CITY OF SPORES

PRAISE FOR CITY OF SPORES

“Austin Shirey’s City of Spores is unlike anything I've ever read! An incisive, whip-smart, edge-of-your-seat, hard-boiled mystery that deftly tackles themes of corruption, colonization, social stratification, racism, and revolution. Each page draws you deeper into the fungal folds of Madripol, exposing rot and ruin, but also, perhaps a chance for redemption.”

—Tiffany Michelle Brown, author of How Lovely To Be a Woman, and co-host of the Horror in the Margins podcast

“Austin Shirey's novella about a private investigator in a town overrun with fungi is absorbing and utterly imaginative. The setting is poetry written in mushroom spores, a world fit for fans of Jeff VanderMeer. The story maintains the smoky noir atmosphere, quick pace, and puzzling clues of everyone's favorite detective novels. Wonderfully contagious weird fiction!”

—Ivy Grimes, author of The Cellar Below the Cellar and The Ghosts of Blaubart Mansion

“While following in the footsteps of noir gone before, Shirey blazes his own trail with this speculative story of violence, revenge, and grace. City of Spores is an intersection of the old and the new—in more ways than one—suggesting hope for the future can sometimes be found thriving in the remains of the past. As if that weren't enough, it's also a rollicking good read, brimming with imagination and curiosity. Shelve this one between VanderMeer and Miéville, but keep your Chandler and Hammett close.”

—TJ Price, author of The Disappearance of Tom Nero

“A relentless descent into corruption and decay, Shirey’s fungal noir ruptures the city's ecosystem, revealing rot itself might be the sign of something new and vital.”

—Andrew F. Sullivan, author of The Marigold

“Subversive fungal noir is the genre blend I didn’t realize I was missing until now! Two-fisted, fast-paced, and pulpier than a portobello, City of Spores delivers hard-boiled P.I. thrills with a few mycologically mind-bending twists.”

—Gordon B. White, Bram Stoker Award finalist