A risk-taking, labyrinthine, and absolutely original collection of short stories.
Every Night I Dream I'm a Monk, Every Night I Dream I'm a Monster offers an unfolding puzzle of the human psyche that is at once explosive, funny, dark, sweet, pained, and utterly strange. From the tangled threads of a messed-up family to the timeless themes of consciousness, love, art, and death, Damian Tarnopolsky's narrative journey takes readers through past, present, and future, with stories spanning from 1980s England to present-day Canada to visions of Renaissance France and a world yet to come.
Each tale stands alone in its stylistic direction, only to connect and reflect back on each other in unexpected, touching, and sometimes jarring ways. As characters from different times and places converge, the result is a mosaic of emotions and insights that mirror the complexities of a self in time.
With echoes of Chekhov, Olga Tokarczuk, and Jennifer Egan, this is a collection that transcends the boundaries of traditional storytelling, offering a glimpse into the workings of relationships, inheritance, and experience.
