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Dearest Readers,
Have you heard that we are running another membership drive? Membership, membership, membership, membership. Literature > money, but literature is often funded by trust fund babies with millions squirreled away in stylish tote bag. Be our Medici?
Membership as gift! Membership with letters from authors! Membership as membership as membership! 318 supports have joined us so far. We need 282 readers to step up and get us to our 600 Member goal.
with love and tryptophan,
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Letters in the Mail (from authors)
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Every month subscribers get a book in the mail handpicked by The Rumpus staff. We search for titles that we are truly excited about!
Next up: USERS by Colin Winnette for our (prose) Book Club (excerpt below!) and JUDAS GOAT by Gabrielle Bates for our Poetry Book Club selection. If you're not already a subscriber, join by midnight December 15 to receive either or BOTH!
*You can also select 🎁 THIS IS A GIFT 🎁 for a favorite reader on your holiday gift list!
As a subscriber, you'll also be invited to an exclusive online discussion with the book's author the last week of every month and we'll send you a pass code to join. These will take place on the brand new Rumpus Crowdcast channel and will remain available to members for 1 month after they take place in case you miss the live event or you'd like to re-watch the conversation later.
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This week we're sharing an excerpt from our January Book Club pick USERS by Colin Winette, to be published on February 21, 2022 by Soft Skull Press. Join the Book Club by December 15 to receive a copy of the novel and join our subscriber-only discussion with the author.
1
YOUR HEART WILL STOP
Miles was getting death threats. So far, fewer than he would have liked. Not that he wanted to be getting death threats, but once he started seeing them for what they were, he felt like having a few more, from a few more people, would somehow be less threatening. Technically, this first one wasn’t the first. It was the first he’d noticed. The first he’d recognized as a legitimate death threat.
SOON
That was all the real first threat had said. He was sure he wasn’t alone in his capacity to misinterpret the message. It was only a word, and words came alive in context. They relied on one another; the difference between a log and a log cabin.
YOUR HEART WILL STOP
The messages were letter-pressed on weighted stationery—not tossed off online in a fit of pique. There was no postmark on either envelope, no return address. Someone had spent time, actual money. They had carried the notes to his home, slid them in the mail slot, and left.
When Miles’s daughters arrived home from school to find him staring at the refrigerator, they absently asked about the new artwork mounted to its door.
“It’s a reminder,” he told them. “A note to myself.”
“It’s pretty,” said his six-year-old, fingering the edge of the cream-colored paper.
Miles had placed a kitchen magnet on the bottom half of the threat, so the top half became a flap that could conceal or reveal the message with a touch. He guided his daughter’s hand from the flap before she could lift it.
But she was right. It was pretty. The quality of the stationery was part of the reason he’d overlooked the first threat.
SOON
Seeing the envelope, he’d mistaken it for a wedding invitation. Opening it, he’d amended the mistake, guessing it was advance notice for a forthcoming save-the-date.
YOUR HEART WILL STOP
There was no longer room for misinterpretation. Soon finally had a context. Soon was when his heart would stop.
(continue reading here)
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