Whatup guys, giving away free copies of my book to anyone who wants to review it.
Dark contemporary fiction.
Spiritless but Actually Not.
Shoot me a DM and I'll send you a copy.
———Goodreads Blurb———
Twenty-two literary artifacts. Exceptionally bleak. And then impossibly: Sublime.
A picture of contemporary existence painted with strokes of rawest emotion—contained herein is everything you were told you weren’t supposed to feel. With self-recognition as you stray from the identity thrust upon you in your youth—now your own guilt and horror—find yourself reacting to a world which couldn’t give any less of a fuck about you. You swore you never would, but you’re becoming violent, and extraordinarily upset.
What do all these disparate experiences share? What overlaps between the Berkeley quantum physicist (with his intention for apotheotic omnipotence), and that of the adderall-addled teenager suffering through pre-calc?
What’s the difference in the existential horror experienced by a conservative father exercising his god-given right to purchase a barbecue to feed his suburban nuclear family… and that of the contemporary descendant of a barely-extant native culture, peering from a mountaintop into suburbia and badtripping not on drugs but existence itself?
Yes, how many gods and belief systems were culled so that we could have this rendition of society, this contemporary dystopia with its incessant drip of joy, joy, joy?
And more joy?
———Amazon Blurb———
You’ve never read this book.
You’ve never read anything like this book.
Almost unbearably vivid.
Twenty-two stories, alongside twenty-two stunning illustrations.
Monthly Goals
A young immigrant in Europe on the verge of homelessness starts a life-coaching business from his computer. His natural charisma lends itself to the activity. But at what point does charisma become sociopathy? Twelve days later (and thousands of dollars richer), his conscience is beginning to take hold. Why doesn’t he feel horrified for what he’s become? Who cares—just get the money, pay the rent, survive.
Circa 2011
A problematic teen has to watch the neighbors’ house while they’re out of town, so that, in the eyes of her mother she might “come of age” and “develop character.” Ironic then that she spends her time in the vacant home getting higher and higher, deliberately attempting to lose her mind so that all of suburbia might finally make sense. If she can just get back to the ignorance of childhood… But as she searches the empty house, room after room, suburban drywall and carpet unforthcoming—all she encounters is herself. Staring in the mirror once again, confronting the self-harm scars which dress her arms: Why am I unlike anyone else?
My Utterly Hollow Existence
A former LSD chemist walks his new neighborhood at night, alone and very paranoid. With a gun. He’s moved out here to avoid his old associates, and the vengeance they’d be justified in exacting. But what’s really getting to him is something else. Years ago, when he first encountered the nature of existence, in all its absurdity—something you can’t unsee. This runs through his head, at the store, at the park, as he peers from his blinds to the yard across the street… How can I undo this horror, which begins anew with every breath I take?
Spiritless but Actually Not is scintillating, existentially unsettling, and ultimately relatable. The writing is unforgiving, hypnotic, consumable, and elusive. What Kyle Mitchell leads us to—and ultimately pulls us out of—is the immeasurable depth of human experience itself, a profundity which we all share.
AEPH maintain the highest typographical standards, and accordingly suggest the reader purchase the paperback edition of this work, wherein shine most brilliantly all decisions made by author and illustrator regarding illustrations, footnotes, etc.
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Shoot me a DM and I'll send you a copy.