Lullaby for the Rain Girl by Christopher Conlon

At age 36, Ben Fall is a man in torment. Overstressed, out of shape, in the middle of a bitter divorce, and carrying a secret that weighs heavily on his psyche, he's convinced he's a failure. He can hardly get out of bed in the morning to make his way to the high school where he teaches English. But suddenly one gray afternoon, a mousy, nondescript new girl appears in his classroom. She seems fascinated by everything he says and does--disturbingly so. Yet, though she gazes obsessively at him and hangs on his every word, she won't even tell him her name...just that she's "The Rain Girl." Who is she? Where does she come from? What does she want?

"We could call this book a 'contemporary metaphysical mystery' or a 'modern fantasy,' but it's far more...Lullaby for the Rain Girl resonates like the Expat Paris of Hemingway in A Moveable Feast and the 1960s College Crazy of Richard Farina's Been Down So Long Looks Like Up To Me: detailed recall of 'what was' interwoven with 'what should have been.' There's a rough 20th century romanticism, too, something like Richard Matheson's sensibility filtered through Henry Miller's libidinous viewpoint. It gives us the hauntings of not-quite-ghosts, lingering regrets and remembrances, and the documentation of the results of not so wise but always human choices. It is one hell of a story told by one hell of a writer, a novel that feels more evocatively true than many memoirs." - Mort Castle, author of Moon on the Water and The Strangers

"This powerful novel is both innovative and a fine example of world-class storytelling: it's about life and the restless shadows it casts; it's about death and ghosts who aren't ghosts. Gripping, nuanced, and deep, Conlon's novel delivers." - John Shirley, author of Bleak History and In Extremis

Editions

Premium Leather-bound Deluxe Thirteen Hardcover w/slipcase (sold out): mint and first edition, numbered 1-13, 6''x9'', bound in leather, signature page which is signed by both author and artist, front cover stamped and spine stamped with the title and the author's name, includes end papers, colored book ribbon with full colored header, 60lb. natural vellum stock, a slipcase and laminated dust jacket.

100 Signed and Numbered Limited Hardcover: mint and first edition, numbered 1-100, 6''x9'', bound in leatherette, signed by the author, stamped on the spine with the title and author's name, includes 80lb. natural vellum end papers, colored book ribbon, multi-colored header, 60lb. natural vellum stock and laminated dust jacket.

Trade Paperback: first 100 copies signed by the author, 6"x9", 12 point full color laminated cover, 60lb. natural vellum stock.

Halloween Grab Bag (Lullaby for the Rain Girl included): get all the slithering horrors in the limited time Halloween Grab Bag and ensure Lullaby for the Rain Girl is one of the titles you receive.  The Halloween Grab Bag includes: 1x Signed and Numbered Limited Hardcover, 2x Fiction Trade Paperbacks, 1x Poetry Trade Paperback, 1x DRP t-shirt (leave size request in order comments), 1x DRP bookmark and the new story from Jeff Strand "Protect Us From The Piranha People!"  Any Halloween Grab Bag buyers also have a chance to win a membership to the 2012 DRP Book Club ($210 value). 

About the Author

Christopher Conlon is a writer, poet, and editor whose best-known book is his Richard Matheson tribute anthology He Is Legend, a Bram Stoker Award-winning compilation of original stories from Stephen King, Joe Hill, Whitley Strieber, and many others. He has written novels, including the Stoker Award finalist Midnight on Mourn Street, along with volumes of poems, collections of short stories, and a stage play. He lives in Silver Spring, Maryland.

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