Soldiers in Hiding (27 page)

At Hawthorne Books, we're serious about literature. We suspected that good writers were being ignored and cast aside as a result of consolidation in the publishing industry, and in 2001 we decided to find these writers and give them a voice. We publish American literary fiction and narrative non-fiction, although we won't turn down a good international title if we find one. All of our books are published as affordable original trade paperbacks, but feature details not typically found even in casebound titles from bigger houses: acid-free papers; sewn bindings which will not crack; heavy, laminated covers with French flaps and built-in bookmarks. If you like to read, we think you'll enjoy our books. If you like to write—well, send us something. We're always looking.

Kassten Alonso

Fiction
208 pages
$12.95
ISBN 0-9716915-7-6
FINALIST, 2005 OREGON BOOK AWARD

THIS INTENSE AND COMPACT NOVEL crackles with obsession, betrayal, and madness. As the narrator becomes fixated on his best friend's girlfriend, his precarious hold on sanity rapidly deteriorates into delusion and violence. This story can be read as the classic myth of Hades and Persephone (Core) rewritten for a twenty-first century audience as well as a dark tale of unrequited love and loneliness.

Alonso skillfully uses language to imitate memory and psychosis, putting the reader squarely inside the narrator's head; deliberate misuse of standard punctuation blurs the distinction between the narrator's internal and external worlds. Alienation and Faulknerian grotesquerie permeate this landscape, where desire is borne in the bloom of a daffodil and sanity lies toppled like an applecart in the mud.

JUMP THROUGH THIS gothic stained glass window and you are in for some serious investigation of darkness and all of its deadly sins. But take heart, brave traveler, the adventure will prove thrilling. For you are in the beautiful hands of Kassten Alonso.

KASSTEN ALONSO takes the reader on a wild ride inside the mind of a disturbed man as he descends into madness and violence. A beautifully written book. Impossible to put down.

KASSTEN ALONSO'S AMAZING Core will startle you. A fierce story that taught me to read it as I went deeper and deeper—it's as if this book is written in a rich, beautiful language I'd once known and somehow forgotten. I'm happy and terrified to have it back.

Poe Ballantine

Fiction
376 pages
$15.95
ISBN 0-9766311-1-3

“IT'S IMPOSSIBLE NOT TO BE CHARMED by Edgar Donahoe [
Publishers Weekly
],” and he's back for another misadventure. Expelled from college for drunkenly bellowing expletives from a dorm window at 3:00 am, Edgar hitchhikes to Colorado and trains as a cook. A postcard arrives from his college buddy, Mountain Moses, inviting him to a Caribbean island. Once there, Edgar cooks at the local tourist resort and falls in love with Mountain's girl, Kate. He becomes embroiled in a love triangle and his troubles multiply as he is stalked by sinister island native Chollie Legion. Even Cinnamon Jim the medicine man is no help. Ultimately it takes a hurricane to blow Edgar out of this mess.

I'M DRUNK AS I WRITE THIS and I wish I would've never left San Diego. San Diego is PARADISE. Billings, Montana is a PIMPLE ON MY BUTT. Edgar, Edgar, I loved you, why did you run away to a desert island? And why didn't you take me with you? I would've fought by your side. I would've drank with you all night and waited tables at that hotel. Jesus, the booze there is cheap. When I called your parents they said you'd gone to New YORK. How was I going to reach you? And why didn't you mention me more than once in your new novel about love and betrayal in the jungle? I thought I was your best friend, Edgar. I feel so bad about Bev. Oh, Edgar, Edgar, please forgive me (and put me in your next book, O K ?).

YOU'RE LUCKY YOU RAN OFF to that island, Edgar, you
pinche pendejo
.
Chin-gada
, I'm still pissed and if you ever show your face around here again I'll kick you in your
pajarito
. My husband is gay and it was your fault. I'd still like to know what you did to him.

I'M FAT NOW, EDGAR. I'm a blimp. I married this navy guy, do you believe it, and we're living at my mom's house on Mt. Helix. I see you're still drinking too much. And then you fall offf a clifff and I can't stop crying. I'm so unhappy. Adrian told me about Bev. It wasn't your fault. Why do we have to grow old? Why can't we have another chance?

Poe Ballantine

Fiction
196 pages
$15.95
ISBN 0-9716915-4-1

SET AGAINST THE DILAPIDATED halls of a San Diego rest home in the 1970s,
God Clobbers Us All
is the shimmering, hysterical, and melancholy story of eighteen-year-old surfer -boy orderly Edgar Donahoe 's struggles with friendship, death, and an ill-advised affair with the wife of a maladjusted war veteran. All of Edgar's problems become mundane, however, when he and his lesbian Blackfoot nurse's aide best friend, Pat Fillmore, become responsible for the disappearance of their fellow worker after an lsd party gone awry.
God Clobbers Us All
is guaranteed to satisfy longtime Ballantine fans as well as convert those lucky enough to be discovering his work for the first time.

A SURFER DUDE TRANSFORMS into someone captivatingly fragile, and Ballantine's novel becomes something tender, vulnerable, even sweet without that icky, cloying literary aftertaste. This vulnerability separates Ballantine's work from his chosen peers. Calmer than Bukowski, less portentous than Kerouac, more hopeful than West, Poe Ballantine may not be sitting at the table of his mentors, but perhaps he deserves his own after all.

IT'S IMPOSSIBLE NOT TO BE CHARMED by the narrator of Poe Ballantine's comic and sparklingly intelligent
God Clobbers Us All
.

GOD CLOBBERS US ALL
SUCCEED[S] on the strength of its characterization and Ballantine's appreciation for the true-life denizens of the Lemon Acres rest home. The gritty daily details of occupants of a home for the dying have a stark vibrancy that cannot help but grab one's attention, and the offf-hours drug, surf, and screw obsessions of its young narrator, Edgar Donahoe, and his coworkers have a genuine sheen that captivates almost as efffectively.

Poe Ballantine

Non-fiction
266 pages
$12.95
ISBN 0-9716915-1-7

THESE RISKY, PERSONAL ESSAYS are populated with odd jobs, eccentric characters, boarding houses, buses, and beer. Ballantine takes us along on his Greyhound journey through small-town America, exploring what it means to be human. Written with piercing intimacy and self-effacing humor, Ballantine's writings provide entertainment, social commentary, and completely compelling slices of life.

IN HIS SEARCH FOR THE REAL AMERICA, Poe Ballantine reminds me of the legendary musk deer, who wanders from valley to valley and hilltop to hilltop searching for the source of the intoxicating musk fragrance that actually comes from him. Along the way, he writes some of the best prose I've ever read.

BALLANTINE NEVER SHRINKS from taking us along for the drunken, drug-infested ride he braves in most of his travels. The payofff—and there is one—lies in his self-deprecating humor and acerbic social commentary, which he leaves us with before heading further up the dark highway.

POE BALLANTINE REMINDS US that in a country full of identical strip malls and chain restaurants, there's still room for adventure. He finds the humor in situations most would find unbearable and flourishes like a modern-day Kerouac. With his funny, honest prose, Ballantine explores the important questions about being an American: Do I have enough money to buy this bucket of KFC? Can I abide another sixteen-hour Greyhound bus trip? Did my crazy roommate steal my beer again? It's a book to cherish and pass on to friends.

Peter Donahue