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Palaces
"Jacobs’s terrifying debut novel is a master class in anxiety and atmosphere. Jacobs creates a setting that fans of Jeff Vandermeer’s Southern Reach trilogy will enjoy while still offering up fresh frights, including a wolf in the foyer, a screaming child in the closet, and a knife that keeps showing up, no matter how many times John throws it away. Jacobs is a writer to watch; his talent for crafting an immersive, scary narrative is undeniable."
— Publishers Weekly , starred review
John and Joey are a young couple immersed in their local midwestern punk scene, who after graduating college sever all ties and move to a perverse and nameless northeastern coastal city. They drift in and out of art museums, basement shows, and derelict squats seemingly unfazed as the city slowly slides into chaos around them.
Late one night, forced out of their living space, John and Joey are driven to take shelter in a chain pharmacy before emerging to a city in full-scale riot. They find themselves the only passengers on a commuter train headed north, and exit at the final stop to discover the area entirely devoid of people. As John and Joey negotiate their future through bizarre, troubling manifestations of the landscape and a succession of abandoned mansions housing only scant clues to their owners' strange and sudden disappearance, they're also forced to confront the resurgent violence and buried memories of their shared past.
With incisive precision and a cool detachment, Simon Jacobs has crafted a surreal and spellbinding first novel of horror and intrigue.
— Publishers Weekly , starred review
John and Joey are a young couple immersed in their local midwestern punk scene, who after graduating college sever all ties and move to a perverse and nameless northeastern coastal city. They drift in and out of art museums, basement shows, and derelict squats seemingly unfazed as the city slowly slides into chaos around them.
Late one night, forced out of their living space, John and Joey are driven to take shelter in a chain pharmacy before emerging to a city in full-scale riot. They find themselves the only passengers on a commuter train headed north, and exit at the final stop to discover the area entirely devoid of people. As John and Joey negotiate their future through bizarre, troubling manifestations of the landscape and a succession of abandoned mansions housing only scant clues to their owners' strange and sudden disappearance, they're also forced to confront the resurgent violence and buried memories of their shared past.
With incisive precision and a cool detachment, Simon Jacobs has crafted a surreal and spellbinding first novel of horror and intrigue.
230 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 16, 2018
14 people are currently reading
501 people want to read
About the author
Simon Jacobs
26 books48 followersauthor of STRING FOLLOW (MCD/FSG, 2022), MASTERWORKS (Instar Books, 2019), and PALACES (Two Dollar Radio, 2018). David Bowie superfan.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
October 16, 2017
4 YEARS OF LABOR
August 15, 2018
there are a lot of words in this book. like.. a lot a lot. how did he get so many words in there?
February 20, 2021
2.5 stars.
I really loved this book until I didn’t.
But before I go any further, let me just emphatically state that this could very well be a case of “It’s not you, it’s me.”
And I also want to say something that I suspect is true, even if I don’t know it for sure: I think to truly enjoy this book you have to have a susceptibility for melancholy.
Which I do.
Dreary autumn days. The Smiths & Joy Division. Jim Carrey’s opening monologue in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. If it makes me feel sad, I’m usually all in.
And the first half of Palaces does exactly that.
For a while it’s an odd duck of a post-apocalypse novel. Joey (short for Josephine) & John are lovers originally from Richmond, Indiana who now navigate the desolate husk of an unnamed East Coast city. They live on the top floor of an abandoned building & decorate it with a vase liberated from a deserted art museum. They ruminate & navel-gaze, & these scenes are intercut with flashbacks to their punk rock origins in Indiana.
But then something happens that forces them to leave their squat. They decide to venture north.
They make their way to a town near the seashore, where they spend their time searching abandoned McMansions. They’re chased by a wolf. They discover a small child hiding in a wardrobe. Joey becomes attached to the girl – named Vivian – & realizes the youngster represents a fresh start. She can cast off the ascetic lifestyle she & John have adopted. Which necessarily means casting off John.
And here’s where the book loses me. As John pursues Joey & Vivian through a forest, the narrative takes on a dreamlike state, the line between what’s real & what isn’t blurring substantially. The result is that I stopped caring. Without Joey as his foil, John disappears completely into himself & the book sort of . . . stalls.
Friends, I read the last 75 pages in a stupor, idly flipping pages, the words pinging heedlessly off my eyeballs. I know things happened, but John’s self-absorption was so total I couldn’t begin to tell you what they were.
Look: Simon Jacobs is a talented writer. There are moments of true beauty in here. Palaces absolutely has an audience.
I’m not it.
I really loved this book until I didn’t.
But before I go any further, let me just emphatically state that this could very well be a case of “It’s not you, it’s me.”
And I also want to say something that I suspect is true, even if I don’t know it for sure: I think to truly enjoy this book you have to have a susceptibility for melancholy.
Which I do.
Dreary autumn days. The Smiths & Joy Division. Jim Carrey’s opening monologue in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. If it makes me feel sad, I’m usually all in.
And the first half of Palaces does exactly that.
For a while it’s an odd duck of a post-apocalypse novel. Joey (short for Josephine) & John are lovers originally from Richmond, Indiana who now navigate the desolate husk of an unnamed East Coast city. They live on the top floor of an abandoned building & decorate it with a vase liberated from a deserted art museum. They ruminate & navel-gaze, & these scenes are intercut with flashbacks to their punk rock origins in Indiana.
But then something happens that forces them to leave their squat. They decide to venture north.
They make their way to a town near the seashore, where they spend their time searching abandoned McMansions. They’re chased by a wolf. They discover a small child hiding in a wardrobe. Joey becomes attached to the girl – named Vivian – & realizes the youngster represents a fresh start. She can cast off the ascetic lifestyle she & John have adopted. Which necessarily means casting off John.
And here’s where the book loses me. As John pursues Joey & Vivian through a forest, the narrative takes on a dreamlike state, the line between what’s real & what isn’t blurring substantially. The result is that I stopped caring. Without Joey as his foil, John disappears completely into himself & the book sort of . . . stalls.
Friends, I read the last 75 pages in a stupor, idly flipping pages, the words pinging heedlessly off my eyeballs. I know things happened, but John’s self-absorption was so total I couldn’t begin to tell you what they were.
Look: Simon Jacobs is a talented writer. There are moments of true beauty in here. Palaces absolutely has an audience.
I’m not it.
December 11, 2017
review to come
March 24, 2018
absolutely insane ......... the story itself super fucked up ur like “WHO IS THIS GUY” but simon is such a good writer like. u know when someone can somehow describe exactly the most enigmatic moments and feelings of being alive ..,. or when they can describe things you’ve never experienced and yet it feels like something familiar .... simon does that.. READ IT
August 3, 2023
I spent the whole book waiting for this to go somewhere, or to start making sense. It never did. This has a really cool premise, but it was written in a disjointed way that leaves the reader confused.
November 11, 2017
My favorite scene is in the house with the sex mirrors and good clothes, but I like every scene and wholeheartedly endorse this work!
March 15, 2018
There are some amazing sequences in this book. And there are some that slip away beneath your feet for pages and pages. I'm sure that's part of the point of it. And I'm sure I'll be thinking about this book for a while, especially its cocked and loaded imagery that never unfurled. I can't justify more than 3.5 stars for my own satisfaction, but I can see how some of the addicting sections could sway another reader. An interesting, often lyrical, sometimes frustrating read. I'm curious what else Simon Jacobs will produce.
May 10, 2019
I am so confused.
I think I enjoyed this, particularly the second half. But I really don't understand it at all.
So Palaces starts off as it means to continue: ambiguous and wordy. The first fifty or so pages is concentrated in an American city, where the characters are slumming and stealing and destroying. They go to raves, they deface art in museums, they set pharmacies on fire. What interested me throughout these events is their lack of a clear motive. The main character mentions wanting to separate himself from tangibility and others in a detached way but never examines it, neither does his partner. There's no clear political ideology or rejection of culture, they're just removing themselves. The closest we come to a real thought about this is when the protagonist compares his parents with Joey's, musing that she has some legitimate reasons for cutting off contact.
This passage in particular really reminded me of Rent and how I loathe that musical. I was not anticipating the next 170 pages if they were more of the same.
Luckily, in Part III - North, everything goes to hell. In Part III 'Jonathan' and Joey explore a luxury ghost-town. I don't want to say any more other than that at some point it becomes clear that Jonathan is a very unreliable narrator and that he's frequently dissociating.
I've spoiler-ed my main questions here:
I'm really perplexed with this book because I don't understand it at all, nor do I understand the lack of self-awareness of its characters or how they seemed to be surviving on thin air. I'm going to go away now and read some reviews to see if it'll shed some light on the subject!
========= After reading other people's reviews =====
It seems that people think this was post-apocalyptic. I really had no sense of that at all but I suppose it could be one explanation.
Regardless, this is definitely one for a book club!
I think I enjoyed this, particularly the second half. But I really don't understand it at all.
So Palaces starts off as it means to continue: ambiguous and wordy. The first fifty or so pages is concentrated in an American city, where the characters are slumming and stealing and destroying. They go to raves, they deface art in museums, they set pharmacies on fire. What interested me throughout these events is their lack of a clear motive. The main character mentions wanting to separate himself from tangibility and others in a detached way but never examines it, neither does his partner. There's no clear political ideology or rejection of culture, they're just removing themselves. The closest we come to a real thought about this is when the protagonist compares his parents with Joey's, musing that she has some legitimate reasons for cutting off contact.
This passage in particular really reminded me of Rent and how I loathe that musical. I was not anticipating the next 170 pages if they were more of the same.
Luckily, in Part III - North, everything goes to hell. In Part III 'Jonathan' and Joey explore a luxury ghost-town. I don't want to say any more other than that at some point it becomes clear that Jonathan is a very unreliable narrator and that he's frequently dissociating.
I've spoiler-ed my main questions here:
I'm really perplexed with this book because I don't understand it at all, nor do I understand the lack of self-awareness of its characters or how they seemed to be surviving on thin air. I'm going to go away now and read some reviews to see if it'll shed some light on the subject!
========= After reading other people's reviews =====
It seems that people think this was post-apocalyptic. I really had no sense of that at all but I suppose it could be one explanation.
Regardless, this is definitely one for a book club!
May 6, 2023
Palaces by Simon Jacobs
🔪🔪🔪🔪/5
Printed by a local publishing company, Two Dollar Radio, in Columbus, Ohio, this was an interesting read. The book feels like a treasure, I did really enjoy it but it really was a “WTF did I just read?” kind of book.
Absurd, mind-boggling, and confusing—but I love this because it’s a read where I need to stop and think about it which is an exciting process for me because I feel like I am an archaeologist digging out the meaning in the book.
Synopsis:
John and Joey are a young couple recently out of college and have moved North on their own. They live in an abandoned building until they are chased out and take an empty train farther north until the train reaches the end of the line. John and Joey exit into the empty wilderness and explore three mansions that have abandoned. Strange events have happened here as the uncover disturbing secrets and attempt to keep moving and stay safe.
My Review:
This book was confusing but this is what I got from it. Jacobs is an insanely talented writer, creating a lucid story that floats between flashbacks and the current storyline, and really brings the reader into the moment as the main character, John struggles through different events. You feel, see, hear, and smell everything in these moments. It is INTENSE.
Trigger warnings:
Violence, explicit details, spicy, gore, horror, PTSD, self-harm, and suicide.
🔪🔪🔪🔪/5
Printed by a local publishing company, Two Dollar Radio, in Columbus, Ohio, this was an interesting read. The book feels like a treasure, I did really enjoy it but it really was a “WTF did I just read?” kind of book.
Absurd, mind-boggling, and confusing—but I love this because it’s a read where I need to stop and think about it which is an exciting process for me because I feel like I am an archaeologist digging out the meaning in the book.
Synopsis:
John and Joey are a young couple recently out of college and have moved North on their own. They live in an abandoned building until they are chased out and take an empty train farther north until the train reaches the end of the line. John and Joey exit into the empty wilderness and explore three mansions that have abandoned. Strange events have happened here as the uncover disturbing secrets and attempt to keep moving and stay safe.
My Review:
This book was confusing but this is what I got from it. Jacobs is an insanely talented writer, creating a lucid story that floats between flashbacks and the current storyline, and really brings the reader into the moment as the main character, John struggles through different events. You feel, see, hear, and smell everything in these moments. It is INTENSE.
Trigger warnings:
Violence, explicit details, spicy, gore, horror, PTSD, self-harm, and suicide.
September 10, 2018
this book is told in alternating verses of an ending. From the linear trajectory of college to street punks, we’re not quite sure what the ending will be, it could be an entirely different novel, and I could not shake the similarity to City on Fire by Garth Risk Hallberg.
January 14, 2020
Just finished this book and I am so confused by the ending? Honestly my problems might be solved by going back and figuring out who the hell Allie Moore is, if she’s ever previously mentioned, but after all the other confusing stuff I’ve had to reread in this book, I simply don’t have the energy. I was for the most part satisfied with the book and was grudgingly okay with the suicidal ending, but I am PISSED OFF by the ambiguity of the afterword.
In general, I liked the vibe of this book. I was bored as fuck by the beginning sections and found them pretentiously vague, but my interest was finally piqued by the introduction of Vivian and my realization that John’s narration is in no way to be trusted. This is first evident when he realizes his assumption that August and Candace would know why he was attacking them was completely insane. We experience again this disorientation when he brandishes the knife towards Joey and can’t understand why she’s terrified. My FAVORITE SCENE was when they both realized Vivian was a creepy liar who didn’t belong in the house, who didn’t fit in the clothes, who wasn’t in the family photos — but neither of them said anything?!?!?? Did Joey just know that John was a murderer? I also loved the crunchy pasta and Vivian distracting from the photos by making her front all red with pasta sauce — a “massacre,” I believe it’s called. This is incredible writing and I gobbled it up.
My conclusion from the ending is that John was a serial murderer. I believe him to be responsible for just about every single death in the book and his reality is so distorted that he’s not aware he’s doing it. Honestly, the whole time he had Joey’s shoe, I was 98% sure it was actually a gun. I was SO satisfied when it turned out he had to repress his murderous urges by going outside and stabbing a corpse. That’s how I interpreted it, anyway. He has flashes of self-awareness that make it all very frightening for him. With this theory in mind, I am not really sure what the book is doing/trying to do/say?? Is it just a weird story about how reality isn’t real and material itself is not to be trusted? Is it about how violence is always available in the world and the mind? Do any of these questions make any sense?
Honestly, I have no clue. I somewhat enjoyed the read and somehow managed to finish it even though some parts were VERY difficult to slog through. I’ll give it three stars because it made me think, and I’m glad it’s just a library book because I do not have the energy for a reread. Anyone have any explanation for the ending? Anyone less lazy than me willing to figure out who Allie is? Thanks friends.
In general, I liked the vibe of this book. I was bored as fuck by the beginning sections and found them pretentiously vague, but my interest was finally piqued by the introduction of Vivian and my realization that John’s narration is in no way to be trusted. This is first evident when he realizes his assumption that August and Candace would know why he was attacking them was completely insane. We experience again this disorientation when he brandishes the knife towards Joey and can’t understand why she’s terrified. My FAVORITE SCENE was when they both realized Vivian was a creepy liar who didn’t belong in the house, who didn’t fit in the clothes, who wasn’t in the family photos — but neither of them said anything?!?!?? Did Joey just know that John was a murderer? I also loved the crunchy pasta and Vivian distracting from the photos by making her front all red with pasta sauce — a “massacre,” I believe it’s called. This is incredible writing and I gobbled it up.
My conclusion from the ending is that John was a serial murderer. I believe him to be responsible for just about every single death in the book and his reality is so distorted that he’s not aware he’s doing it. Honestly, the whole time he had Joey’s shoe, I was 98% sure it was actually a gun. I was SO satisfied when it turned out he had to repress his murderous urges by going outside and stabbing a corpse. That’s how I interpreted it, anyway. He has flashes of self-awareness that make it all very frightening for him. With this theory in mind, I am not really sure what the book is doing/trying to do/say?? Is it just a weird story about how reality isn’t real and material itself is not to be trusted? Is it about how violence is always available in the world and the mind? Do any of these questions make any sense?
Honestly, I have no clue. I somewhat enjoyed the read and somehow managed to finish it even though some parts were VERY difficult to slog through. I’ll give it three stars because it made me think, and I’m glad it’s just a library book because I do not have the energy for a reread. Anyone have any explanation for the ending? Anyone less lazy than me willing to figure out who Allie is? Thanks friends.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 8, 2018
I love the impressionistic feel of this novel further heightened by the use of the second person and oscillation of time, but I felt the amount of detail was unbalanced with the narrator's insights and often led to a claustrophobia as a reader (although perhaps that was the point). I think this book will require multiple reads as throughout I didn't know which details were relevant. While an interesting concept and idea, I did want more grounding as a reader. I love symbols and repeated images but I wasn't satisfied with their conclusion. I craved Joey's perspective more than once because of her presentation as a manic-pixie dream girl fantasy and found myself lacking empathy for the narrator himself because of this intended refraction. That being said, there were plenty of moments of intrigue but I can't help but find myself mildly baffled after spending time with this book; although, I've never read a book quite like it.
August 8, 2021
I'm.....confused LOL...
I got very strong spotless mind vibes from this but I can't tell u why.. probably the couple on a train imagery that's pretty pervasive throughout it. Not by any virtue of similarities in plot or theme. Simultaneously a pain and a pleasure to read; once i warmed up to it I could read it for longer periods of times but initially it couldn't read more than a few pages at a time. It's just very overwritten and poetically waxing. Not necessarily a bad thing. Just not everyone's cup of tea. Interesting but boring.....
This book contains multitudes is what I'm getting at!!! (But is ultimately vacuous perhaps? *Kombucha girl meme face*)
I got very strong spotless mind vibes from this but I can't tell u why.. probably the couple on a train imagery that's pretty pervasive throughout it. Not by any virtue of similarities in plot or theme. Simultaneously a pain and a pleasure to read; once i warmed up to it I could read it for longer periods of times but initially it couldn't read more than a few pages at a time. It's just very overwritten and poetically waxing. Not necessarily a bad thing. Just not everyone's cup of tea. Interesting but boring.....
This book contains multitudes is what I'm getting at!!! (But is ultimately vacuous perhaps? *Kombucha girl meme face*)
January 4, 2026
The setting of this story feels just a couple steps left of consensus reality, and I enjoyed the energy that gave to the narrative. It's certainly not the first book I've read to play with the "apocalypse-or-crazy" trope, but it does it well and with what felt like the right level of unreliability in the narrator. My primary quibble is with the ending--without giving any potential spoilers I'll just say I felt it left me both wanting more and questioning whether I'd missed something in earlier chapters. I enjoyed the journey overall though, and would definitely recommend this book to fans of surreal fiction or "quiet apocalypse" type novels like The Road.
January 18, 2023
Damn. This was so, so beautiful. Brutal, terrifying, aching. Easily now in my top five favourites, maybe even top three. So glad I found this gem in a little free library in a tiny little mining town in the middle of nowhere; miffed it sat on my shelf waiting for me to open it for so long. It's January and this might be the best book I'll read this year.
I'd like to give this one a real review but I need to let this one sink in for a while first.
Damn.
I'd like to give this one a real review but I need to let this one sink in for a while first.
Damn.
September 6, 2018
Really liked the first half of the book, didn't feel like the second half connected like I hoped it would. Didn't get what was being described for most of the second half. I tend to prefer a lot of narrative tightness, didn't feel much of that.
October 24, 2020
I liked the first half but got so lost in the second half. It was incoherent, too many disparate elements with not enough threads to hold them together. I kept waiting for a thread that I could follow, but it was too chaotic.
July 20, 2023
the imagery at play here was so well-crafted, so well-written. post apocalyptic or neither pre/post but actual apocalyptic? micro-apocalypse for the protaganist?? donnie darko, the world isnt ending, just yours is
September 2, 2024
local punk with memory problems who has read too much Deleuze and Guittari finds himself abandoning a petit-bourgeoisie upbringing to squat in labyrinthine mansions with his punk partner from college in and around a pre-post(?)apocalyptic unnamed NYC. Hoosier dome forever
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 12, 2018
i liked this very much
February 9, 2018
A lot of slippy dreamlike logic and beautiful imagery. This was fun to read/figure out.
June 17, 2018
I really liked this book. Shades of Exit West with the chaotic changes of Grief is a Thing with Feathers. I genuinely don't know how it ends and I read the last parts over and over.
July 6, 2018
Incredible book.
December 12, 2019
I could not finish this book. The author is clearly skilled but the plot is thin and lacks purpose. I was waiting for something to draw me in, but lost patience half way through.
December 27, 2019
Rambling and incoherent at times, maybe a feature or a bug
October 31, 2020
Oh my godddddddddddd, this was so good. The descriptions of the punk scene are tangible and accurate. The memory jumping is perfect for the story. I wish I wrote this.
May 8, 2024
I honestly have no idea what I just read. I feel like I wasted my time with this one.
November 7, 2025
A to hard attempt at art house, no real narrative, no conclusion. Passages that go on way to long for now satisfaction or pay off.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews