Rebecca Demarest (Fiction) | Seattle, WA

Rebecca Demarest is an award-winning book designer, author, and technical illustrator living in Seattle, WA with her husband. She loves to teach writing, and writes and reads mainly speculative fiction, with a smattering of literary fiction thrown in as a palette cleanser. In what spare time she can eke out, she rock climbs, crochets, quilts, and takes care of her indoor forest.

Books

Comment:

“I love doing readings, having conversations about my writing or writing in general, and teaching classes about writing. I’m happy to connect with classrooms, book clubs, and writing groups via Skype anywhere in the world, so long as its a reasonable time in Seattle!”

Press & Reviews | About Undeliverable

“Engaging, inventive and full of feeling, Demarest’s debut engagingly addresses what we lose when we lose someone we love.” ~ Kirkus Review

“Demarest’s writing is sharp and witty. Her book is a great read with a bit of social conscience. While I was reading, I felt as if Demarest was taking me on a wild ride, a ride that I enjoyed and met a bunch of cool people along the way. From Gertrude to Sylvia – the characters are a great group of people. Benjamin faces struggles throughout the investigation, but in the end…well, read it and I think that you will enjoy it as much as I did.” ~ Portland Book Review

“This is a well-plotted, well-written story — its central metaphor of lost mail for a lost child creative and poignant. Ben channels his frustration with his inability to find his child to reconnecting mail to its intended recipient — efforts often similarly futile. The details of the “mail recovery system” and history of the mail service, in general, are actually interesting. Most topics are inherently interesting, when gone into with enough depth and clarity. The details of the detective work that Ben does in his search are actually more thorough and systematic than that of the professional police detectives. Riveting. There is peace, if no real happy endings, at the resolution of the story for both Ben and Sylvia, both tragic figures who have experienced loss.” ~ San Francisco Book Review

“Undeliverable delivers a range of pleasures to its readers: a unique and fascinating setting, an urgent mystery, a cast of oddball characters, sharp and witty dialogue. But what makes it compelling above all else is its heartfelt exploration of one man’s grief and determination in the face of his son’s disappearance. We yearn for Ben to find his missing boy, but even more, we want him to find a path to fulfillment in a world full of trouble. In Rebecca Demarest’s hands, his journey is tense, thrilling, and deeply satisfying.” – Scott Nadelson, author of Saving Stanley and The Cantor’s Daughter

“Herman Melville knew that the dead letter office of the U.S. Postal Service was a potent metaphor for modern life. His short story, “Bartleby the Scrivener,” harnessed the great sighs of humanity found there. Rebecca Demarest’s engaging tale of what has become the “Mail Recovery Center” picks up the beautiful sadness and loss of a place that contains letters to “Santa, Jesus, God, Satan, The Perfect Man, [and] The Easter Bunny…” Her tale is framed engagingly by the “Property Office Manual” instructions by the long gone Gertrude Biun, a ghost of bureaucracies past. Rebecca Demarest knows how tales work. She gives her readers spirited language, dead-on humor and a trip to the inner workings of despair and strangeness. Serious readers will love this book.” – Michael Strelow, author of The Greening of Ben Brown, and his new novel, Henry: A Novel of Beer and Love in the West

“A modern noir with a social conscience, Demarest’s novel combines the page-turning qualities of the “man on a mission” thriller with the heartwrenching realities of child abduction. Publishers, and fans, of cinematic fiction with a something extra, take notice.” – William Orem, playwright and author of Killer of Crying Deer

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