Fell of Dark

by Patrick Downes

Genres: Young Adult; YA Social Themes

Synopsis

A book that challenges the word "powerful" and obliterates it

Written in searing prose, this is the story of two boys: Erik, who performs miracles, and Thorn, who hears voices. The book chronicles their lives as their minds devolve into hallucinations, and shows the way their worlds intersect, culminating in a final stand-off.

This debut novel offer a raw, insightful look at the forces that compel us to act against our will. Even more so, it captivates and dares us to look away, knowing full well we can't.


Praise for FELL OF DARK:

* "Downes brilliantly plays with language and metaphor, and explores the dualities of sanity/insanity, beauty/ugliness, voice/voicelessness in a chilling echo of real incidents of school violence. A stunning debut novel that offers sophisticated readers a glimpse into the psychological disintegration of two distinct characters."--Kirkus Reviews *STARRED*

* "For many readers, this will be an impersonal but impressive work of literary art. But for some, serendipity will strike, whether in an image or in a confused, despairing reaction to an incomprehensible world, and Downes’s vision will connect into an epiphany."--Publishers Weekly *STARRED*

* "Readers willing to sink into the depths of two unstrung teens and their frantic individual struggles to understand the cruelties and redemptions of the universe will be rewarded by this disarming, thought-provoking, and entrancing story."--Booklist *STARRED*

"Readers who are up for a literary challenge will find this dual narrative provocative, beautiful, and deeply sad."--BCCB

“Here is a book built of darkness and gleam, of raw emotion and shattering poetry, of harrowing compulsions and zero compromise. Patrick Downes possesses blazing, beautiful, terrifying talent. His characters walk the shadows. His language bursts like sky.”—Beth Kephart, National Book Award nominee and author of Small Damages
 
“Luminous and pure. A masterwork of astonishing authority and beauty.”—Julie Berry, author of All the Truth That’s In Me

Release date: May 12, 2015

Publisher: Philomel Books

Print pages: 208

Sample

Eulogy

It’s all I know how to do, all I’ve ever done: read and think and write. I have to write to someone. That someone is you.

I’ve known you since before we were born. Aren’t all true loves, the really great loves, destined? All we have to do is meet. When will I learn your name?

Go ahead, ask me a question. When was I first hurt? When did I first see you? When did the first miracle happen? When was my first kiss? When did I first write a eulogy?

Eulogy for a Young Boy

He thought. He wrote. He read. He ran and drank milk. A boy made of milk and concrete. He was cut in two. He bled. He died.

A stranger smart enough to steal a child and lock a door took the boy’s life. The man cut him in half, then chewed him up. Blood and rubble.

Even though the boy was dead, he dreamed up a girl with skin and hair of light, taking care of him, holding his hand. He dreamed the girl gave him a kiss, and he wondered if the kiss would send him back to the world. It didn’t. It kept him under. He sleeps in the box with the girl made from light.

We have to forget him so we can take him with us.

That’s the eulogy exactly as it came out of me a little less than six months ago, the day I turned fourteen. I haven’t touched it. I’ve read it a few dozen times, and I still can’t be sure I understand it. But I can tell you this: I had died. I eulogized myself.

I remember the locked garage and screaming for it to be unlocked. I remember a square of brown sunlight on the floor of the garage and a window I couldn’t reach. Why couldn’t I figure how to reach the window? Why couldn’t I stack crates and climb out? I could’ve broken the glass and escaped. I don’t know. I can’t exactly tell you what happened in that garage, except I left it without the belt I had to hold up my pants, my zipper was broken, and I was bleeding. My right arm didn’t look like mine.

I don’t remember what happened, or how many times I ended up in that garage. It might’ve been once or a thousand times, but I died, and this came so soon after my mother lost my father.

No, she didn’t lose him, like he was a mitten or a penny dropped through a hole in her pocket. A car killed him in the street.