AS 01: Not So Much Cleansed As Surviving
On 'Your Dreams' by Thomas Moore and 'Counterillumination' by Audrey Szasz.
The air smells like smoke and the sun is a red yolk, but the apocalyptic aura is fitting. I will pretend this is part of our plan. We are simply using the earth to advertise all that we have going on: Counterillumination by the prodigal Audrey Szasz is out in the US and the UK, as is Your Dreams by the inimitable Thomas Moore (US, UK). Read descriptions of these two masterworks:
Audrey Szasz’s epic third novel is her most ambitious trip yet. A 400-page psychic assault course journeying through the delirious present and harrowed hellscapes of futures past. This truly encyclopaedic outsider vision of ecstasy and, until now, unimaginable horror will surely warp your pretty little mind forever.
Thomas Moore’s latest novel Your Dreams, the follow-up to 2021’s devastating Forever, is a visceral yet contained inquiry into the endless need to be understood. Eavesdropping on a debate about cancelled bands, listening to a close friend’s explanation of his disturbing desires, facilitating a conversation about kinks at a party until it goes wrong, Moore’s narrator is less of a character than a witness of desperate disconnection. Your Dreams, despite its impulse to hide, faces the reader head-on in an intimate unmasking, still grasping for closeness in a world of limits.
Writer Thomas Kendall rhapsodized about the way Moore’s prose is “that of subtractive sculpture,” he wrote in Lit Reactor, “it is what is cut away or markedly absent that reveals an impenetrable form.” Not to spoil the shrewd, engaging review that you should read in its entirety when you have the time, but it concludes with the following sentiment:
Published by the impeccable Amphetamine Sulphate, Your Dreams is a thrillingly complex, emotionally challenging novel that you may be able to physically read in a single afternoon but which will haunt you long after you put it down. It is a novel that passes through the fire and emerges out the other side, not so much cleansed as surviving.
Meanwhile, Dennis Cooper showcased both books on his renowned website. “This weekend the blog has been happily commandeered for the purpose of giving a big, warm worldly welcome to the new novel by literary wiz kid, maestro, and phenom Audrey Szasz,” he wrote about Counterillumination. “A most noble and exciting cause.”
For Your Dreams, Cooper shared an interview between Moore and remarkable writer Nate Lippens (author of the spectacular 2021 supernova My Dead Book). The pair discuss the use of the label “transgressive” in literature, changes in POV, endings, the sanitization and vilification of communities, perception, ambiguity… and more.
Additionally, writer Ben Arzate penned a thoughtful Your Dreams review on his Substack, The Feel Bad Dispatch. “Your Dreams is an incredibly amazing and devastating work,” he wrote. “It explores trauma and coping mechanisms in a painfully real and honest way.”
Finally, we have reached the portion of the post where the curtains are drawn and you can get a glimpse of what this madness is all about. Find excerpts of Counterillumination and Your Dreams below. (An extra excerpt of Counterillumination can be read on Hobart Pulp as well).
COUNTERILLUMINATION
I’ve written all of this before. Scribbled it in crayon or smudged it with fluorescent highlighter pens. I’ve scratched it into my skin with a razor blade or a safety pin. I’ve filled notebooks. I’ve seen endless sheets of paper torn up or shredded before my very eyes. My various attempts to journal or keep illicit diaries have been thwarted time and time again. I’ve seen post-it notes, scavenged receipts, or pastel pink index cards covered in my serif-laden scrawl thrown into the fire, dog-eared edges curling up, irreparably singed, burnt to ashes.... I’ve been covertly monitored, left in solitary confinement, or alternately subjected to intrusive supervision. And yet I persist, nonetheless. I will write this all down for the nth time, if not on parchment or walls then simply in my head. I will endeavour to recite this truth — my truth — but my memory is hazy — I continuously feel suffocated, inside, like I’ve slept far too much — like I’m constantly waking up from anaesthetic — like I’ve been given sedatives or prescription painkillers — like my internal sense of chronology is always out of sync — time slows to a crawl — I seem to swim along the corridors — like I’m dragged along by some invisible thread — at a glacial pace — like I’m perpetually jet-lagged — like I’m wide- awake, but somehow far away — and yet I crave further rest. Rays of divine insomnia radiate from the ceiling and the floor into my seemingly hollowed-out skull — and the windows are glazed — outside, toxic nature proliferates — a wilderness — an infestation — teeming with malignant life.... I want to just lie in bed forever and sink beneath my blankets like I’m descending into the grave — bio-stasis — frozen in time, like some abject Sleeping Beauty — the macerated marionette of an infernal machine — but I must not succumb to this role — I must not give in to this effortless passivity — I must try to resist my training, cultivate some self-worth, some sense of prevalence, or inner drive. I attempt to reassure myself by insisting that the fact that I am still writing must mean that there is something inside me which hasn’t been broken — something internalised — something like a soul or a spirit — something else — but perhaps this is all that remains — a collection of splintered fragments — some missing, some still yet to be found, some irretrievably lost — that I am attempting to put back together — or failing that, sculpt into something new....
YOUR DREAMS
How can I believe a single word that anyone says from now on?
He always joked that he’d go to hell.
“When are you coming to see me?”
John’s voice sounds brittle and heavy at the same time – if that makes sense – I don’t know if I’m the best to tell or not. There are too many pauses in what we say and I can’t tell if it’s down to him or me. I can’t tell if he’s wanting to see me or not, which is appropriate, given that that’s identical to my current feelings towards him. It’s this feeling of suddenly not knowing someone who I felt like I’d known my whole life.
“I fly on Wednesday. I’ve booked a taxi to pick me up late Tuesday night, early Wednesday morning. The flight is at 6am.”
Even listing the facts feels exhausting. I’m dreading having to talk about the things that we have to – the things that I can’t say over the phone, the reason why I got a new credit card to fund my airfare to New York, so I can look John in the eye when we talk about them, the things that I can’t address right now, the things that John doesn’t even make reference to despite them being the entire basis for us having this conversation.
“When will you get here?”
“12pm your time on Wednesday. I fly into Newark. It’ll take me about an hour or two to get into the city and get settled.”
“Call me when you get here.”
“I will.”
“It’ll be good to see you. I mean with everything that’s…”
I wince and am relieved when John stops where he does. I can’t do this right now and feel – not glad, but – it’s just easier that seemingly he can’t do it right now either.
“I’ll talk to you soon. Travel safely.”
xoxo AS Head Girl Danielle Chelosky
Really still processing both of these, I read them within about a week of each other and --- well, that was quite the week.