Category: Fiction

by Kevin Bartelme

Kevin Bartelme, the author of five humorous novels, turns to the form of the classic short story in LET THEM EAT RUBBISH. The contrast between his wildly imaginative images, and the familiar structures of the literary short story—of De Maupassant, O. Henry, O’Hara—creates a crackling tension that ripples through the fifteen stories. His language, too, follows the classic structures and punctuation of “good English” so you always know exactly what he is saying—explicitly, at least. The clarity of his writing, and its strong narrative flow, lets the reader experience his creativity in a way that wouldn’t be possible if his prose was as offbeat and unexpected as his imagination.All the stories take place, at least in part, in pre-pandemic New York City—on its streets and in its bars, offices, apartments and shops. Love, wealth, ambition, sex, drinking, old age and immortality are themes that writers have explored for four thousand years, and Bartelme joins them in his vivid, 21st-century way. Rather than Odysseus struggling to free himself from the goddess Calypso, JOHN AND ELSA gives us a strangely convincing romance between a devil and an angel in a Manhattan club who have a hard time getting together, but find it even more difficult to break up. In VALLEY OF THE DOLTS, the high-tech screen called Solipsist, which lets a Las Vegas hooker grow a new body part, is oddly reminiscent of the reflection that dazzled Narcissus. And in PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST—and several other stories—the reader embarks on the same quest for immortality that captivated Gilgamesh.With vivid language and surprisingly twisty plots, Bartelme brings his characters and their emotions to life even as the title of this book, LET THEM EAT RUBBISH, loudly advertises one of his main concerns: there’s a lot he doesn’t like about the modern, consumerist, high-tech world. In the humorous, often memorable struggles of his characters, he shows us exactly why.

by Kevin Bartelme

In The Tin Hat, his fifth humorous work of fiction with Coolgrove, author Kevin Bartelme brings us another biting satire about our culture’s fast slide into disturbing, uncharted territory. Not new to that critical point of view, our author lends us his literary goggles to witness hosts of science deniers submitting to delusional superstitions in hot, blind pursuit of their measures of success. Through deft application of dramatic devices he allow us a comedic gaze at outrageous behavior in the light of wise hindsight to be found in the best of ancient Greek comedians—writing as they were, in an already mature democracy—no strangers to diversity and valuing truth over correctness. In street parlance, Bartelme tells it like it is. Perhaps the stars will be aligned this fateful summer of 2020 for tired Americans to step back and be entertained by this author’s talent for treating heavy subjects with a light touch.When Professor Ted Gershem and his graduate school abnormal psychology seminar participants investigate conspiracy theorists diverse as flat-earthers and gluten rejectors they encounter a slew of Cassandras who warn them about everything from the Reptilians to the Bilderbergers. Before long they find themselves plunged in bizzare world-views where nothing is what it seems and where dark, unseen forces, battle for control of our minds. In this outrageous gambol through the dark side of New York, the group gets more than what they bargained for as they’re drawn into bizarre, off the wall situations involving eccentrics with exceedingly ‘rich inner lives’ dwelling in nothing but alternate realities propounded by, among other extreme tin hatters, a cabal of Ayn Rand revivalists. We are taken on a painless romp through an America gone soft on science but fallen hard

by Kevin Bartelme

Fukushima and it’s effect on the US. A comic drama Ain’t Life Swell is a contemporary family saga that hop-scotches all over the world, stopping on every continent but Australia and the South Pole [and those aren’t really continents anyway.] Three generations of the Howell family, originally from California, manage to get in trouble with everyone from the CIA to the Mexican mob to Big Nuclear in a wild, farcical romp through the time zones, inviting us to reflect on the mess the human species has got itself into. Is there any escape from this seemingly inevitable impending train wreck? This timely tome tries to ignore the question and will make great, light summer beach reading foranyone with their…is a contemporary family saga that hop-scotches all over the world, stopping on every continent but Australia and the South Pole [and those aren’t really continents anyway.] Three generations of the Howell family, originally from California, manage to get in trouble with everyone from the CIA to the Mexican mob to Big Nuclear in a wild, farcical romp through the time zones, inviting us to reflect on the mess the human species has got itself into. Is there any escape from this seemingly inevitable impending train wreck? This timely tome tries to ignore the question and will make great, light summer beach reading foranyone with their head in the sand. head in the sand.

By Kevin Bartelme

Martin Seward’s soujourn in the country is about to take an unexpected turn for the better, it least for those last golden, sunlit days of summer. However, the fateful intersection of his cousin Alicia and his neighbor Dacron Redstone will eventually lead to consequences that can only be described as disastrous. At least if you have no sense of humor. Bartelme’s comical account of life with the summer people will make you wonder if that country house is really worth it.