Monsters of Ohio (preorder)

Dust jacket illustration by Michael Koelsch.

Published by Tor Books.

Monsters of Ohio is a heartfelt exploration of a tentacular solution to the struggles of the modern world from the New York Times bestselling author of Starter Villain

Note: There is a limit of one copy per person/household.

In many ways Richland, Ohio is the same tiny, sleepy rural village it has been for the last 150 years: The same families, the same farms, the same heartland beliefs and traditions that have sustained it for generations. But right now times are especially hard, as social and economic forces inside and outside the community roil the surface of the once-placid town.

Richland, in other words, is primed to explode... just not the way that anyone anywhere could ever have expected. And when things do explode, well, that’s when things start getting really weird.

Mike Boyd left Richland decades back, to find his own way in the world. But when he is called back to his hometown to tie up some loose ends, he finds more going on than he bargained for, and is caught up in a sequence of events that will bring this tiny farm village to the attention of the entire world... and, perhaps, spell its doom.

From Kirkus (Starred Review):

“[Scalzi’s] fiction and nonfiction portray a writer who’s angry about what’s happened to our world and who desperately wants, against all odds, for justice to be served and for people to get what they deserve. His endings are typically a bit too neat, but that’s what his readers come back for. It’s his equivalent of the romance writer’s happily-ever-after, although this book has one of his more unusual flavors of happy ending… Trenchant, funny, grotesque, and improbably sweet.”

Library Journal (Starred Review):

“Scalzi’s (When the Moon Hits Your Eye) delightfully quirky, cozy sci-fi horror serves up a heaping helping of small-town charm, offers a love letter to the author’s own rural Ohio small town, and pays homage to the pulp horror of classic scary movies while snarkily commenting that humans are the scariest monsters of all.”

From Publishers Weekly:

“Three-time Hugo Award winner Scalzi (The Shattering Peace) unleashes humorous hell on a cozy Midwestern setting in this fun fantasy that doubles as a tirade on private equity and public spectacle... The result is a surprisingly cheerful tale of a suffering community fighting back against corporate predation. With Scalzi’s dry wit on full display throughout, readers will have a blast dropping into Richland to mash with its monsters.”