Aqueous Books announces the release of the 2nd edition of HiStory of Santa Monica by Michael J. Atwood
Now On Sale!
- New Reader’s Guide
- Hand-drawn Map of Santa Monica
- Larger font
- Justified margins and spacing
Contacts: Cynthia Reeser, publisher, Aqueous Books - pubs@aqueousbooks.com or Michael J. Atwood, author, 508-243-2591 – mja2atwood@mac.com. See mjatwood.com or historyofsantamonica.com for more information.
The collection is thematically linked by both the characters—who are struggling to realize their Hollywood dreams and the setting—Santa Monica, California. A seemingly peaceful seaside city, Santa Monica is also a purgatory where the characters must face failure and loss—as well as their demons and ghosts. Family and ritual are consistent motifs throughout the collection, as are the themes of escape, addiction, redemption, reparation, religion, and death. Whether it is a young couple looking to buy their first home or a man returning to his hometown for a funeral or a baptism, readers will find the everyday rituals in these stories identifiable in many ways.
- Michael J. Atwood is a fiction writer and weekly opinion columnist for the North Attleborough Free Press (Massachusetts). His work has appeared in a number of literary magazines and online journals.
HiStory of Santa Monica is also available from the following retailers:
Books on the Square - Providence, RI
Brown University - Providence, RI
Boston College Bookstore - Boston, MA
Baker Books - Dartmouth, MA
All Newbury Comics locations, MA
Brookline Booksmith - Boston, MA
Village Books - Pacific Palisades, CA
Heywood Hill Ltd. - London, England
Shakespeare & Co. - Paris, France
A book for anyone who has ever been in love or hate with the idea (or actuality) of Hollywood, HiStory of Santa Monica is one of this year’s best collections about the Golden State. Written by Michael J. Atwood and published by Aqueous Books, HiStory tackles themes of men supporting crumbling families with careers in teaching or screenwriting, reprehensible behavior, and an East versus West coast war that turns typical debates upside down. Atwood’s collection of twelve stories is full of beautiful details so elegantly picked—like Californian grapes themselves, the author’s intricate attention to the facets of life in Los Angeles is intoxicating. He makes any ex-Californians hungry for the taste of home—details down to In and Out Burger make for a collection of mouth-wateringly real stories. Atwood captures the diversity of California’s terrain and shows a love for his home state: “A traffic light held red and swayed gently in the breeze coming off the sea. I stopped for a moment and strained and heard the ocean just a mile away. To the north, I heard a coyote howling in the canyon.”
Atwood’s is a refreshingly fresh voice, rolling to the rhythm of the Pacific Ocean, but with the edge of a salty Boston harbor, and readers can’t help but have their own debate about what coast to call home. The author may shift tenses and points of view throughout the collection, but his colloquially poetic voice stays. While juxtaposing East and West, Atwood also compares beach and desert; this duplicity sways through his writing like picture frames during an earthquake. “The road behind us is dark and quiet,” Atwood writes in the story “Windmills.” “I look in my rearview mirror but see only a long empty path of tar leading back through the desert to Palm Springs—our promised land. It’s illuminated by the orange sun, which is burning out brilliantly.” Atwood’s attention to the moment brings readers back to a time before the instant gratification of flash literature, and lets the reader sink into his beautiful language.
While Atwood writes about families, not a single family in the work is functional or even communicating well—but within the brokenness hide real relationships and flawed, but heart-throbbing, characters. The interconnectivity within the book could confuse readers, specifically when two stories in the novel contain the same character, Gabriel. It seems Gabriel bookends the collection—we start with him, nervous at his uncle’s funeral, and end with him, nervous at his nephew’s baptism. However, Gabriel seems to grow out of his nervousness—on the last page of the collection, after running away from his nephew’s baptism, he takes the initiative to answer his enraged sister’s call. One could argue every character is a reflection, or shadow, of Gabriel in a way, even the one story in which Atwood conquers the female perspective. This mono-character is not droning, however, but more refreshing—in this way, readers realize how many people have the same thoughts, concerns, problems. After reading HiStory of Santa Monica, there is left a feeling of connectedness, a satisfied need for good literature, and a craving for Mexican food.
