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Zoetrope Bizarre
Flickers in a darkened movie house. Half-remembered midnight television. Light and shadow on a screen, whether big or small. A “lost” space odyssey, pretend interplanetary nightmares, a mysterious late-nite horror show hostess who may never have existed. Boojums and Alison Maehl (or Alice Mal). Insanity and rumor. Murder and fandom and Hollywood rabbit holes.
In this taut, enigmatic novella, Caitlín R. Kiernan invites the reader to chase the mystery of things that may never have existed or may only have been misplaced—perhaps on purpose and perhaps for the best. Zoetrope Bizarre unfolds like frames of film discarded on a cutting room floor, Kiernan's most ambitious tale of weird cinema since the World Fantasy Award-winning “The Prayer of Ninety Cats.”
In this taut, enigmatic novella, Caitlín R. Kiernan invites the reader to chase the mystery of things that may never have existed or may only have been misplaced—perhaps on purpose and perhaps for the best. Zoetrope Bizarre unfolds like frames of film discarded on a cutting room floor, Kiernan's most ambitious tale of weird cinema since the World Fantasy Award-winning “The Prayer of Ninety Cats.”
- GenresFantasy
102 pages, Hardcover
Published July 1, 2025
About the author
Caitlín R. Kiernan
423 books1,705 followersCaitlín Rebekah Kiernan is an Irish-born American published paleontologist and author of science fiction and dark fantasy works, including ten novels, series of comic books, and more than two hundred and fifty published short stories, novellas, and vignettes.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
April 5, 2026
Read this in one sitting. Kiernan tells an intriguing little story featuring a forgotten, possibly cursed film, 2 horror film buffs on the hunt, and a late night horror film host with a mysterious past.
“Sometimes mysteries are better LEFT mysteries, don’t you think?”
“Sometimes mysteries are better LEFT mysteries, don’t you think?”
July 9, 2025
Another strange and gorgeous tale weaved by non other than the leading writer of weird fiction alive today, CRK!
July 5, 2025
2050: The world is a wasteland. All desert. No humans in sight, but something rustles in the shadows behind certain boulders.
2025: The new Caitlin R Kiernan book is here! And it comes with a bonus novella titled Zoetrope Bizarre. Sounds interesting, I think I'll read that one first.
2026: A copy of Zoetrope Bizarre is mysteriously delivered to the Oval office.
2027: The first of the nukes is dropped.
2030: Wasteland.
2040: Wasteland.
1890: Random flashback to old timey frontiersmen.
2050: Wasteland.
2025: The new Caitlin R Kiernan book is here! And it comes with a bonus novella titled Zoetrope Bizarre. Sounds interesting, I think I'll read that one first.
2026: A copy of Zoetrope Bizarre is mysteriously delivered to the Oval office.
2027: The first of the nukes is dropped.
2030: Wasteland.
2040: Wasteland.
1890: Random flashback to old timey frontiersmen.
2050: Wasteland.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews