Dear Editors,
I am seeking publication for a crypto-fictitious nonsense novella called A Life in the Book of Monsters: Arthur Hindside Comes of Age (24,000 words). I think it may be a good fit for your publishing house.
The novella tells the story of a failing romantic poet in the middle years of the nineteenth century, who believes that the monsters of myth still inhabit the far-flung places of the earth. He feels compelled by moral duty to encounter these monsters and tell the world about their true nature. The book employs multiple text types – diary extracts, letters, poems, and extracts from academic texts – to tell the tale of his early life. The poet, who may suffer from a delusional psychosis, is nearly drowned by an imaginary sea-monster while crossing the channel from France, and recuperates in a sanitorium. Upon release, he works a brief stint as a journalist but is fired for drawing the ire of the Church. His attempts to fit with London literary society are met with scorn and derision and his absurd poetry is rejected by a small-scale publisher. Finally, his benefactor tires of his failures and sends him off to Scotland to be a schoolteacher, at which point he is kidnapped by fairies for seven years, and the volume ends. I am planning two further volumes to tell of his middle years (travelling in Asia), and later life (working as a folklorist in Scotland).
The book is intended as parlour-book nonsense, something to be idled over in the lounge room, or perhaps the lavatory. I believe it may amuse anyone who enjoyed Edward Lear as a child (or Edward Gorey as an adult), but its more complex nature may also appeal to fans of James Branch Cabell, Flann O’Brien, or some of Jeff VanderMeer’s post-modern fiction. I intend further volumes on Hindside's travels to the East, and his life in old age as a still-deluded antiquarian and folklorist.
Thank you for taking the time to review this submission. I look forward to hearing from you.
Kind regards,
S. J. McKenzie.
I am seeking publication for a crypto-fictitious nonsense novella called A Life in the Book of Monsters: Arthur Hindside Comes of Age (24,000 words). I think it may be a good fit for your publishing house.
The novella tells the story of a failing romantic poet in the middle years of the nineteenth century, who believes that the monsters of myth still inhabit the far-flung places of the earth. He feels compelled by moral duty to encounter these monsters and tell the world about their true nature. The book employs multiple text types – diary extracts, letters, poems, and extracts from academic texts – to tell the tale of his early life. The poet, who may suffer from a delusional psychosis, is nearly drowned by an imaginary sea-monster while crossing the channel from France, and recuperates in a sanitorium. Upon release, he works a brief stint as a journalist but is fired for drawing the ire of the Church. His attempts to fit with London literary society are met with scorn and derision and his absurd poetry is rejected by a small-scale publisher. Finally, his benefactor tires of his failures and sends him off to Scotland to be a schoolteacher, at which point he is kidnapped by fairies for seven years, and the volume ends. I am planning two further volumes to tell of his middle years (travelling in Asia), and later life (working as a folklorist in Scotland).
The book is intended as parlour-book nonsense, something to be idled over in the lounge room, or perhaps the lavatory. I believe it may amuse anyone who enjoyed Edward Lear as a child (or Edward Gorey as an adult), but its more complex nature may also appeal to fans of James Branch Cabell, Flann O’Brien, or some of Jeff VanderMeer’s post-modern fiction. I intend further volumes on Hindside's travels to the East, and his life in old age as a still-deluded antiquarian and folklorist.
Thank you for taking the time to review this submission. I look forward to hearing from you.
Kind regards,
S. J. McKenzie.
