Starman After Midnight: A Novel-in-stories
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- $4.99
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- $4.99
Publisher Description
In suburban Wells Port, things are not what they seem: wild animals appear unexpectedly in backyards, raised garden beds produce fruit in days, not weeks, and a mysterious figure lurks across sidewalks late at night.
The stories in Starman After Midnight weave an often hilarious and sometimes melancholy spell. Four young boys are terrorized by a wiener dog on their walk to school, but strategize for a safer route. A beer-loving man befriends a likeminded neighbor, only to discover his jovial new acquaintance is a registered sex offender. An elderly Uber driver suspects a young rider is being lured by a night stalker and debates whether he should help her or mind his own business.
Connecting these stories are two next-door neighbors—Seff and Big Dave—who couldn't be more different: one a progressive-minded writer, the other a conservative plumber. Their love of beer drinking, backyard philosophizing, and gossiping brings them together. When several pets in the neighborhood wind up missing or worse—dead—Seff and Big Dave monitor their security cameras for the culprit. When they discover a naked man roaming their street late at night, suspicions are raised while hysteria spreads through the neighborhood social media app. What is the connection between the missing pets and this naked man? Seff and Big Dave form a posse of neighbors to find out.
Moving between humor and surrealism, friendship and grief, Starman After Midnight is a novel told in stories, a collection that adds up to something greater than the sum of its parts. From the quirky imagination of Scott Semegran, Starman After Midnight packs a comedic punch and uncovers the magic that seems possible in ordinary places.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
An unlikely friendship is tested by zany events in this darkly funny if diffuse novel from Semegran (The Benevolent Lords of Sometimes Island). Seff, a writer, finds a drinking buddy in Big Dave, the conservative plumber who lives next door in their Austin, Tex., suburb. Big Dave's belief in climate change ("Ranchers and farmers... know better than to deny what Mother Earth is telling us") and generally compassionate nature perpetually upends Seff's stereotypical assumptions about right-wingers. When other neighbors' pets start disappearing and some come back mutilated, Big Dave insists they install cameras. The cameras capture another nuisance: a man walking naked in the middle of the night, and Big Dave becomes fixated on tracking down the "pervert," putting a strain on his and Seff's friendship. The novel's numbered chapters are intercut with short stories devoted to side characters, such as the trio of brothers who try to outsmart a dachshund that chases them on the way to school in "The Kirby Boys Battle Cindy the Weiner Dog," and the young girl who tends a magical garden in "Melon Girl." Not all of it hangs together, but Semegran has a knack for drawing colorful characters. This waggish slice of life is worth a look. (Self-published)
