The Ignis Psalter

by Danny Jacobs

1913: After an incident of familial violence, budding arsonist Cotton Steeves is left with burn scars on his back that show an oddly mirrored geometry. Burdened by his would-be magician uncle, who grows obsessed with the scars’ properties, Cotton looks for a way out from under his increasingly erratic influence. It’s time for his next fire.

1993: Ten-year-old Morton Lounsbury collects things. His prized possession is The Ignis Psalter—an anonymous book of pyromaniacal spiritualism addressed to an initiate of flame. And someone or something—ghost, rumour, urban legend—is connected to the book. A meeting with an ageless recluse named Cotton Steeves will change everything Mort knew about his hometown. 

Welcome to Petitcodiac, New Brunswick. Welcome to The Village of Fire. In this village of outsiders, moonshiners, fox farmers, and conjurors, a fire-haunted place where the next blaze never seems far away, Cotton must contend with his family’s legacy of burning. and with the help of young Mort Lounsbury, confront his uncle’s shadow once and for all.

Part lyric fairy tale, part small town gothic, The Ignis Psalter is the bizarre and pulpy debut novel from poet and essayist Danny Jacobs.

Genres: Canada

187 pages, Paperback

Published April 1, 2025

Reviews

[Laurie Burns · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thanks so much to @dannyjohn_jacobs & @porcupinesquill for sending me "The Ignis Psalter". I took my time with this one, because the writing is so moody and beautiful and I wanted to allow it to have time to sink into my bones. The Ignis Psalter is the name of a pyromaniacal spiritualism addressed to the initiate of flame. The book's inspiration was based off of a series of real life mysterious arsons in the small town of Petitcodiac, New Brunswick, but it it more than that. Part lyrical fairy tale ghost story, part small town gothic. I grew up in Moncton, N.B. and from the first page I felt nostalgic for my left long ago province. "Take the overgrown farmhouse, a model of rural decay scattered throughout our fair province." Jacob's writing is very dark and descriptive, so descriptive you can feel the pain and loneliness. This is a coming of age in a rural area, when you feel a deep solitary and a lonely sense of out of place. A shroud of avoidance is covering the whole tale, trying to burn out the flame. A dark and bleak novel that reminds me of fellow New Brunswicker David Adams Richards, a book well worth taking your time with.

[Ian · Rating 3 out of 5]

In The Ignis Psalter, the eerily compelling debut novel from poet and essayist Danny Jacobs, fire and weirdness are the order of the day. This is the unnerving tale of budding arsonist Cotton Steeves of Petitcodiac, New Brunswick, and his uncle, fox farmer and pyromaniac Lester Mansard. Lester earns a living raising foxes for their pelts, but his true vocation, as he sees it, is setting fires. He has already set a few, and the village of Petitcodiac has suffered for his efforts. But Lester’s fascination with fire is anything but an ordinary garden-variety obsession. He has made a lifelong study of the science and the spiritual nature of fire, and even written a book he’s titled The Ignis Psalter, a small volume of homespun instruction and overwrought philosophical musings. In the novel’s opening section, set in 1913, Lester is tutoring his nephew on the art of setting things ablaze, preaching that “fire is the true Magick element” that bestows meaning to existence. But when Lester takes things too far—deliberately setting his nephew alight during an apparent initiation ritual—Cotton eventually takes his revenge, and as the section ends it appears Lester is no more. But in early 20th-century Petitcodiac, little is as it seems. And when, in the novel’s final segment, the story jumps ahead to 1993, it turns out that Lester’s influence has not been extinguished. This is because the last surviving copy of The Ignis Psalter (miraculously still in pristine condition) has fallen into the hands of 10-year-old Mort Lounsbury, a socially awkward boy whose collections run the gamut from books and hockey cards to “railroad spikes” and almost any other curious object that comes his way. Lester Mansard’s legend has survived as well, as has Cotton Steeves, who in extreme old age has become reclusive and something of a local character. Danny Jacobs’ novel, The Ignis Psalter—filled with eccentric behaviours, inexplicable phenomena, ghostly sightings—is stunningly atmospheric and induces tense forebodings in the reader as Mort and Cotton team up and the story creeps toward a seemingly unavoidable confrontation between good and evil. From the first page we fall under the spell of the haunting incantatory cadences of Jacobs’ prose, which moves at a leisurely pace as it tells a gothic-tinged tale of deranged obsession. It’s worth noting that The Ignis Psalter is not a book for the general reader. This novel is the product of a dark and surreal vision that the author pursues with singular zeal and conviction and will appeal primarily to those whose tastes lean toward the bizarre. But it is also a noteworthy achievement that places Danny Jacobs near the top of the list of writers to watch.

[Mbauck · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Ignis Psalter starts off as a bit of a slow burn (pardon the pun), but turns into something really special. The book's inspiration was based off of a series of real life, mysterious arsons in the small town of Peticodiac but the story evolves from there into something altogether more halucinatory and mythic. Pulp stories and good prose dont have to be mutually exclusive and the Ignis Psalter proves that. What a fun read. I hope more folks discover this gem.