Nicola Mason: Because the book involves time travel, there are two Aarons and two Violets (what one reviewer calls a ménage à quatre). As readers, we are privy to the thoughts of both Violets—the impassioned musician in 1988 and the frazzled mother of two in 2006....
Acre Books Blog
An Interview with Thomas Legendre, Part 2
Nicola Mason: In your essay “A Phenomenology of Fiction,” you describe how modern philosophy and quantum physics undergird not just your characters’ perceptions but your writing methodology as well. I was particularly struck by Christopher Tilley’s treatment of...
An Interview with Thomas Legendre, Part 1
Nicola Mason: In Keeping Time, Aaron is an archaeologist—and American expat in Scotland—and his knowledge of Neolithic sites and rituals derives in large part from your script-writing research for Half Life, an environmental art event (taking place across a hundred...
Three Foreword INDIES finalists for Acre!
Three of Acre’s titles made the Foreword INDIES Book of the Year finalist lists—Ethan Chatagnier’s Warnings from the Future (short stories), Michael Downs’s The Strange and True Tale of Horace Wells, Surgeon Dentist (historical), Sara Kersting’s Duty to Warn...
Acre’s Holiday Sampler, Part 4
We continue our review of Acre’s 2018 titles with The Strange and True Tale of Horace Wells, Surgeon Dentist—a novel that the Los Angeles Review of Books aptly described as “not so much a character study or psychological novel as a meditation on the power of pain—the...
JMWW reviews A STRANGE AND TRUE TALE
JMWW weighs in with glowing review for THE STRANGE AND TRUE TALE OF HORACE WELLS, SURGEON DENTIST.
Rave Reviews for Acre’s Offerings
Sara Kersting’s Duty to Warn—due out in October—has already racked up two amazing reviews: one in Kirkus, another (starred!) forthcoming in Foreword, which hails the book as “a finely tuned, suspenseful chase story . . . captivating.”Annnnddd, The Strange and True...
Michael Downs on His Debut Novel
Michael Downs, author of the newly released Strange and True Tale of Horace Wells, Surgeon Dentist, answers a few questions about his ambitious, sweeping debut novel, centered on the modest, scientifically-minded man who changed the world by discovering that nitrous...
Spring Release and Fall Lineup!
It’s a banner day for Acre Books: the official release date of our fledgling press’s first novel—Michael Downs’s THE STRANGE AND TRUE TALE OF HORACE WELLS, SURGEON DENTIST—as well as the big reveal of our fall lineup of fab titles! Tooth keys, erupting mountains,...
Podcast: Michael Downs on His Debut Novel
The story of the doctor who discovered painless surgery was possible. LISTEN to Michael Downs discuss his new novel, The Strange and True Tale of Horace Wells, Surgeon Dentist, on Baltimore’s NPR news station.