Welcome to another installment of If My Book, the Monkeybicycle feature in which authors shed light on their recently released books by comparing them to weird things. This week Bryan Furuness writes about Do Not Go On, his new novel published by Black Lawrence Press.
If Do Not Go On were a vehicle, it would be a school bus, and some shit would be going down in the back.
If Do Not Go On were a burrito, it would explode in your microwave, but the mess would smell so good you would reach into the microwave like a bear pawing honey from a beehive and scoop the red mess into your mouth, handful after cheesy handful, hoping no one will ever find out, but knowing there will come a day when, loosened by the anesthesia from a minor dental procedure, you will confess (complete with groggy pantomime) to the oral surgeon, and the flash of disgust in her eyes will make you feel large and electric with shame, which is to say: fully alive.
If Do Not Go On were a test, it would be the SAT, but the answer to every question would be NONE OF THE ABOVE.
If you were a bird, you would be a bluebird.
If my book were an egg, it would be your egg. Except when it hatched, it would be—surprise!—a cuckoo, and you would be like What the hell? but you would raise it anyway, at first because you couldn’t bring yourself to kill a baby, and then out of a morbid fascination (How big is this fucker going to get?) and then finally because you love this monster more than your own true children, who, let’s face it, are basic.
If Do Not Go On were a house, it would be an old farmhouse with storm cellar doors that led to an unfinished basement where you would go when the tornados came.
If Do Not Go On were a sword—
No way it would be a sword. Like ever.
If Do Not Go On were a road, it would be two lanes of asphalt laid down like a zipper between endless cornfields. When your GPS loses its signal, you stop your car to look at the old map in your glove box, and even though you can’t see anything but the rustling corn plants on either side of the road, you get the feeling that someone or something is watching you, so you hightail it out of there. Better to be lost than found.
Bryan Furuness is the author of Do Not Go On (Black Lawrence Press, 2019) and The Lost Episodes of Revie Bryson(Black Lawrence Press, 2013). He is the editor of the anthology My Name was Never Frankenstein: And Other Classic Adventure Tales Remixed, and the co-editor (with Michael Martone) of Winesburg, Indiana. His stories have appeared in New Stories from the Midwest, Best American Nonrequired Reading, and elsewhere. He lives in Indianapolis, where he teaches at Butler University. Follow him on Twitter at @furunati.
