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Free Book Friday: The Word of God & The Wall of America by Thomas M. Disch

JK Evanczuk / Friday, July 23, 2010 View Comments

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 MRG for getting a free copy of The Cat’s Pajamas and Other Stories by James Morrow.

The Word of God by Thomas M. DischThe Wall of America by Thomas M. Disch

This week, we are giving away copies of the books The Word of God and The Wall of America by Thomas M. Disch.

The Word of God is the only tome ever written by God Himself! In this compelling memoir, the first and hopefully the last of its kind, America’s most divine author reveals the intimate and shocking details of His sudden elevation to the most coveted and least understood position in the universe. In early 2005 (A.D.), wearying of the world’s religious schisms, doctrinal heresies, and manifold editorial sins, Thomas M. Disch took matters into His Own hands and became the Deity. As controversial as it is incontrovertible, the moving true story of His awful transformation and its awesome aftermath reveals, at long last, the hidden web that links Disch, Philip K. Dick, Western wear, the Leamington Hotel, and Eternity itself. Read it in fear and trembling. But read it, or else.

Following the breakout novel, The Word of God, the surreal, satiric stories in The Wall of America pay a mesmerizing visit to the shadowy zone that lies between everyday life as we now know it and a perilous near future that is frighteningly tangible. In “The Wall of America,” the Department of Homeland Security has put up a border wall between the U.S. and Canada. But the NEA has plans for the wall as well, turning it into the world’s largest art gallery. After the Rapture, working-class life for “A Family of the Post-Apocalypse” is not as different as one might imagine, despite the occasional plague of biker-gang locusts, Between addiction and art is “Ringtime,” where a criminal is trapped in a recursive compulsion to visit other people’s memories while he is forced to record his own for an eager audience. A Somali schoolgirl living in post-WWIII Minneapolis goes on a bloody crusade to rid her town of a familiar predator, one who might just be a monster, in “White Man.” Vivid, starkly imagined, and strikingly articulate, this disquieting collection is a journey that skillfully straddles the line between playful absurdity and pointed irony.

This week’s Free Book Friday is sponsored by Tachyon Publications. Tachyon is an independent publisher of science fiction and fantasy for grown-ups. Their books are unique, challenging, and have high literary value. Their books are also a lot of fun. Tachyon is known for their canonic anthologies that redefine everything from the Victorian whimsies of Steampunk to the “lit-fi” world of Slipstream. In publishing risky story collections they’ve helped to spark a short fiction renaissance. They’ve commissioned innovative original novels and brought out-of-print classics to a new generation of readers. Their award-winning authors include Peter S. Beagle, Charles de Lint, Michael Moorcock, Kage Baker, James Morrow, Tim Powers, Nancy Kress, Cory Doctorow, Carol Emshwiller, Thomas M. Disch, and many more. In 2010, Tachyon is celebrating fifteen years of publishing smart science fiction and fantasy. Stick around, they’re just getting started.

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:

  • Sign up for Tachyon Publications’ mailing list
  • Subscribe to the Tachyon Publications blog
  • Become a fan of Tachyon Publications’ on Facebook
  • Sign up for our newsletter
  • Become our friend on TwitterFacebook

Winner will be chosen randomly at 12pm on Friday, July 30 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: Giveaway now closed. Congrats to this week’s winner AMY MARIE. Check out the new Free Book Friday featuring THREE anthologies from Tachyon.

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  • Michael Carter

    I love Disch.
    Please enter me!

  • Amy Marie

    Enter me, please!

  • Claudia

    count me in :D

  • http://wisb.blogspot.com/ SMD

    Any time Disch is involved, I’m in.

  • Sue

    Please include me. Thanks!

  • Abe

    The premise for the Word of God sounds pretty cool! Put my name in the hopper, please!

  • http://dustbowlpoetry.wordpress.com Shelley

    Best protection against the coming end-of-the-world is to fight against the power of giant corporations. This works better than being Raptured and also means you get to wake up in your own bed the next morning.

  • skillj

    the word of god will be mine! (hopefully) put my name in please!

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