Guillermo Stitch's Blog

Thanks to everyone at Post Road magazine for publishing my story, The House. It'll be out in print later in the year but is available online now:

https://www.postroadmag.com/2021/02/1...

Lake of Urine has been included in the New York Times Editor's Choice recommendations this week!

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/03/bo...

It's been a wonderful week for Lake of Urine, with praise coming from national press in three countries:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/23/bo...

https://www.independent.ie/entertainm...

https://www.theguardian.com/books/202...

Many thanks to The New York Times, The Sunday Independent and The Observer.

Wonderful news and a wonderful review—Houman Barekat in the TLS.


https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/la...


Deepest thanks

I'm very grateful for the positive reviews of Lake of Urine, which are still coming in.

“Such a talent for world-building. An abundance of funny, bizarre, imaginative touches.”
Alastair Mabbott, Herald Scotland https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/1...

“What a deliciously bizarre book! Here is the type of novel that can be endlessly picked apart for its meanings…. a great addition to the modern literary universe.”
Electra Nanou, Book Breath https://bookbreath.blog/2020/09/24/re...

“[Stitch’s] writing is constantly surprising, and the fecundity of his language deserves all the accolades…. At bottom, amid the multifarious themes tackled in this novel, a few stand-outs are: Domestic violence, tenderness, and family trial. It is cheekily old fashioned and postmodern at the same time…. The author contemplates human relations with stark and unabashed honesty, sidelong, through the medium of parody, across a wide array of settings, all amply described, immersive, and brutally comic, the pages beset with gestures both lurid and poignant…. All around an impressive and entirely unique work of fiction.”
L.S.Popovich https://lspopovich.com/2020/09/27/rev...

A few more very pleasing reviews are in, from

The Mantle

—"Brilliant tragicomedy...every character is an eccentric blend of caricature and nuance...takes the absurdist satire to its logical extreme."

https://www.themantle.com/literature/...

Arts Fuse

—"Like something out of a dream, familiar and unsettling, a convincing achievement on par with the recognizable nowhere-ness of Flann O'Brien's The Third Policeman."

https://artsfuse.org/208061/book-revi...

and Maudlin House

—“I can’t decide whether this novel brings Voltaire or David Foster Wallace to mind, but I doubt either could do a better job of bantering about the savage human spirit than Stitch does here in 2020…. It’s dirty. It’s funny. It’s complex. It’s the kind of debut novel that most authors could only hope for. Guillermo Stitch is just the kind of writer that this year needs. Check out this book before the chaos ends.”

https://maudlinhouse.net/not-drowning...

Deepest thanks to all.

A slightly baffled but apparently entertained Kevin Kiely reviews the book for Books Ireland. Deepest thanks.

https://bit.ly/3hjbpHm

"Guillermo Stitch’s Lake of Urine is a wild ride, which from the get-go sets out its terms and conditions: ‘If anybody tells you this story isn’t true they are lying. It is a true story; I am lying if it isn’t, and I don’t lie,’ reads its playful, meta-modernist opening gambit. Whatever our own normative intuitions as readers regarding what fiction should or shouldn’t be, it is hard, even after a few pages, not to surrender to Stitch’s unflinching audacity, which is everywhere on display."

Deepest thanks to Totally Dublin, who have published a wonderful review of Lake of Urine, at

https://www.totallydublin.ie/more/pri...

The Irish Times have published a rather wonderful review of the book. Deepest thanks.

https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/bo...

The book is finally out in the world and, without wishing to make an Oscars speech out of it, I would like to repeat my heartfelt thanks to the following:


Jacob Smullyan, founding editor of the the incredible press, Sagging Meniscus. For any of this to be real, some nut had to say yes to my nutty book, and it turned out to be Jacob. As far as I can make out, he publishes the work he publishes for the love of it, with no other discernible guiding principle. Perfect. Everything about my association with Sagging Meniscus has been exactly right. They make beautiful books, inside and out.


Royce M Becker, whose gorgeous and adorable artwork for the cover is attracting its own excellent reviews. I think it has been instrumental.


Small Press Distribution in the US, Gazelle Book Services in the UK, and Michael Darcy of Brookside Publishing Services in Ireland, for their efforts in getting the book out there, not to mention the independent Irish book shops that have ordered copies, which I believe include Dubray, O'Mahony's, Books Upstairs, The Book Centre and Kenny's.


Anne Cunningham, book critic, who has taken an incredibly supportive interest in my work since I published the novella, Literature™, in 2018.


The book's blurbers, who didn't know me from Adam and nevertheless took the time to read and support it: Dan Chaon, Sara Lippmann, Matthew Vollmer, Christian TeBordo.


I have to mention Zé Burns, an early reviewer, whose infectious enthusiasm for the book has been so encouraging.


And to keep this brief and minimize the self-indulgence, I will reproduce the book's Acknowledgments here:


“My deepest thanks go to Matt Dennison, without whose support and encouragement in the early stages I might not have gone ahead, to Christopher Allen for his insight and to Katherine Graham for hers, to Sally Houtman who is no longer with us and whose contribution to this work cannot be overestimated, and to John Patrick Higgins who is as culpable for the final shape of the thing as I am and whose participation I made sure, every step of the way, was torturous. Above all to Katja Spindler, whose minor and major corrections have been many, on and off the page.”


Early reviews have been overwhelmingly positive, with more press to come this month and next.


You may wish to appraise yourselves of the buy links, here: https://www.guillermostitch.com and here: https://www.saggingmeniscus.com/catal...


Love to all.