It’s also quite funny to be clear
by Luke O’Neil
For the past year or so I’ve been publishing short stories and poetry here in Flaming Hydra and in my own newsletter Welcome to Hell World. If you have enjoyed them I have some very good news because the best of those pieces—plus dozens of newer ones—have now been collected in my new book We Had It Coming. The book is the followup to my 2023 collection A Creature Wanting Form. Readers will find a similar mix of solace and despair about the world we live in today and the one we will soon find ourselves in.
It’s also quite funny to be clear!
This is my fourth book for the mighty OR Books. Is it a coincidence that Zohran Mamdani shouted out OR Books just hours before his big win?
Well we don’t know.
There is a lot of ground covered but I suppose one of the central things the book is concerned with is:
I don’t think I know how to live correctly. If there is a correct way. What does a person do?
And:
I asked her something like is it devastating for you how many awful people there are in the world or instead is it heartening how many good people there are in spite of that and she said she needed to think about that one for a while.
I wake up every day and think no one is going to stop this she said after some silence. No one? And then resign myself to that fact and start the whole process all over again.
I am not naive she said. I did not just learn about how the world works today. Over the past year. It’s just that my stubborn belief in the goodness of people has been so hard to finally and utterly kill off. And it repairs itself like a slowly mending heart.
I don’t know how many people are evil I said. Not most. But enough of them that the balance doesn’t make a difference. They are worse than we are not.
It also features some lovely and/or unsettling illustrations by Tyler Littwin.
Purchasing it or asking your local book store or library to stock it or sharing the word would be greatly appreciated.
If any of you would like a review copy for your publication or podcast or what have you let me know and we can sort that out.
