The Burning House

" The Burning House is an achingly lovely novel about the things that bind us together in this life and the things that pull us apart. Paul Lisicky has an extraordinary gift for exploring emotional nuance and the rhythms of desire. With this book he yet again asserts himself as one of the select writers who continues to teach me about the complexities of the human heart."—Robert Olen Butler The new house ate up every square foot of its lot. Copper roofing, copper flashing, copper downspouts: every last detail crying out, notice me, notice me, keep up with me. Exactly the kind of house Joan would have despised, with good reason. In this captivating family saga, narrator Isidore Mirsky finds his close-knit family and community suddenly coming apart. Facing the illness of family members and the loss of homes in a recession-plagued urban town, he also contends with an overwhelming new desire—his feelings for his wife's sister. The Burning House finds its narrator at his most vulnerable, and explores what it means to be a good man amidst chaos. Paul Lisicky is the author of Lawnboy and Famous Builder . Lisicky maintains a highly active schedule with readings and book signings, and connects with his readership through Facebook and his blog. He lives in New York City and on the east end of Long Island, and teaches at New York University. A collection of short prose pieces, Unbuilt Projects , is forthcoming in 2012.

Paul Lisicky is well-known and well-connected in the literary and academic worlds. (Husband is Mark Doty.)

Extensive reading tour planned, with 30-40 stops at bookstores, book festivals, writers' conferences, and universities. (Author did more than 20 readings on his own in 2010, with no new book since 2006.)

Author is an active social networker, with over 4000 Facebook friends and Twitter followers, as well as a popular blog and web site.

Burning House already has stellar blurbs, from Jayne Anne Philips, Nick Flynn, Robert Olen Butler

Media and booksellers will be invited to book parties in New York, the Hamptons, and Provincetown
Author has two previous books (novel and memoir) published with Graywolf, that were well reviewed and widely publicized.

Subject matter of Burning House has widest appeal of any of the author's works: a family saga comparable to Michael Cunningham's Flesh and Blood

Timely non-fiction hook: A close-knit family and community torn apart by battles over community development and gentrification, in a recession-plagued exurban environment seldom depicted in fiction.

Both witty and profound, the narrative presents a dynamic interior monologue: One man struggles to do right as his family and community begin to come apart. This witty and astute novel explores loss, desire, and moral choice, as a recession-era family and community disintegrate into chaos