The Best of Whatever—Chris Deal

1. Pike by Benjamin Whitmer. This book scared me. There’s no horror here, no monsters or demons or ghosts but man at his worst, or maybe his best. Digging through the evil done to reach catharsis, the writing is a beautiful frame holding a horrible painting. Sharp and to the bone.

2. It Came From Del Rio by Stephen Graham Jones. It was a toss up between Pike and Del Rio for number one. Literally, I flipped a coin. It Came From Del Rio is a surprisingly realistic novel about a rabbit-headed zombie chupacabra herder. Split between the perspectives of a father and a daughter, Del Rio hits on what it is to be a father, how those you love can let you down, and how you can achieve salvation decades after you die. Plus, this book has the best cover of the year, hands down

3. Stay God by Nik Korpon. Loaded with pop culture shout outs and rich, amazing prose, this Baltimore dealer novel proves that Korpon will be a force in the future.

4. Transubstantiate by Richard Thomas. I didn’t expect this book. With eight perspectives on a world after something horrible, but we don’t quite know what.

5. The Soul Consortium by Simon West-Bulford. I lucked out. This doesn’t come out until 2012, but West-Bulford creates the most ambitious debut imaginable here. Science fiction but so much more. This is man at the end, literally.

6. The Little Sleep by Paul Tremblay ,. A clever twist on the PI, this Boston noir takes the unreliable narrator to it’s extreme: he’s not just unreliable to us, but to himself. How do you solve a crime when you don’t know if what you saw or experienced is real?

7. Occultation by Laird Barron

8. Grease Stains, Kismet, and Maternal Wisdom by Mel Bosworth. A simple novella about love between two people who refuse to let the world touch them. I hit this in one sitting and can’t wait for my next chance. Surprisingly meta and subversively straight forward.

9. Major Inversions by Gordon Highland. A real surprise, this becomes something you could never expect. There are multiple layers to this simple narrative about a slacker musician who falls into something he couldn’t have seen coming. Power through the initially unlikable protagonist and you’ll find more heart than you’d realize.

10. Complete Poems by John Berryman. Nick Cave himself said Berryman was the best, and who am I to argue? With poetry rich with imagery and struggle, these poems will alter the way you see the world as only the best poets can do.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:Chris Deal writes from Huntersville, North Carolina. His debut collection of microfiction, Cienfuegos, was published in early 2010 by Brown Paper Publishing. Find him online at www.Chris-Deal.com

Stay God By Nik Korpon—Reviewed by Chris Deal

With fierce, deep prose and copious amounts of pop-culture fading through the fuzzy head of a Baltimore drug dealer, Stay God is a remarkable debut. Standing firmly in the noir vein, this novel follows Damon, who runs Stay Gold, a second hand shop where they sell drugs hidden in CD cases along with his girlfriend, Mary. He runs with a group of users as deep into horror and video games as he is. His supplier is a kid who has seen The Godfather too many times and has a lust for Mary that just barely supersedes his hatred for Damon. When a new drug hits the street that could set up the two of them for life, Damon makes a decision that could ruin everything.

The story and the mystery pull you in, but it is the writing itself that will hook you. Korpon writes like a mix between Hamsun and Larkin, poetically showing the ugliness of the life and the city:

‘Someone stabbed the sun. It’s dripping onto Baltimore, seeping through gauze clouds onto the cobblestone street, reflecting off wet tire tracks in pinpoint sparks like the ones that follow a two-by-four across the nose. It’s dimming, dying, falling in slow motion, but the city is oblivious. Couples in matching jackets and complementary scarves walk arm-in-arm down Thames and through Fell’s Point. They push strollers with babies double-wrapped in winter coats. Share hot chocolate and kiss the dot of whipped cream off their noses. Window-shop the poster place next-door, looking for the perfect thing for the TV room. Happy lives, happily self-contained in their happy little oblivious universes.’

Every new word brings Damon clearer into focus, painting him as clear as if you grew up with him. The city is, as cliché as this may sound, its own character, but one written as rich and fully as every other person who occupies Damon’s world. Mary herself is a surprise, in that you never doubt for a second that she loves Damon, but she’s not written as your basic female, she’s her own person and the bond between the two of them propels Damon and the reader further. Stay God cuts sharply through the fog of drugs and desire and gets to the matter of identity and maturing in a way that you’d never expect. Stay God ends but you only want it to keep going, to stay in Korpon’s world

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Chris Deal writes from Huntersville, North Carolina. His debut collection of microfiction, Cienfuegos, was published in early 2010 by Brown Paper Publishing. Find him online at www.Chris-Deal.com