This post received about 1200 visits in its first ten days. That's no indication of how many readers there are, but it seemed like a good sign.
I have sent this book to only two publishers. One accepted it with the highest praise and we signed a contract. Then he mysteriously unburdened himself of it many months later, in case you're wondering why I present it here. I believe I'd get more readers by offering it for free, instead of trying for another small press, and maybe pick up some more interest in my books that way. Right now I'm shopping other books to publishers.
For now, anyone can read "The Lord's Hacker." Please read it here, paste the full manuscript onto your computer or Kindle, or give it to others. Print it out if you like. When you're done with it, drop it from your window page by page, or keep it in a drawer for your mom. It's your book.
The Lord’s Hacker
A Novel
Ryan Blacketter
For Harland, a wild and
extraordinary soul
“I couldn’t put The
Lord’s Hacker down. Often it felt like On the Road, capturing swift
movement and many characters in the American tapestry. The book is
psychologically fraught, understated, and rewarding. By the title, I assumed it
was an exposé of a Christian charlatan, but I was delighted
to discover it’s about love, life, and hope. The writing is raw and evocative
and it inspired me to write.” --Jose
Chaves, author of The Contract of Love
"Ryan has a marvelous eye for the
emotional textures of the most commonplace experience, the kind that
familiarity makes almost subliminal." --Marilynne Robinson, author
of Housekeeping
“Ryan Blacketter’s writing is often humorous
and melancholy in the same breath.” –Mary Owen, daughter of Donna Reed
“[Ryan’s] characters
are interesting and real.” --Robert
Pollard of Guided by Voices
"The
author’s prose is as outstanding as the story it conveys, with spare, raw
dialogue and deft scene-setting that is descriptive without feeling
overwrought."
--Kirkus Review on Horses
All Over Hell
Author of Down in the River and Horses All Over Hell, Ryan is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. His books have been explored in Poets & Writers, Kirkus Review, Fiction Writers Review, Paste Magazine, the Rumpus, Largehearted Boy, Pittsburgh City Paper, Canada’s Miramichi Reader, and Rain Taxi Review of Books. He served as fiction mentor through PEN America’s Writing and Justice Program for ten years.
“The greatest trick the Devil ever
pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist.”
--Charles Baudelaire
