Curation #132 from my Kerouac bookshelf: Move Under Ground by Nick Mamatas

Item #132 in my Kerouac bookshelf curation project is this softcover 2006 Prime Books (no printing number) edition of Move Under Ground by Nick Mamatas. 158 pages, it measures about 5-1/2" x 8-1/4" and is in very good condition. The provenance is that I ordered it from Amazon on October 1, 2011.

I've tried to reconstruct how I learned about this book to no avail. Based on my searching, I haven't blogged about it before and I have no e-mail records (e.g., contact with the author or publisher). No matter, it's on the old Kerouac bookshelf so it gets curated. And besides, the Kerouac connection is obvious.

Here is the back cover blurb:

The year is nineteen-sixty-something, and after endless millennia of watery sleep, the stars are finally right. Old R'lyeh rises out of the Pacific, ready to cast its damned shadow over the primitive human world. 

The first to see its peaks: an alcoholic, paranoid, and frightened Jack Kerouac, who had been drinking off a nervous breakdown up in Big Sur. Now Jack must get back on the road to find Neal Cassady, the holy fool whose rambling letters hint of a world brought to its knees in worship of the Elder God Cthulhu. 

Together with pistol-packing junkie William S. Burroughs, Jack and Neal make their way across the continent to face down the murderous Lovecraftian cult that has spread its darkness to the heart of the American Dream. But is Neal along for the ride to help save the world, or does he want to destroy it just so that he'll have an ending for his book?

Written in first person from Kerouac's point-of-view, this is Mamatas' first novel. I think I read this bizarre Kerouac meets Lovecraft novel when I first got it, but I don't remember my reaction. That likely means it didn't bowl me over one way or the other (or I didn't read it). Scanning it just now, I am wanting to (re)read it just to reside in Kerouac's world for a while, even though it is set within a Lovecraftian plot. This brief review provides an excerpt from the book: Weird Fiction Review.

If you're collecting books not just by but also about Jack Kerouac, this one fits the bill for your Kerouac bookshelf. I can't vouch for how much you'll like it.








Below is a picture of Shelf #4 of my Kerouac bookshelf showing the placement of this book (25th from the left) on the day I started curating my collection. Next up: yet another copy of The Beat Handbook: 100 Days of Kerouactions by Rick Dale.

Shelf #4 of my Kerouac bookshelf