First published 2022
A high school teacher in Communist Romania begins keeping a diary of his ordinary life. He waits in endless grocery lines, navigates the absurd education system, and endures family misery. But his mundane existence transforms when he encounters other dimensions and timelines. He visits a tuberculosis sanatorium and meets an anti-death protest movement. He joins a society that investigates dreams. He travels to the microscopic world of dust mites on a slide. Scientists like Nicolae Tesla and George Boole appear in his reality alongside mysterious artifacts like the Voynich manuscript. The teacher faces an impossible choice: save a newborn or save artwork from a burning building. His journey through forking paths reveals how life and art exchange energy across parallel universes. These alternate dimensions break through into his Communist present, creating monstrous disruptions in everyday reality.
Genres: science-fiction, dystopia, magical-realism, alternate-universe
Vibes: intimate, lyrical, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Romania, Communist Romania
Period: 20th-century
639 pages · Paperback · Deep Vellum Publishing
Content warnings: mental-illness