Tomorrowland

by Joseph Bates

Overview

Joseph Bates's debut short story collection Tomorrowland offers stories full of strange attractions and uncanny conceits, a world of freakish former child stars, abused Elvis impersonators, derelict roadside attractions, apocalyptic small towns, and parallel universes where you make out with your ex. At its core, the world of Tomorrowland is our own, though reflected off a funhouse mirror--revealing our hopes and deepest fears to comic, heartbreaking effect.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780988825888
Publisher:	Curbside Splendor Publishing
Publication date:	09/23/2013
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	NOOK Book
Pages:	160
File size:	342 KB

About the Author

Joseph Bates is the author of Tomorrowland (Curbside Splendor, 2013) and The Nighttime Novelist (Writer's Digest, 2010). His fiction and nonfiction have appeared in such publications as New Ohio Review, South Carolina Review, Identity Theory, The Rumpus, The Cincinnati Review, and Shenandoah. He teaches in the creative writing program at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. Visit Joseph online at josephbates.net.

Editorial Reviews

08/26/2013
In his debut short story collection, Joseph Bates (The Nighttime Novelist) establishes a house of mirrors that alternately reveals the surprising truth of life and reflects back such a bloated, grotesquely stretched-out version thereof that any hope of truth recognition is lost. Bates's stories share the sense of dangling over the cliff of reality, from the unlikely action taken in "Survey of my Exes" to the multiverse-scanning machine of "Mirrorverse." In the latter as well as in "Future Me," Bates washes the real world in straightforward sci-fi, revealing a certain restlessness to sift through alternate possibilities. At its best, the collection uses exaggerated reality and irrational otherworldliness in order to highlight elements of everyday life, such as when Bates illustrates the ambitions and loneliness of a genetic outcast in "Gas Head Tells All." Yet in some stories he takes this too far, particularly those that broach modern politics. The church-government hastily elected in "Bearing a Cross" is frightening, yes, and provides a clear parable against panicking and handing over individual liberty to a strong-armed state, but no subtle undertone or delightful truth breaks the surface of the all-too-obvious. Overall, an entertaining collection that gets bogged down when addressing politics. (Aug.)

Publishers Weekly

"The highly inventive stories in this debut collection address a fantastic yet familiar world, where shiny promises of fulfillment fall flat, age disappoints and love is not exactly the answer."
—Susan Weinstein at NOTANOTHERBOOKREVIEW

"Tomorrowland is a revelation, combining slightly skewed or fantastic conceits, a darkly comic tone, and wonderfully nimble, funny prose, all in service of a surprisingly serious, touching vision. These inventive stories mark the debut of a major talent." —Michael Griffith, author of Trophy and Bibliophilia

"Tomorrowland's not enough; Joseph Bates needs to put out a collection of stories every month. These are quirky, sly, brilliant, playful stories that belong shelved somewhere between Barthelme and Saunders. Tomorrowland is outstanding, and unforgettable, and universal. It's like opening up one of those chocolate samplers and finding out that, through a mix-up at the factory, each piece is your favorite."—George Singleton, author of Stray Decorum

"Joseph Bates's tales are so funny, and so sad, and so full of life in the truest, wildest way. He sends these stories bounding through the universe—and even the multiverse—through lands both unaccountably strange and uncomfortably familiar. But behind the Boardwalk Elvises and sadistic trick-or-treaters and busted-up futures past, these are ultimately stories about the little and larger failures of just being human—in any kind of world." —Amber Sparks, author of May We Shed These Human Bodies and The Desert Places

From the Publisher