Welcome to this week’s Free Book Friday, wherein we give you the best titles in indie publishing for the low low price of nothing. Congrats to last week’s winner Scott Kennedy for snagging a copy of Floodmarkers by Nic Brown.
This week, we are giving away a copy of Osama Van Halen by Michael Muhammad Knight. Amazing Ayyub, an Iranian Shi’ite skinhead, and his sidekick Rabeya have hijacked Matt Damon, demanding that Hollywood depict Muslims in a positive light—”just one movie where we’re not these two-dimensional al Qaeda stereotypes.” But Damon’s concerned they’re playing into that same terrorist paradigm and furthering a neo-conservative perception of Islam. Meanwhile, Ayyub embarks on a mission to rid taqwacore of a Muslim pop-punk band, Shah 79. Along the way he makes himself invisible, escapes punk-eating zombies in a mosque off the desert highway, runs into some psychobilly jinns, and finds himself face to face with his creator, the author…a riotous journey of enlightenment. (But not all hilarious: At the end of the novel, Knight is decapitated by Rabeya.) You can read an excerpt of Osama Van Halen on the Soft Skull Press website.
This week’s Free Book Friday is sponsored by Soft Skull Press. Counterpoint is comprised of two imprints, Counterpoint and Soft Skull Press, and in 2008, Counterpoint began publishing books in association with Sierra Club Books. Counterpoint publishes fiction, literature, and poetry in addition to nonfiction, including history, memoir, biography, and nature. Soft Skull publishes contemporary fiction, as well as graphic novels, and nonfiction, including current affairs, counterculture, and politics. Sierra Club Books publishes environmental books.
To enter the giveaway, all you have to do is comment in the space below. Make sure to tell us your email address so we can contact you if you win! We also recommend doing the following:
- Signing up for Counterpoint’s mailing list and Soft Skull’s mailing list
- Becoming Soft Skull’s friend on Twitter, Facebook & MySpace
- Subscribing to Soft Skull’s blog
- Becoming our friend on Twitter & Facebook
- Signing up for our newsletter
- Writing a haiku about hijacking Matt Damon
Winner will be chosen randomly at 12pm on Friday, December 4 and notified via email. The winner must respond to our email within 48 hours, or a new winner will be randomly selected.
Good luck!
Edit: Contest is now closed. Congrats to this week’s winner ARDITH. Try your luck again with Lydia Millet’s Love in Infant Monkeys.
