Still Life with June - by Darren Greer (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

A disaffected writer gets caught in the morass of complicated human relationships when he appropriates the life of a former patient and befriends his mentally challenged sister.

The people in gay bars on Christmas Day are so desperate for basic human contact that they'd go home with a Doc Marten shoe if it made a move, and maybe even if it didn't.

So begins the story of Cameron Dodds, a disenfranchised writer who visits gay bars on Christmas and works at a Salvation Army Drug and Alcohol Treatment Center in order to steal the stories of the people he meets there. But when Cameron finds a patient hanged in the utilities closet, his infatuation with other people's stories becomes an obsession. Assuming the man's identity, Cameron seeks out and forges a relationship with the victim's mentally challenged sister, who lives in a home uptown. As Cameron becomes more involved in the woman's life, he begins to discover truths that will challenge him to the very core of his existence.

Review Quotes

"Mordant, hilarious, and unsparing, Still Life with June is a scourge and blessing both. Reminiscent of Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer, Knut Hamsun's Hunger, or Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground, but in a category of its own; if any school for it exists, it's the school of its own daring and invention." --Andrew Lewis Conn, author of P: A Novel

"It is a gift of humanity and storytelling that makes Darren Greer's experimental new novel a triumphant success. Still Life with June is a remarkable book, reminiscent of Catcher in the Rye, Fight Club, and Bright Lights, Big City. It's a striking, compelling narrative with a style so inventive and innovative as to be a new form." --Eric Shaw Quinn, author of Say Uncle

"A novel with edge and energy, astounding style and substance to spare." --Richard Labonté, editor of Best Gay Erotica

"Still Life with June is a compelling novel, and Darren Greer a writer we'll be hearing from." --Ralph Keyes, author of The Post-Truth Era

About the Author

Darren Greer grew up in several towns in Nova Scotia. He studied literature at the University of King's College, Halifax, and Carleton University. Still Life with June is his American debut.