!! ZAPP!!! BAM!!! CRASH!!! IT’S COMIC BOOK!!!

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“Arias-Misson’s writing is comedic and sharp, clever and intelligent.”—American Book Review

“Given the stature and history of this enigmatic, creative polymath, it is unlikely that he would turn out a straight-forward, commercially viable novel; he has spent several decades making innovations in art, poetry, performance and experimental fiction.” –Evergreen Review

Alain Arias-Misson’s COMIC BOOK barges into the bookcase

like a superhero on steroids. On the surface it’s a simple Boy (“Company” operative) chases Girl (gorgeous Corporate Terrorist) story. Set  “physically” in comic book format, it leaps relentlessly from one discontinuous window to the next, and becomes labyrinthic and baffling as the characters—discovering their comic book constraints—attempt to throw off these mental shackles and achieve their erotic ends.

Prepare to have your preconceived thought balloons punctured by this mind-blowing novel.

COMIC BOOK is a gas.

$12.95
Trade Paperback: 170 pages
5.1 x 0.4 x 7.8 inches
ISBN-13: 978-0692440674

THIS TITLE IS OUT OF PRINT

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Other titles by Alain Arias-Misson available from Black Scat Books: 

THE MAN WHO WALKED ON AIR & Other Tales of Innocence [short stories]

TINTIN MEETS THE DRAGON QUEEN in THE RETURN OF THE MAYA TO MANHATTAN [novel]

bloomsday

Happy Bloomsday!

Love at First Smite

Love knows no virtue, no profit; it loves and forgives and suffers everything, because it must

Originally published in 1870, the notorious novel Venus in Furs quickly became a landmark work of erotic literature. Written by the Austrian author Leopold von Sacher-Masoch (who inspired Krafft-Ebing to coin the term masochism), the book’s themes of female dominance and sadomasochism are legendary. This compact new edition features stunning collage illustrations by French artist Nelly Sanchez.

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This is the first volume in the New Urge “Classics of Passion” collector’s series.

VENUS-COVER

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In the wings, some special things (seventh edition)…

 

There is a lot of excitement buzzing around our editorial bunker here in northern California. We are adding quite a few titles to our growing list of sublime art & literature, with books by Alphonse Allais, Alain Arias-Misson, Mark Axelrod, Pierre-Corneille de Blessebois, Catherine D’Avis, Farewell Debut, Edith Doove, Eckhard Gerdes, Richard Kostelanetz, Terri Lloyd, Doug Rice, and Carla M. Wilson, among others. As always, expect some surprises, including  (we hope) a book once listed as forthcoming by the great Gaberbocchus Press in London that, alas, never appeared. For now, that’s all we’re at liberty to divulge.

For those who missed out on collecting all 31 titles in the Absurdist Texts & Documents series, we suggest getting in on the ground floor of our New Urge imprint—devoted to contemporary erotic fiction by writers from Europe and North America. The first volume, White Fire & Other Tales by Cody Kmoch has just been released, with four more scheduled to appear in 2015. These sensual trade paper editions are numbered sequentially, handsomely designed, and custom-sized  (5 x 7.7 inches) for your comfort and edification.

We should also mention that our magazine Black Scat Review has been redesigned, and will sport a new look when its eleventh issue appears in the spring.

Here are a few goodies waiting in the wings.

SQUAD

THE SQUADRON’S UMBRELLA 
by Alphonse Allais
Translated from the French by Doug Skinner
FIRST PUBLICATION IN ENGLISH

A collection of 39 pieces by the great French absurdist. This is quintessential Allais, featuring some of his funniest texts—never before translated.

In regards to the significance of the title, Allais states in his preface the following:

“I have entitled this book The Squadron’s Umbrella for two reasons, which I ask the reader’s indulgence to tick off before him.

  1. There is no mention, in my volume, of umbrellas of any kind.
  2. The vital question of the squadron, considered as a unit of combat, is not even broached.”

That pretty much says it all.

 

UPDATE 1/30 —ON SALE NOW

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ANGEL OF EVERYTHING
by Catherine D’Avis
Translated from the French by Kenneth D. Fletcher
FIRST PUBLICATION IN ENGLISH

Bored with her life in a quiet, French coastal town and desperate for excitement, Emma sends out a prayer to the Angel of Happenings. When she meets an enigmatic Parisian photographer, her wish appears to have come true, until she finds herself drawn into an intimate world of erotic temptations, obsession and danger.

The controversial novel L’ange de toutes choses originally appeared in Paris in 2012. Published under the pseudonymous initials “C.A.,” the work received favorable reviews, as well as the condemnation reserved for works in this arena. Ms. D’Avis’s writing has been compared to the novelist Marguerite Duras.

ORDER ON AMAZON

 

 “The Zombie of Great-Peru marks an extremely important literary occasion.” —Apollinaire

Guillaume Apollinaire

THE ZOMBIE OF GREAT-PERU
by Pierre-Corneille de Blessebois
Preface by Guillaume Apollinaire
Translated from the French by Doug Skinner
FIRST PUBLICATION IN ENGLISH

Black Scat Books will proudly resurrect this rollicking novel featuring the first mention of zombies in world literature! Originally published in 1697, it offers “a biting satire of colonial society as licentious, credulous, and possessed by its own belief in zombis.”*

In the words of translator Doug Skinner, this libertine tale is “Great fun. Filled with sex, slapstick, deceit, and fake zombies.”

Who could ask for anything more?

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*Doris Garraway, The Libertine Colony

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MINCE
by Edith Doove

A collection of poems & observations by a gifted young British writer. These works were originally written in Dutch and composed over a ten year period.

Ms. Doove has a sharp eye and her words whisper fresh visions.

PUBLICATION; January 31, 2015

 

Another Rave for the Encyclopedia Mouse!

STRAW-cover

The following review by Laura Hinds is reprinted from Pacific Book Review:

Where do I begin? At the beginning or the end? Or should I jump right into the middle? In all likelihood, it doesn’t matter a whit.  Officially, I will call this “Science Fiction.” Unofficially, I will name it “Science Fiction Science Philosophy Genre Bending Fiction.” I think that the author will appreciate this, and that it will give readers fair warning (and thus build anticipation) as to the nature of the book they are about to delve into.

Author Tom Whalen has an amazing phantasmorgraphical imagination. Perhaps he is from a higher level dimension than the rest of us mere mortals. I’d like to think that I’ve been intellectually and spiritually challenged, if not, in fact, enhanced by “The Straw That Broke.”

The book centers around “Encyclopedia Mouse,” a small creature who has the massive ability to save the multiverse. There are stories within stories, and frankly, words that must be unique to the author that left me feeling uncertain as to which way was up. Yet, as a determined reader, I buckled down and plowed ahead to figure things out.  Encylopedia Mouse is spinning a web of tales to several minor mice, with himself in the role of Nuncle (uncle) Mouse. The Mouse faces off against enemies galore, with no shortage of narration that deftly weaves everything from philosophy to history into the story. Encyclopedia Mouse faces challenges with an inner strength that many men do not possess. He goes up against his Doppelganger, and must save the multiverse by narrating it, without regard for time nor space. Will he, or won’t he be able to defeat his Dopplelganger, and will author Bulwer Zetford finish “The Cosmic Messenger? “There are so many characters and unusual situations in “The Straw The Broke,” that the best way to read it may be one chapter at a time, and absorb that before you move on to the next, in which you will be confronted with an entirely new set of circumstances.

I am not sure if Whalen is attempting to amuse, enlighten, or educate readers, but I’m sure he will do some of each for every individual reader.  I wish that I’d had the chance to read the previous book, or books, I’m not really sure, in this series, as it may have made things clearer. Or not. Nevertheless, I was vastly amused, highly intrigued and overall would recommend this book for anyone looking for answers beyond your wildest imagination about that nature of reality, from a valiant mouse perspective, with a multidimensional twist.

If you know a Sci-fi fan who thinks they have seen it all, heard it all, and read it all, “The Straw That Broke” by Tom Whalen would be the book you want to get for holiday gift-giving. They won’t be able to put it down, and you will be rewarded with much gratitude, and lots of peace and quiet as they read for hours and hours!

BUY ON AMAZON

And now for dessert . . .

EXCERPT

from SWEET AND VICIOUS / Copyright © 2014 by Suzanne Burns

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“Sweet and Vicious is an inspired exploration of Waldeinsamkeit and (post)romantic angst that turns the mundane into something beautiful and wild. Burns is a gifted writer.”
—D. Harlan Wilson

Black Scat Books is proud to present this innovative work of fiction by Suzanne Burns.

Sweet and Vicious is a provocative and relentlessly compelling new novel.

CLICK HERE TO ORDER

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Suzanne Burns writes poetry and fiction in Bend, Oregon (and sometimes in Paris, France). She is the author of Siblings, Misfits and Other Heroes, and Love Songs for Las Vegas, among other books. Sweet and Vicious is her first novel.

The Mouse That Soared…

“An intriguing blend of SF, philosophy, and word play . . . Giddy fun!” —Rudy Rucker

STRAW-FOR-SCAT

“Call it science fiction or meta-fiction or cyber fiction . . . wonderfully funny, often exciting, always baffling, and occasionally even profound. It’s the Moby-Dick of mice!”   —R.H.W. Dillard

“Pollinates post-cyber-punk with headier poetry than the genre has yet known.”    —Andrei Codrescu

“Allusive, punning, intricately plotted and exponentially self-referential . . . science fiction which ultimately explores the science of fiction or, more aptly, the art of narrative.”  —Brad Richard, American Letters & Commentary

“Storytelling which is subtly, wickedly funny.”     —The Times-Picayune

Bulwer Zetford’s work-in-progress The Cosmic Messenger is about to take a strange turn, and the multiverse with it, when Roithamer of Relix “beads” once again and brings swirling into Zetford’s Kaduza M-mon processor the Encyclopedia Mouse, the one creature who can save the multiverse. Tale twines tale as the mouse battles his Doppelgänger in cyberspace, Heidegger in his Black Forest hut, and a hyper-crazed Roithamer. Death is everywhere, but the mouse, birling (if only barely) in his Binding Nexus Drive, is determined to narrate the universes away from their demise.

Dive into August with a stunning work of speculative metafiction. This is seminal post-cyberpunk with wicked Oulipian twists, crafted by a master of innovative fiction.

THE STRAW THAT BROKE
A novel by Tom Whalen
6” x 9”, trade paperback original. 172 pp.
$14.95  /  ISBN -13 978-0692259436

am-but

 

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tom-whalenTOM WHALEN is a novelist, short story writer, poet and critic who has written for Agni, Asymptote, Bookforum, Chicago Review, Fiction International, Film Quarterly, the Washington Post and other publications. His books include Dolls, Elongated Figures, The Birth of Death and Other Comedies: The Novels of Russell H. Greenan, and the novels Roithamer’s Universe and The President in Her Towers, which John Warner in the Chicago Tribune called a “mash-up of Kingsley Amis and Italo Calvino. A strange, surreal and wonderful novel.”  Whalen currently lives in Stuttgart, Germany, where he teaches film at the State Academy of Art and Design.

Summer Scatastic!

Here’s a look ahead at some of the goodies coming your way in the next few months.

In August we’re bringing you a major new novel by Tom Whalen, The Straw That Broke—a stunning work of speculative metafiction— filled with wordplay and literary hijinks. This is seminal post-cyberpunk fiction with wicked Oulipian twists, crafted by a master of experimental fiction.

On Labor Day, Mao Zedong’s clandestine Long March reaches its revolutionary climax in The Little Red Book of Commie Porn. A collaboration between California artists Terri Lloyd and Norman Conquest, this outrageously funny collection of satirical art & text is unlike anything we’ve ever published. Indeed, the book is nearly  impossible to describe and must be seen to be believed.

Another literary event you won’t want to miss: the first English translation of the Selected Plays of Alphonse Allais, compiled and translated by Doug Skinner. This special illustrated edition makes a nice companion volume to Allais’s Captain Cap: His Adventures, His Ideas, His Drinks. This new collection includes 24 works: eight monologues, three one-act plays, plus short skits, dialogues, and burlesques. For fans of the absurd, this is a must-have.

For armchair travelers who enjoy going nowhere in wickedly clever fashion, there’s  David Slavitt’s absurdist chapbook Walloomsac: A Week on the River. It has already received advance praise from R. H. W. Dillard: “…I haven’t had this kind of significant fun since I stayed up ‘til dawn…breathlessly reading Pale Fire for the very first time.” This one’s a real treat.

Coming in September. we’re thrilled to be publishing Suzanne Burns’ experimental novel Sweet and Vicious. This new work by the gifted young author of Siblings and Misfits and other Heroes, is sure to enhance her reputation as one of the most innovative contemporary American writers.

And just in time for Halloween… the third volume of Oulipo Pornobongo: Anthology of Erotic Wordplay. The collection includes works by Maria Schurr, Paulo Brito, Tom La Farge, Lucy Selleck, Doug Skinner, Ellen Nations, Paul Forristal, and others.

Be sure to subscribe to this blog so you don’t miss out on these and other forthcoming titles.