Simplicity
A Novel
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- £9.49
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- £9.49
Publisher Description
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the acclaimed author of horror sensation Boys Weekend, a vibrant new graphic novel about a timid academic sent out from the walled dystopian security territory of New York City to investigate a cult in the wilds of the Catskill Mountains
"Mattie Lubchansky is a genius.”—Kristen Arnett, New York Times bestselling author of Mostly Dead Things and With Teeth
"[Lubchansky] blends dystopian science fiction and folk horror into a queer, trans story of hard-won hope in a future as terrifying—and as ridiculous—as our present. Sexy, insightful, and darkly funny.”—Lindsay King-Miller, author of The Z Word
In 1977, a group called The Spiritual Association of Peers decamps to the woods of the Catskills, taking over an abandoned summer camp. They name their new home Simplicity.
In 2081, scholar Lucius Pasternak, a fastidiously organized trans man, tries to keep his head down living in the New York City Administrative and Security Territory, which was founded after the formal dissolution of the United States in 2041. Then, he's offered a job by the mayor, billionaire real estate developer Dennis Van Wervel, to complete an anthropological survey of the people of Simplicity for a history museum he's financing. A wary Lucius is nevertheless drawn in by the people of the small wooded community, intrigued by its strange rituals and in particular by the charming acolyte Amity Crown-Shy. Born and raised on the compound, Amity is comfortable in their own skin, a striking contrast to Lucius' repressed reserve. But Lucius' control starts to slip when he begins to suffer visions both terrifying and sensual—visits from beautiful but nightmarish creatures.
Then, just as Lucius discovers that Van Wervel's project is more sinister than it seemed, members of the community begin to disappear, leaving behind grisly signs of struggle. The denizens of Simplicity believe that a being they call “The Lamentation” is responsible for the attacks. Amity and Lucius set out to hunt for the creature in the dangerous Exurb Zones, a wild wood full of libertarian doomsday preppers, wealthy isolationists, and worse. There, they'll finally discover the true threat to their way of life—and what they're willing to do to stop it.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The future is hauntingly familiar and hilariously horrific in the ambitious latest from Lubchansky (Boys Weekend). In the year 2081, anthropology student Lucius Pasternak is hired by the Museum of the Former State of New York to leave his high-tech walled city and study Simplicity, a hippie commune that's survived in the woods since the 1970s. "We're mighty kind here," he's told not long after arriving. "That doesn't mean we're just nice." Lucius interviews commune members, works on their farm, and observes the Mutual Rite, a nightly orgy of sex and violence in which they release their collective id. Inevitably, he becomes part of the community, and Simplicity's countercultural rejection of gender assumptions is refreshing to him as a trans man. But mystical visions of nature gods, monster sightings in the woods, and a string of bloody deaths suggest that Simplicity may not be so simple after all. Lubchansky's bright, cartoony art lends lightness and humor to the story's heavier elements and gives the moments of fantasy a psychedelic touch. The book is almost too many things at once—science fiction, folk horror, political satire, call to revolution—but Lubchansky spins the disparate elements into an audacious story about 20th-century utopian dreams meeting 21st-century cynicism. It's a sharp addition to the canon of socially relevant science fiction.
