Hello there!

I have two novels near completion, both brief historical epics that take place between the late Middle Ages and Early Modern Era.

1. The Martyrdom of Ten Thousand tells the story of the Reformation in four parts — The Gospel of Ottilie; the Gospel of Luther; the Gospel of Philip; and the Gospel of Karlstadt.
   
2. A Muted Hymn shows the growing madness of the Baron Gilles de Rais after his compatriot Jeanne of Arc was captured, tried, and killed during the war between the English and the French in the early 1400s.

I’m not very good at selling my work. Most writers, to describe the experience of reading their novels, compare their story to two others. (“My book is Titanic meets Scooby Doo.”) Unfortunately, that’s not how my brain works. Both my novels seem to be members of the same family. Rather than compare them to others, I feel more comfortable describing the extended family.

For example, I might say that my novels’ father is Moby Dick. The mother is Pedro Páramo. Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson is the lonely aunt who’s been sleeping on the couch for the past fifteen months and waking far too early each morning to singe her hair with a cigarette lighter. The Holy Sinner by Thomas Mann is the lunatic step-uncle who lives in the closet.

My novels’ most recent siblings are:

The Doloriad by Missouri Williams
Recital of the Dark Verses by Luis Felipe Fabre
The Trial of Anne Thalberg by Eduardo Sangarcía

All of these stories — these convoluted members of my family — share important characteristics. Each is written with an eccentric and lyrical style. Each is haunted by religious ideas and religious trauma. Each displays a pervasive sense of joy even in the passages of most miserable suffering. And their authors, in the creation of these lugubrious beasts, seem to have suffered bouts of temporary insanity that somehow made their characters and themes more compelling and realistic.

If either (or both!) of my novels are published, it will mean the addition of a new member to the family I’ve just outlined. And that, at least to me, will be a beautiful thing.