Shadowbahn

Book excerpt: A LA TIMES' BEST BOOK OF 2017 (FICTION) “Gorgeous, compassionate, weird, unpredictable, alarmingly prescient . . . an answer to and sanctuary from the American Century to come." —Fiona Maazel, New York Times Book Review When the Twin Towers suddenly reappear in the Badlands of South Dakota two decades after their fall, nobody can explain their return. To the tens of thousands drawn to the “American Stonehenge” — including Parker and Zema, siblings driving from L.A. to Michigan — the Towers seem to sing, even as everybody hears a different song. And on the ninety-third floor of the South Tower, Jesse Presley, the stillborn twin of the most famous singer who ever lived, suddenly awakes. Over the days and months and years to come, he’s driven mad by a voice in his head that sounds like his but isn’t, and by the memory of a country where he survived in his brother’s place. So begins Shadowbahn, a kaleidoscopic, musical road-trip across the dreamscape of American destiny. Original and fearless in vision and form, Steve Erickson’s novel speaks to our current times, and to a nation “defiling its own great idea . . . the moment that idea was born.” “A beautiful, moving, strange examination of apocalypse and rebirth.” —Neil Gaiman, author of American Gods “Jaw-dropping. A tour-de-forcer’s tour de force.” —Jonathan Lethem, Granta