Today marks the official release of Blake Butler's Scorch Atlas from Featherproof Books, and I can't urge you enough to pick up a copy directly from Featherproof or from one of the other usual places you buy books, all of which should have it available. Scorch Atlas is a fiercely original book, and one I've had the pleasure of reading once in manuscript form and then again, earlier this summer, when I picked up a final copy of the book at The Dollar Store reading here in Ann Arbor.

Scorch Atlas contains fourteen interlocking stories, each one rendering some family relationship apocalyptic and imperiled. What at first may seem merely bizarre--especially given the shifting forms that provide much of the textual delight of the book--eventually becomes terrifyingly familiar. Butler excels at forcing the familiar through the a sieve of strange until it is stripped clean of its everyday banality, until it is once again made so fresh you can smell the decay it contains, until you can taste the despair that threatens to destroy not just his characters but also the dangerous worlds they inhabit.

Enhancing the text is Zach Dodson's gorgeous design work, from the book's spectacular cover to the "destroyed" pages within, each one bearing some unique set of deformations. No other book looks like this, and the fact that the design goes so far as to mimic the apocalypses happening within the text is a testament to what makes Featherproof such a unique press. I think writers spend a lot of time worrying about who will be willing to publish their work, and maybe not enough thinking about what presses are a perfect fit for the book itself, but in this case there can be no doubt: Scorch Atlas is a book perhaps only Featherproof could have published this well, and as readers we're all lucky that Butler and the Featherproof editors found each other and agreed to work together.

Again, you can buy a copy of Scorch Atlas from Featherproof Books, or anywhere else you regularly buy books. I hope you'll pick up a copy, and that you'll enjoy this book as much as I have. Like all of Butler's work, this is a book that both invites and demands repeated reading, with each subsequent trip through its stories revealing more of the great artistry and heart contained within. I can't wait to read it again, and if you haven't read it yet yourself, then you can't afford to wait either.

Congratulations again, to Blake and everyone at Featherproof! Scorch Atlas is a great book and fine object, and you all deserve to feel very proud today.