Welcome to another installment of If My Book, the Monkeybicycle feature in which authors compare their recently released books to weird things. This week Spencer Fleury writes about his debut novel, How I’m Spending My Afterlife, out now from Woodhall Press.
If How I’m Spending My Afterlife were a road trip, it’d be the one where you tried to go to the beach for a long weekend but never actually made it, because you took a wrong turn somewhere and ended up lost in the desert for three days, harassed by snakes and roving bands of zombie outlaws the entire time, but in the end the whole thing was totally worth it because there’s no way Myrtle Beach would’ve given you a nighttime sky like that.
If How I’m Spending My Afterlife were a vodka, it’d be the kind that comes in one-gallon plastic jugs and is equally useful as a medium-strength adhesive remover. The kind your dad drinks because he doesn’t know any better. Or maybe because he doesn’t want to know any better.
If How I’m Spending My Afterlife were a mix tape, one side of it would be side one of Joe Jackson’s Look Sharp! album, and the other would just be “Sabotage” by the Beastie Boys repeating for thirty minutes.
If How I’m Spending My Afterlife were a car, it would be the one you really wanted before you talked yourself into settling for the one you actually ended up buying. You know the one I mean.
If How I’m Spending My Afterlife were a sporting event, it’d be the first day of March Madness, flashy and sloppy and chaotic.
If How I’m Spending My Afterlife were your neighbor, it’d let the lawn grow well beyond the HOA’s maximum permitted length, put out subversive lawn decorations for religious holidays, and always insist on being the last stop (desserts) of your neighborhood’s annual progressive dinner.
If How I’m Spending My Afterlife were a hotel, it would definitely not be the trendy hipster hotel in a rapidly-gentrifying-but-still-slightly-edgy neighborhood just south of downtown. It would be the cheaper, somewhat less fashionable hotel next door, from which you could easily sneak into the hipster hotel’s pool.
If How I’m Spending My Afterlife were a fast-food chain, it would be Whataburger. Because more things should be Whataburger.
Spencer Fleury has worked as a sailor, copywriter, record store clerk and economics professor, among other disreputable professions. His work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and has previously appeared in outlets including Utne Reader, Ascent, and the anthology City by City: Dispatches from the American Metropolis. This is his first novel. He lives in San Francisco. Follow him on Twitter at @SpencerFleury.
