Kill Me Now

Praise for Kill Me Now One of the Most Anticipated Small Press Books of 2018 (Big Other) Reed convincingly writes a three-dimensional teenager whose self-consciousness, emotions, and hormones threaten to crush him. . . . A coming-of-age story capturing male adolescence in all its disgusting, irrational, and messy glory. --Kirkus Reviews What distinguishes the book is Miles' voice: introspective, self-aware, wry, and honest . . . The result is a delightful coming-of-age story. --Booklist Reed captures all the hilarious grossness of being a teenage boy in this solid coming-of-age story. --Publishers Weekly What's most impressive about Reed's work is his attention to detail. From his elaborate descriptions of Baltimore neighborhoods to evocative scenes of Miles smoking weed with his eccentric old neighbor (whom his sisters suspect is a serial killer), Reed meticulously takes readers on a summer-long journey that is as viscerally awkward as our own teenage years. --Baltimore Magazine Kill Me Now could be the story of Huckleberry Finn's trip to Hell...or no, just the seamier sides of Baltimore--not so much the mean streets of The Wire as the post-apocalyptic working class neighborhoods of Matt Porterfield's Putty Hill. Miles Lover, a.k.a. Retard, is as crusty a kid as they come, with a taste for strains of trouble that would stagger an adult. But as much as he thinks of himself as a moron, his perceptions of the weird world he lives in are subtly and precisely nuanced, and his story, inside its scaly carapace, has a surprisingly tender heart. --Madison Smartt Bell, author of Behind the Moon Timmy Reed is one of the best. In Kill Me Now, he has created one of the great teenage narrators of our time. Like a modern version of Updike's Sammy, Miles Lover is part philosopher, part screw up, and part skateboarding prince of Baltimore. He's wild and buzzing and will say almost anything. Including the truth. --Scott McClanahan, author of The Sarah Book, Hill William, and Crapalachia There was Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn, then J. D. Salinger's Holden Caulfield, and now there is Timmy Reed's Miles Lover, the irrepressible narrator of Kill Me Now, which is itself a funny, compassionate, and twisted take on the coming-of-age novel. --Michael Kimball, author of Us, Big Ray, and Dear Everybody Kill Me Now is the answer to all the literary fiction that ever bored you . . . a guide book on how to cheat death, smoke bowls, tre flip in the pouring rain. Tough, honest, beautiful in only the way the unashamed ever are. Kill Me Now is an M-80 in an open palm, fuse lit, world holding its breath. --Bud Smith, author of Work and F 250 Timmy Reed writes like a whacked-out angel. Miles Lover is the perfect everykid, overlooked and underestimated and so sharply observant it makes you wince a little. I loved this book. --Amber Sparks, Author of The Unfinished World and May We Shed These Human Bodies If George Saunders and Russell Edson had a baby, he'd probably grow up to write like Timmy Reed. --Jessica Anya Blau, author of Drinking Closer to Home Praise for I.R.L. Timmy Reed is one of the most original prose stylists to come down the pike in the last couple of decades, but there's more to his work than just style, and that 'more' includes a remarkable emotional honesty. In a hundred unexpected ways, I.R.L. lets you know just what it feels like to live in this weird world we share. --Madison Smartt Bell, author of Behind the Moon and National Book Award finalist All Souls' Rising I.R.L. is probably the best book I've ever read about someone who's addicted to the Internet, and showing what constantly being connected does to how we think, feel, and act. And this book is pretty funny while at the same time being deeply disturbing. Every time I read more Reed I want to keep reading more Reed. You will too. - Jamie Iredell, author of Last Mass Praise for Miraculous Fauna No one writes like Timmy Reed; he has a haunting, unique voice that sticks hard and fast in your head. Miraculous Fauna is freaky in the very best way. You'll glide straight through to the tender and enchanting end. --Jessica Anya Blau, author of Drinking Closer to Home and The Summer of Naked Swim Parties Miraculous Fauna is nothing less than a miracle of a novel: beautifully strange and richly moving. Timmy Reed continues to create worlds that I long to get lost in, and this novel is no exception. Start reading, and soon you'll want to get lost in Miraculous Fauna too. --Laura van den Berg, author of Isle of Youth and Find Me Timmy Reed's sense of detail and description astounds me and makes me jealous, that he threads so much of that through this Miraculous Fauna is nothing short of, well, miraculous. Baby Rachel is a beautiful monster and the novel is full of great compassion. Miraculous Fauna is one of the most fantastic and one of the most fucked up novels I've read in years. --Michael Kimball, author of Big Ray, Us and Dear Everybody Robots will never replicate the imaginative heart and soul in a Timmy Reed creation. Very few authors can make me sincerely say awwww after one sentence, then giggle in the next. The magic in Miraculous Fauna does this within celebrity-culture-infatuated backdrop that takes the reader inside and outside the experience of reality. --Tracy Dimond, author of Sorry I Wrote So Many Sad Poems Today and I Want Your Tan Bobbi is a multidimensional, finely drawn character; the plot surrounding her years of road-tripping with Rachel is compelling; and the themes present throughout the novel are affecting and thought-provoking, clearly stated without sinking into heavy-handedness. --Miranda Fisher, Fields Magazine And in Miraculous Fauna, Timmy Reed has given us a parable of our zombified lives. --Michael Tager, JMWW Praise for The Ghosts That Surrounded Them Reminiscent of Shane Jones and Kevin Brockmeier, but with a style all its own, Timmy Reed's The Ghosts That Surrounded Them is a history of the unseen world, a beautifully written surreal meditation on life and death, the distances that surround us all, and the beauty of life. Reed is a real talent. I devoured this book in a single sitting, and it stayed with me like few others. --CL Bledsoe, author of Man of Clay Timmy Reed, in the vein of Matt Bell and Blake Butler, is the literary world's next exciting wordsmith, but it is the tender care of his subjects--fragile, human ones--for which he will really be remembered. --Jen Michalski, author of The Tide King and Could You Be With Her Now Timmy Reed has a strange and wonderful imagination, one of the results of which is the beautifully haunted world of The Ghosts That Surrounded Them, a short novel that reads like a fake handbook of the world with a particular emphasis on the fascinating history of ghosts and reminds the reader of the inescapable tragedy of the human condition. --Michael Kimball author of Big Ray and Dear Everybody Praise for Kill Me Now Reed convincingly writes a three-dimensional teenager whose self-consciousness, emotions, and hormones threaten to crush him. . . . A coming-of-age story capturing male adolescence in all its disgusting, irrational, and messy glory. --Kirkus Reviews What distinguishes the book is Miles' voice: introspective, self-aware, wry, and honest . . . The result is a delightful coming-of-age story. --Booklist Reed captures all the hilarious grossness of being a teenage boy in this solid coming-of-age story. --Publishers Weekly Kill Me Now could be the story of Huckleberry Finn's trip to Hell...or no, just the seamier sides of Baltimore--not so much the mean streets of The Wire as the post-apocalyptic working class neighborhoods of Matt Porterfield's Putty Hill. Miles Lover, a.k.a. Retard, is as crusty a kid as they come, with a taste for strains of trouble that would stagger an adult. But as much as he thinks of himself as a moron, his perceptions of the weird world he lives in are subtly and precisely nuanced, and his story, inside its scaly carapace, has a surprisingly tender heart. --Madison Smartt Bell, author of Behind the Moon Timmy Reed is one of the best. In Kill Me Now, he has created one of the great teenage narrators of our time. Like a modern version of Updike's Sammy, Miles Lover is part philosopher, part screw up, and part skateboarding prince of Baltimore. He's wild and buzzing and will say almost anything. Including the truth. --Scott McClanahan, author of The Sarah Book, Hill William, and Crapalachia There was Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn, then J. D. Salinger's Holden Caulfield, and now there is Timmy Reed's Miles Lover, the irrepressible narrator of Kill Me Now, which is itself a funny, compassionate, and twisted take on the coming-of-age novel. --Michael Kimball, author of Us, Big Ray, and Dear Everybody Kill Me Now is the answer to all the literary fiction that ever bored you . . . a guide book on how to cheat death, smoke bowls, tre flip in the pouring rain. Tough, honest, beautiful in only the way the unashamed ever are. Kill Me Now is an M-80 in an open palm, fuse lit, world holding its breath. --Bud Smith, author of Work and F 250 Timmy Reed writes like a whacked-out angel. Miles Lover is the perfect everykid, overlooked and underestimated and so sharply observant it makes you wince a little. I loved this book. --Amber Sparks, Author of The Unfinished World and May We Shed These Human Bodies If George Saunders and Russell Edson had a baby, he'd probably grow up to write like Timmy Reed. --Jessica Anya Blau, author of Drinking Closer to Home Praise for I.R.L. Timmy Reed is one of the most original prose stylists to come down the pike in the last couple of decades, but there's more to his work than just style, and that 'more' includes a remarkable emotional honesty. In a hundred unexpected ways, I.R.L. lets you know just what it feels like to live in this weird world we share. --Madison Smartt Bell, author of Behind the Moon and National Book Award finalist All Souls' Rising I.R.L. is probably the best book I've ever read about someone who's addicted to the Internet, and showing what constantly being connected does to how we think, feel, and act. And this book is pretty funny while at the same time being deeply disturbing. Every time I read more Reed I want to keep reading more Reed. You will too. - Jamie Iredell, author of Last Mass Praise for Miraculous Fauna No one writes like Timmy Reed; he has a haunting, unique voice that sticks hard and fast in your head. Miraculous Fauna is freaky in the very best way. You'll glide straight through to the tender and enchanting end. --Jessica Anya Blau, author of Drinking Closer to Home and The Summer of Naked Swim Parties Miraculous Fauna is nothing less than a miracle of a novel: beautifully strange and richly moving. Timmy Reed continues to create worlds that I long to get lost in, and this novel is no exception. Start reading, and soon you'll want to get lost in Miraculous Fauna too. --Laura van den Berg, author of Isle of Youth and Find Me Timmy Reed's sense of detail and description astounds me and makes me jealous, that he threads so much of that through this Miraculous Fauna is nothing short of, well, miraculous. Baby Rachel is a beautiful monster and the novel is full of great compassion. Miraculous Fauna is one of the most fantastic and one of the most fucked up novels I've read in years. --Michael Kimball, author of Big Ray, Us and Dear Everybody Robots will never replicate the imaginative heart and soul in a Timmy Reed creation. Very few authors can make me sincerely say awwww after one sentence, then giggle in the next. The magic in Miraculous Fauna does this within celebrity-culture-infatuated backdrop that takes the reader inside and outside the experience of reality. --Tracy Dimond, author of Sorry I Wrote So Many Sad Poems Today and I Want Your Tan Bobbi is a multidimensional, finely drawn character; the plot surrounding her years of road-tripping with Rachel is compelling; and the themes present throughout the novel are affecting and thought-provoking, clearly stated without sinking into heavy-handedness. --Miranda Fisher, Fields Magazine And in Miraculous Fauna, Timmy Reed has given us a parable of our zombified lives. --Michael Tager, JMWW Praise for The Ghosts That Surrounded Them Reminiscent of Shane Jones and Kevin Brockmeier, but with a style all its own, Timmy Reed's The Ghosts That Surrounded Them is a history of the unseen world, a beautifully written surreal meditation on life and death, the distances that surround us all, and the beauty of life. Reed is a real talent. I devoured this book in a single sitting, and it stayed with me like few others. --CL Bledsoe, author of Man of Clay Timmy Reed, in the vein of Matt Bell and Blake Butler, is the literary world's next exciting wordsmith, but it is the tender care of his subjects--fragile, human ones--for which he will really be remembered. --Jen Michalski, author of The Tide King and Could You Be With Her Now Timmy Reed has a strange and wonderful imagination, one of the results of which is the beautifully haunted world of The Ghosts That Surrounded Them, a short novel that reads like a fake handbook of the world with a particular emphasis on the fascinating history of ghosts and reminds the reader of the inescapable tragedy of the human condition. --Michael Kimball author of Big Ray and Dear Everybody