Quotes and Blurbs

Clark Gross Novel Award runner-up letter for The Many Raymond Days

"It's fun as hell, an absolute roller coaster of a ride, filled with imagination and humor, experimental and familiar at once with its depiction of familial conflict and obligation, offering up a multitude of unexpected twists and turns. As well, it's an assured piece of writing that reveals a writer willing to go most anywhere, jumping in many different directions while simultaneously following an inner logic that makes perfect sense, never losing sight of his characters and their unique quirks and desires. The writing is rich and wholly original, a very enjoyable and brave piece of work that deserves commendation. A mother and son, a brother discovered, a story of families and science and the end of the world, a sort of Grey Gardens meets A Canticle for Liebowitz, a most impressive debut."

- Matthew Iribarne, author of Astronauts & Other Stories (Simon and Schuster).

Blurb for The Many Raymond Days

"When scientist and recent widower Raymond Day discovers dire news about the time remaining for human life, he is pitched to the center of a frenzy involving government plans for managing the effects of this information. As citizens enter life-span lotteries in order to preserve the species, and must wear hourglasses that signal their untimely ends, Raymond becomes the one person responsible for writing an intelligible account for mankind. Hounded out of his lab by dark forces, and out of his peaceful home by his insistent mother, Raymond becomes an investigator of several mysteries, including a fire at the lab in which his beloved co-worker seems to have perished. Worse yet, his visiting mother has informed him of the existence of a brother who is equally on the cutting edge of strange, apocalyptic science theory. As Raymond walks the streets hiding in a papier-mache head searching for solutions, for his brother, he comes to terms with life, love, and mortality in this gripping and inventive and darkly comic novel that asks questions ,small and large, concerning the meaning of our lives, our commitment to others, and how to gain a foothold in a crumbling, disintegrating culture such as our own. This is our world--no holds barred."

- Maxine Chernoff, Department Chair of San Francisco State's Creative Writing Department