Archelon Ranch

by Garrett Cook

"Archelon Ranch is a metafictional thrill ride on a wild gilawalrus, as merciless in its critique of narrative privilege as it is to its characters. Pay your money, take your chance, keep your concept of the self inside the vehicle at all times. The management is not responsible for personae that are lost or mangled.”
-Scott Nicolay, World Fantasy Award Winner, author of Ana Kai Tangata

Je ne suis pas un chapeau. Je suis un homme... In an overgrown, primeval, jungle-city state, Bernard is a test subject for science experiments. His father and Professor Sagramour have been injecting him with hallucinogenic mud and reality affirming drugs so that one day man will be immune to the insanity inducing, zombifying sentient green mud that is choking the suburbs. But Bernard is beginning to display side effects. Experiencing greater and greater levels of Objectivity cause his consciousness to become one with entities as diverse as pterosaurs and martinis. In the mind of the tyrannosaurus he hears the call of Archelon Ranch, a primal paradise like no other. Will Bernard's unique talents be enough to get him out of the senseless prehistoric cyberpunk city or will dinosaurs, Sagramour's Standardizers and the desire to lose himself in other entities be too much?

Genres: Bizarro Fiction, Horror, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Ebooks, Speculative Fiction, Fiction

147 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 1, 2009

About the author

Winner 1st Annual Ultimate Bizarro Showdown!

Garrett Cook was born in Wenham, Massachusetts July 19th, 1982. There are other details, but they're depressing or banal, with the exception of his haunted birthplace, his struggle with bipolar and a brief, unfortunate cancer scare. Yawn. Garrett Cook's work is far more interesting. He examines crises of faith and conscience through a pulpy,surreal or magorealistic lens to create magical, paranoid worlds that he hopes will entertain, antagonize and endear you. His books Murderland part 1:h8, Murderland 2:Life During Wartime and Archelon Ranch and Jimmy Plush, Teddy Bear Detective are available on Amazon. He is one of the creators and editors of the magazine Imperial Youth Review.

What people are saying about Murderland Part 1: H8


"Perhaps he’s right. Perhaps that meat cleaver is our best hope for salvation. Or maybe he belongs in an asylum. MURDERLAND is a brutally shocking book. Demented. Logical. Disturbing. It can be crudely powerful one moment, tenderly skillful the next, so the reader never knows what’s coming. There’s no way to prepare. No way to protect yourself. Garrett Cook’s work has an edge … and it’s at your throat."-
Robert Dunbar, author of The Shore and Martyrs and Monsters

"The offbeat brilliance of this book will freak your face off-"
Gina Ranalli, author of Mother Puncher, Sky Tongues and House of Fallen Leaves

"I have not read a debut novel this good in a long time (or as far as I could remember)"- Jordan Krall, author of Piecemeal June and Squidpulp Blues

"An intense, satirical and above all entertaining read"- Andersen Prunty, author of Zerostrata and the Overwhelming Urge

"A savage, very original satire that openly mocks the American demigod-like worship of worthless celebrity with a future where despicable murderers become our new focus of adoration. It's as farcical as Swift's "A Modest Proposal," yet no less poignant."-
bravenewworks.com

"Action! Explosions! Hot broads! Garrett Cook is two-fisted Bizarro pulp. I love his stories"-
Jeff Burk, author of SHATNERQUAKE

Reviews

[Christy Stewart · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is one of those things that has me fondly reminiscing. Not that it is intentional by the author, or that any other reader will experience the same thing.

One thing in specific that I was reminiscing about (in the blood-in-your-feces-tonight kind of way) was grade school lessons of what a story should and should not be, and the many times I was corrected on the fact I didn't get it. This book is like a drama of those textbook rules personified and working out the ridiculousness of themselves in a story in and of itself. I wish I had had this to read when I was 8.

The characters discussing the author himself was so funny and so smart and seems so impossible. I wouldn't be able to do it myself, it would end up being a mess of terribly self-defecating (and deprecating) jokes. It works so well that I think the story would just be 'cute' without that aspect tied in. It makes the book personal and personable, instead of just satirical.

Despite the experimental style, the story was good, as were the characters. In the end, that’s what really matters.

My favorite part of the whole book is the "I'm going to tear out your eyes and ejaculate into the sockets" Replace ejaculate with 'ejaculate blood' and I've said that myself to a friend or two.

[Matthew Vaughn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book took me by surprise. This is another one I got without any prior knowledge of any of its content. Starting into it that first chapter struck me as really strange. Now I like weird stories, and so far I haven’t found anything that I thought was just too much, but with this I found myself questioning whether I may have finally found it. But I read on, and I’m so glad I did. Once I got into the second chapter everything changed, I was hooked. This was one of those can’t put it down books for me, I wanted to forget about anything I had going on and just read this straight through.
Telling the story of human test subject Bernard we are treated to a fantastical world where dinosaurs roamed free, and gilawalrus’s came out to hunt when the wind comes, and the dreaded surbanites that live past the malls wander free. The main characters in the book know that they are living in a book, created by Garrett Cook, and that one day a Protagonist will arrive. Clyde believes that his brother Bernard is this protagonist. Against the wishes of the Narrativists, which are the followers of the church of Authorial Intent, Clyde decides to set in motion events that will prove his theory about his brother. But Bernard is one track minded, he just wants to find Archelon Ranch.
Now I haven’t been exposed to much Meta fiction. I feel like if done incorrectly this style could be annoying, in the wrong hands I would hate such a story. Luckily Garrett Cook wrote this, and he is a very capable writer for such an under taking. The characters are genuine, there’s not a dull one in the bunch. And Cook keeps the book paced fast enough that you may have to stop and reread certain passages to make sure you took in everything on the page.
Garrett Cook has written a compelling tale, one where I was virtually on the edge of my seat hoping for Bernard to escape the city and make it to Archelon Ranch. This is a must read for fans of Bizarro, and I would easily recommend it to those who are not also. Plot preserve.

[Kathryn · Rating 4 out of 5]

As far as bizarro fiction is concerned, this is one of my favorites and before I go further, I really can not recommend this enough for fans of the genre or for fans of any type of uber weirdness. And there is an overabundance of weirdness in this book, all of which is (mostly) explained and does contribute towards the story. I dislike bizarro that is strange for no reason other than to shock the reader but that is probably my personal problem as bizzaro fiction is supposed to shock the reader at least slightly. This book has a bit of depth to it and is more thought provoking than other bizarro I have read.

The only reason I am rating 4 stars instead of 5 is that I could not quite get past the ending. There was an amount of conceit to the book which I was able to accept and even find humorous, until the end. I think part of me was so blown away by the amazing world, a dystopian setting I would have loved to further explore, that I wanted more of that setting, maybe some type of conclusion to do with it, instead of what happened. This probably does not make any sense unless you have read the book and I do not want to discourage anyone from reading it.

The book is also too short. I really, really, really wish the author had made it longer. I wanted to explore the world more. I should not count this against the book but it ties back in with me not liking the ending too much, especially as more time goes by.

[Bradley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an unreal/irreal, everything but the kitchen sink type of book. It is more successful than other everything but the kitchen sink type books because the writing is strong.

I really wish I had been able to afford the print version rather than e-book because the writing was a little too rich to be read on screen.

Everything but the kitchen sink-type books are often written by first time novelists, but I assume Garrett Cook at least wrote the first Murderland volume before this book, which is fortunate because this book could have been a bit of a mess.

I used to love postmodern metafiction but had a falling out with it many years ago. This book falls under that classification, but I loved it instead of hated it because I found the meta aspects emotionally resonating and it wasn't just writing about writing. It was writing about the author himself without getting too caught up in the meta aspects of storytelling. Like Andersen Prunty's Zerostrata, it made me feel something in my chest.

[Rodney · Rating 5 out of 5]

I​ ​am​ ​not​ ​a​ ​hat.​ ​I​ ​am​ ​a​ ​man.​ ​I​ ​am​ ​not​ ​a​ ​hat.​ ​I​ ​am​ ​a​ ​man.​ ​The​ ​paradise​ ​that​ ​is​ ​Archelon​ ​Ranch​ ​calls me.​ ​Objectivity​ ​is​ ​a​ ​gift​ ​and​ ​a​ ​curse.​ ​Plot​ ​preserve,​ ​the​ ​significance​ ​of​ ​authorial​ ​intent​ ​and narrativism.​ ​I​ ​frolic​ ​with​ ​the​ ​Gilawalrus​ ​and​ ​cardboard​ ​phallic​ ​symbols​ ​which​ ​spring​ ​from​ ​the earth.​
"You've been through so much. I am sorry Bernard." ​A​ ​fit​ ​of​ simultaneous​ ​purpose​ ​and​ ​aimlessness​ will ​bring​ ​the​ ​freedom​ ​that​ ​would​ ​paralyze​ ​a lesser​ ​being, and you can put​ ​that​ ​in​ ​your​ liquifilm.

[Kyle Muntz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Archelon Ranch is a sophisticated, epicly fucked up integration of bizarro and metafiction, complete with unnecessary violence, sentient hats, and lots of dinosaurs. For the most, it's funny as often as it is profound, and there were times it reminded me of a more subdued Joyce or Barth, just as often as it reminded me of Carlton Mellick. This is maybe the most self-referential novel I've read. Not only did it comment on itself constantly, it even had a tendency to make Garret Cook himself a character of sorts, and say (mostly) bad things about him. And did I mention the dinosaurs?

[David Barbee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Archelon Ranch is very good metafiction with a bizarro sense of style. I’m usually wary of metafiction. To me it usually comes off as gimmicky and self-important. But of course there are good meta stories out there, and Archelon Ranch is one of those stories. It’s set in a gigantic dystopian city of violent authority, hyper-consumerism, and dinosaurs. Society is bound by the Narrative, which is almost like a religious philosophy. People in this story are aware that there is a Garrett Cook and that he’s the God of this world.

One character, Bernard, might just be the messiah if he can get outside of the city. His brother, Clyde, is intent on stopping him. Bernard has been the subject of an experiment to create perfect Objectivity. As a result, Bernard’s consciousness shifts around, able to totally empathize with anyone or anything around him. He may be the messiah (or “the Protagonist”), but Bernard just wants to get out of the city and find Archelon Ranch so he can live in peace. Clyde, however, doesn’t think Bernard should be the main character of this story, and sets out after Bernard to stop him from ever reaching his goal.

From that high concept, Garrett Cook (the real-life author) just cuts loose. He pushes this story along while his characters struggle and rebel against their place in it. It all leads up to a really good ending as Bernard and Clyde finally meet Garrett Cook himself. Bernard’s burden as the Protagonist is traditionally difficult and long, but Cook also gives an honest portrayal of Clyde’s role as “second fiddle”. Clyde isn’t as special as Bernard, but his outrage about that is justified.

This book is weird, but it’s a challenging sort of weird. Garrett Cook tells a story that’s basically about himself but also about humanity. He has a real love for the “second fiddle” characters, because that’s what all of us are. And like real people, this story has a genuine heart wrapped in layers of fear, insecurity, jealousy, violence, and horror. With its insane concept and bizarro imagery, Archelon Ranch is an impressive feat.

[John Kulm · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was the first book I've read connected with the "Bizarro Fiction” genre. It was, as I’d been warned, weird, concise, experimental, and a little self-indulgent in a positive way. The book was also very archetypal as if the author was digging around inside himself and sharing something very personal disguised in strange characters and encounters.

The book takes genetic engineering and global warming to an extreme to foretell of a strange future full of dangerous variations of the human species. The main characters quest for a possibly mythical “Archelon Ranch,” like Jungians in search of the Self. If this is an example of what the Bizarro Fiction Movement is putting out I want more of it.

A couple quotes from the book:
“I was a man who mixed raptor poison for a living, making money on the side by selling drugs to monkeys on a nearby rooftop. We lived in a huge city defended only by enormous malls on all sides, plagued by dinosaurs, jungle cats, snakes and unruly apes. We needed automated police cruisers and triceratops to keep our streets even close to clean. The suburbs were full of oozing, green hallucinogenic mud that turned all its citizens into maladjusted homicidal maniacs, and god knows what was beyond the suburbs.”

“I motioned to a nearby Supra-Adderall tea vendor. ‘I’ll take one of the big ones,’ I told him, ‘one of the real big ones.’ He held up a 90-ounce cup. That was too big. ‘No, not that big. Smaller than that.’ We argued through five more sizes before I ended up having to admit that it was the small I had wanted all along.”

[Trent · Rating 5 out of 5]

To me this was an existentialist's dream without the arrogant reputation that usually comes with such a word. This book is bizarre and totally imaginative, but Cook isn't just being bizarre or imaginative. In this tale it is natural, and everything with the world he has created makes perfect sense. There's great humor here, as well as quite a bit one might call unsettling. For me it was a thinker, and a damned entertaining one at that. I hope to read more by Cook in the future. Check this one out. You'll enjoy it on many levels.

[Donald Armfield · Rating 5 out of 5]

First off I want to thank the author Garrett Cook, for giving me this free ebook THANK YOU!
Garrett's style in this short story is different. He puts his self in the book, but main character (Bernard) bad mouths him amd smights him. This is an execellent read. Garrett stirs your brain up with his words of bizarro. Do yourself a favor and take the trip with Bernard, Rev. and his friend chuck to find out where Archelon Ranch is in this world created by no other but Garrett Cook.

[Anthony Chavez · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book does not give you a break, its all go, and crazy and wild beyond all bizarro I have read previously. Cook not only wrote a novella that is wordy, smart, and constantly keeping me on my toes paying attention, but he put himself in the book, which kinda makes sense since he is the author and plays the author in the book.

I never thought I would read a book with actual characters trying to figure out who the protagonist is and who the antagonist is, a book about characters in a book so to speak. Clyde (the protagonists brother), and other characters throughout the story speak to the fact that they are part of a book and praise and/or curse the author. I had never heard of metafiction before this book, but the label fits. It kept me interested and rereading portions to really understand the plot and what was going on. The one drawback in my opinion was sometimes there was just too much going on at once or new crazy characters were thrown in and it confused me; however, maybe that's just me as many people love and have given this book 5 stars. I look forward to reading more by Garrett Cook.

[J.W. Wargo · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I began reading the first chapter, I didn't think it was going to be a very good book.

I was wrong.

This is perhaps one of the strongest Bizarro books I've ever read. The characters and the world are impressively detailed for a short novel. The language is personal, it reads almost like a diary, but it stays believable even in the most fantastic of situations presented in the story.

As a metafiction novel, it never slows or gets bogged down in unnecessary explanation. A steady pace kept me reading page after page and before I knew it I had read 9 of the 10 chapters in one sitting.

My favorite character is Bernard's brother, Clyde, who believes Bernard may be the Protagonist of the story and is very jealous that the Author chose him.

After reading this book, I'm now convinced that Garrett Cook must be some sort of god in this world, too. I hope he doesn't write me out of the script too early.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a book unlike any I've read before. The stated protagonist, Bernard, must find his way to Archelon Ranch while at the same time avoid the pitfalls of objectivity. After he is given various injections, administered by his father, brother, and doctor, Bernard becomes transformed into everything from a hat to a tyrannosaurus, and gains that point of view. Throughout the book, Clyde (his brother), the priest of the Narrativists, and others, make note of the fact that they are part of a book and intermittently praise and curse the author, Garrett Cook. This is a different sort of story telling and one which I would recommend to those who enjoy metafiction.

[Ginnetta · Rating 5 out of 5]

An unreasonable gripping book. I learned why some people want to slit their wrists and become anything but human.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I started reading this around hour 10 of a 14 hour flight, my brain couldn't handle it. But I started it again and really dug it.

[Edmund Colell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Between Bernard, who views his participation as destiny, and Clyde, whose participation is to claim the spoils of Bernard’s destiny, Garrett Cook’s Archelon Ranch is one of the few (if there are any other) books that really did need the two foreshadowing columns on its back in order to accompany its protagonists. That’s not to say that either character likes being in this book, nor that they don’t question their positions therein. That also doesn’t say why I love this book, but I’m getting to that.

With the first of the separate roads, Bernard’s Deep Objectivity condition causes his form to shift around with such a range that he could be a fedora or a T-Rex with only a moment of acknowledgement to make it happen. He rarely resists these forms, just like how he does not resist his apparent position as the main character. His passive existence gains direction when he learns of a perfect plane of existence named after the book’s title hidden beyond the Mall surrounding the jungle-city of hyper-sexualized and hyper-violent Suburbanites, the police force of triceratops, and the various animals and people living tense lives here and there between. Clyde is among the latter, who says that most of his life was about dealing raptor gas to kids, heroin and bananas to orangutans, and underage liquifilm porn to Mall patrons. In between, he lives with his father and goes to the church of Narrativism, where “Plot Preserve” is said in the same way as “Praise Jesus” or “Cthulhu Fhtagn.” Having been a disposable side character for most of his life and needed to grant himself a name in Garrett Cook’s absence, he has grown to despise his creator and study all of Cook’s flaws. However, his former adherence has given him enough insight to see that Bernard has been made the main character of Archelon Ranch. And, fed up with his lot in life, vows to make it to Archelon Ranch before Bernard can claim it. Along the way he argues the idea of Authorial Intent with the Reverend, an ally at the end of a gun, and searches the best tools which he knows Cook -- a writer of violent fiction, in case you haven’t read any of his stuff -- would leave around. The summary of this journey is shown in the first few lines of the tenth chapter, which I believe should be a quotation used in any sort of discussion about this book. Furthermore, the entirety of said tenth chapter delves into a surreal nightmare that I will likely be re-reading again and again.

Outside of that chapter being awesome, I’d probably say that it shows my only real complaint with Archelon Ranch -- Re-reading again and again. Entire paragraphs, pages, or chapters may need to be looked back over in order to get the most of Archelon Ranch, but really any other complaint I could possibly have would likely be justified by the fact that the book is a heavy exercise in metafiction. Things are going topsy-turvy and it just looks like shit is coming out of nowhere without reason? That happens enough to sound like a major theme in how fiction is inherently absurd. The reader might think the book is pretentious trash like all other metafiction? Clyde’s foreshadowing column has already called Cook on it. Hell, even the re-reading complaint falls short when the book itself is only one hundred and eleven pages.

With one hundred and eleven pages, however, it definitely does not overstay its welcome. While getting acquainted with Cook’s work may be necessary, the content herein looks fit to satisfy anyone who has had any thoughts on how characters feel about being made the tools of the author.

[David Agranoff · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a weird book, but you knew that going in right? It's a bizarro novel by Garrett Cook who won the first ever bizarro showdown at the first bizarrocon so I knew it would be weird. In a way I would say this novel is a mix of dark city and Adaptation. Bernard the main character is being used in an experiment, the world seems to be trying to convince him that he is a hat. Sometimes other objects, all the while he is being shot with hallucinogenic mud.

The point is not that he is an object, as in a hat, or a dresser drawer. As he goes to greater levels he loses more of his sanity, and it's up to his brother Clyde to save him. Clyde is an interesting character,and he knows it. I mean literally he knws he is a character, he is aware that Garrett Cook is writing the book. It seems he has read a lot Garrett's work, and is fairly critical.

So if you have not figured it out it gets a little weird from there. There is a religion that believes in following the word of our author, and Clyde is trying to save Bernard from all the cruel intentions of the author putting him through the experiments.

Is this a horror novel, well I can't say it is not, but I was expecting something a little more horrific. That being said it is a great dip in to meta-fiction. IF anything was missing, was a feeling that Garrett Cook as a author, and creator of this work was out of his mind. He wrote a brilliant piece of meta-fiction but because it was so well written I felt he was solid and in control of the work. That is impressive, but the novel lacked the bat-shit crazy-ness of say Phil K Dick in Three stigmata, where it was so crazy I had no idea where it was going. That is not an insult, Cook is just to good to be that out of control.

[Jess Gulbranson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just finished "Archelon Ranch." Maybe I should wait and let my impressions settle- but no, that would do the book a disservice. All the pertinent details are covered in other reviews and the official descriptions, so it's likely you know what it's about, but here are my impressions. First off, the IRL layer has this book being written and published in the same circumstances as my own forthcoming book, so I immediately felt that resonance. This is a metafictional text of the highest order- it froths over at the climax and spills out even into the author bio at the end. Its setting might be recognizable from Logan's Run, Finder, Escape From New York, etc.- but from the fans atop the dome to the psychedelic mud-choked suburbs surrounding it, this setting lives or dies on the 'open-beam' metafictional framework underlying it, and as many dinosaur toys a young Garrett Cook was allowed to have in his tub. Additionally, while the text may perpetually state that one character is a Protagonist, it is clear that another more well-developed character is, and that narrative friction was enjoyable, though I would like to have seen more time devoted to the latter character. Last, I would like to point out the courage Garrett Cook displays for dumping the uglier part of himself into the story- whether for catharsis, katabasis, or simple praxis, it is emotionally powerful, and I hope my similar tendencies in most of my works are even half as effective. More than just a simple weird tale, this is a keen dart thrown at the void.

[Steven Rage · Rating 5 out of 5]

Plot Preserve!, February 21, 2010
By Steven Rage "You Morbid Westphal" (Evil Nerd Empire)

What happens to an author's characters when their services are no longer required? Will they accept their increasingly anemic demise? Or will they break out and attempt to be something more?

This is the premise (at least my interpretation) of Bizarro Beef Cake Garrett Cooks's Archelon Ranch.

The story is told from Clyde's POV. Which is interesting being that Clyde is Bernard's brother. Bernard, not Clyde, is the annointed protagonist in this tale. Bernard doesn't appreciate it though. Archelon Ranch is Bernard's destiny, but Clyde's going there too. Whether Garrett Cook (the author and therefore god of this book) likes it or not. Cheeky monkey!

Filled with weird characters such as self-aware headgear, rabid dinos, gilawalruses, a self-absorbed Rev. (may the plot preserve us), randy cannibal Suburbanites and the worst shopping mall you have ever been to.

Archelon Ranch is a crazy weird tale penned by the crazy weird Bizarro pulp-smith Garrett Cook and all he wants is a little Objectivity.

Here's a little taste of the pasta sauce: "There is no future for the drowned, no body for this casket. There are no attendees for this funeral. There are no readers for these poems."

Shoot, son! That's some gorgeous filth right there.

And ain't you glad he did.

[Karl Fischer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading Archelon Ranch is a lot like drinking a pricey bomber of ale. It presents a wide package of flavors, by turns subtle and complex, all of which create a damn good brew, but not something you'd have at every occasion.

The book operates on two fronts, the first being a pulpy world of biotechnology gone wrong and the second being a meta-narrative of spiritual significance. In this manner, the narration is split between the "official" protagonist and his jealous brother, a secondary character growing too self-aware for his own good. The author himself makes an appearance, cast in the role of God to his misanthropic creations.

It is a story of strange beauty and depth, a bittersweet apology to the characters, to the author, and to the readers. At times, I couldn't tell if I was supposed to be an audience member or another victim of Cook's cruel imagination.

[Jason Schmit · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are elements of this that completely connected with me, then those same elements kind of worked against me as well. It took me longer than usual to read this, I never quite got sucked in. I am aware that this isn't written to be like most books, as much as it pains me to admit, maybe I just didn't get it. It kind of reminded me of a Brandon Graham comic, like King City in that I delighted in the absurdity but also wrestled with it. Still thinking on this one.

[Katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic. Meta fiction is tricky. It's weird and can go wrong in a lot of ways. This was so right on. It was smart, entertaining, funny and moving at times. Also I love an author who knows the perfect length for a story. I can't say enough good things and don't really have any bad ones so.....Go read it!

[Alexis · Rating 3 out of 5]

the premise and beginning/middle were great, the ending was a little too look! it's metafiction, no really, hey i'm the author! and i'm here, wow, isn't this amazing and edgy! Oh, and I sacrificed telling an interesting story to make my appearance.

[Garrett Cook]

This is my favorite of my books thus far. You can get it as am ebook for just $3.50 here:
http://www.legumeman.com/LegumEbooks....