1. Today -- August 22, 2017 -- will henceforth be remembered as the date when the gods -- #gods -- returned to society.
2. How do I know this?
3. Because this morning, while running (slowly) along the Hudson River, I noticed that someone had erected a collection of non-Confederate statues in their honor.
4. After I returned home from work, I returned to the site along the river (this time with a camera), where I was relieved to find that these statues were not a dream or hallucination.
5. The sculptor was also present, arranging more stones. Some of them were impossibly heavy; I could not believe his strength.
6. "What is your name?" I asked, and he said, "Ulysses." "Are you the same Ulysses who runs my favorite uptown blog Harlem Bespoke?" I asked, and he shrugged ambiguously, neither confirming nor denying. Some mysteries will never be solved.
7. I next asked him why he was arranging the rocks like this, and he said, "To mark the river from which we arrive and depart." I asked him if he was referring to the new ferry routes that the MTA has started to ease crowding on the horrible subways. "No," he said, "these routes are much older than the MTA, but also much newer."
8. I told him I understood. After all, I had written a book about the return of the #gods to society; the official publication date, as I decided not to tell him (because I'm trying not to be too much of a disgusting, self-promotional monster), is also August 22, 2017.
9. I told him his work was beautiful as he -- glowing almost imperceptibly -- disappeared into the sun.
10. If you haven't done so yet, I hope you will consider buying the book :) It's available on Amazon, but it's still better (for society and the gods who are returning to live among us) to buy direct from the publisher. Send me pictures and I will add them to the above collage! Oh and if you read the book and <3 it (or even if you h8 it), please consider leaving a review somewhere: literally every word/photo/tweet/etc helps publicize an independent book! THANK YOU FOR READING: BUILD STATUES TO THE GODS.
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08/22/2017
ORDER HERE
A RADICAL NEW MYTH ABOUT SEX, FAITH, AND THOSE OF US WHO WILL NEVER DIE
A young boy wanders into the woods of Harlem and witnesses the abduction of his sister by a glowing creature. Forty years later, now working as a New York City homicide detective, Gus is assigned to a case in which he unexpectedly succumbs to a vision that Helen is still alive. To find her, he embarks on an uorthodox investigation that leads to an ancient civilization of gods and the people determined to bring them back.
In this colossal new novel from the author of The Metropolis Case, the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice collides with a new religion founded by three corporate office workers, creating something beautiful, illogical, and overwhelming. Part sex manifesto, part religious text, part Manhattan noir—with a dose of deadly serious, internet inspired satire—#gods is a sprawling inquest into the nature of faith and resistance in the modern world. With each turn of the page, #gods will leave you increasingly reborn.
Praise for #gods
“#gods is a mystery, an excavation of myths, an index of modern life, a gay coming-of-age story, an office satire, a lyrical fever dream, a conspiracy. One of the most ambitious novels in recent memory—and a wild, possibly transformative addition to the canon of gay literature—it contains multitudes, and seethes with brilliance.” —Mark Doten, author of The Infernal
“Matthew Gallaway’s #gods is a novel so brilliant, so funny, so full of strange and marvelous things, I couldn’t stop writing OMG WTF I <3 THIS SO MUCH in its margins. It’s rare to find a novel that so dazzlingly reinvigorates age-old meditations on faith and f&!*ing, art and eros. Luminous, enterprising, and sublimely cheeky, #gods tells the story, the myth, the dream of the human soul in all its glorious complexity.” —Suzanne Morrison, author of Yoga Bitch
“Matthew Gallaway’s storytelling manages to be both dreamy and serious; lean and luxurious. His words carry an incantatory power of mythic storytelling where beauty and savagery wrap around each other like bright threads in a gorgeous tapestry.” —Natasha Vargas-Cooper, author of Mad Men Unbuttoned: A Romp Through 1960s America
“If the ancient gods were just like us, only more so, then the same could be said for this strange, wonderful book, in which the mundane sorrows and small triumphs of very ordinary lives glow ever so slightly around the edges, sometimes quite literally. At once an oddly romantic send-up of dead-end office culture and an offbeat supernatural procedural, #gods is terrifically weird, melancholy, sexy, and charming.” —Jacob Bacharach, author of The Bend of the World
'It’s to the credit of Matthew Gallaway’s enchanting, often funny first novel that it doesn’t require a corresponding degree of obsession from readers, but may leave them similarly transported: the book is so well written — there’s hardly a lazy sentence here — and filled with such memorable lead and supporting players that it quickly absorbs you into its worlds.'
-- The New York Times
Music: Death Culture at Sea and Saturnine
Listen or download songs and records from my indie-rock past with Saturnine here and Death Culture at Sea here.
Music Video: Remembrance of Things Past
Watch the rock opera Remembrance of Things Past written and performed by Saturnine and Frances Gibson, starring Bennett Madison and Sheila McClear.
Video: The Chaos Detective
The Chaos Detective is a series about a man searching for 'identity' as he completes assignments from a mysterious organization. Watch the first episode (five parts) on YouTube.