Signal to Noise
The Foundry: A Literary Collective, 2011
Paperback, 268 pages, $12.75

Postmodernism meets music mash-up, remixing, and collage in this late-1980s coming-of-age story, a much-reworked version of author Jonathan Lyons's (Writing 2005) thesis project. It is an alt-underground music extravaganza that repeatedly breaks the traditional form of the novel. As Connor submerges into the underground music scene, he is enthralled by an industrial/hardcore music legend who goes by the handle "The Siren." Their otherworldly commingling alters them, a physical transmogrification that takes hold whenever they are intimate. Music is woven into the text, as lyrics interplay with the storyline in this hybrid of fabulism, alternative and industrial music, and fiction, a tour of the underground music scene of the mid- to late '80s in Iowa City and beyond. The publisher, the Foundry: A Literary Collective, is a small co-op press (started by Lyons) using CreateSpace for fulfillment and delivery of this, its first title. The book is a nominee for the Pushcart Press Editors Choice Book Award.