An exclusive first look at Strange Creatures, my June novel from Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins

As a novelist, I’ve spent the last six years leaning heavily into my ambitions, trying to craft novels that are bigger, more ambitious, and stranger than anything you — or I — have read before. There were times this seemed like a foolish path, moments when I doubted my ability to write emotionally honest and genre-bending stories that other people would, you know, want to read. But once my novel Strange Creatures found a home with the folks at Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins, I felt confident that I was in safe hands.

And nowhere has this been more apparent than during the cover design process.

At 544 pages, Strange Creatures is, quite literally, a big book — it also straddles genre lines and has three (or is it four?) different points-of-view. Think Cloud Atlas. Think House of Leaves. Think S. Think about those books that, on some level, defy explanation — but also those books that almost compel you to fold down pages, underline passages, and pass well-worn copies to friends. As I recently tweeted:

On the surface, Strange Creatures is simple: it’s the story of a brother and a sister and the imaginary kingdom they build in the woods. The brother goes missing. The sister is sure she knows where he’s gone. But then he returns and she has to…