Vivian Lee

THE WAR BEGINS IN PARIS IS OUT NOW!

| Ted Wheeler

Tuesday last week was publication day for THE WAR BEGINS IN PARIS!!!

This is the first novel I wrote from start to finish as a published author, and the first since I became a bookseller. Every day when I got to work on these pages I tried to keep my audience in mind, treating the writing as a sort of performance and an invitation to engage. (As a book written mostly during the pandemic, maybe this was a matter of emotional survival.) The result is, I believe, my best work yet: an imaginative war novel that will challenge, delight, and resonate with many of the scores of readers I have met over the last six years, and hopefully many more.

All my work is topical in some way, but I think this is my most timely novel yet, as a novel about American fascism, but also about strained friendship and lost family. The idea for this story was born out of my experience as a political reporter during the last two presidential elections. The threats against journalists, the denigration of honest reporters, and the cynicism of propagandists—all this was on my mind as I worked on these pages.

Thanks so much to my family for putting up with my shenanigans. This is the fourth book we’ve launched together in seven years. That’s a lot of author relations work on their part, which isn’t easy. All my love. The same to my publishing family, especially my agent Stephanie Delman and editor Vivian Lee. Three novels together! And hopefully many more yet to come.

I hope you enjoy The War Begins in Paris at least a quarter as much as I did while writing it. Let me know what you think; share reviews online; come see me on my book tour; invite me to come visit your book club; request that your local library or bookstore put the book in stock; or suggest the book to a friend who might enjoy reading it. Most of all, I hope you have the time and inclination to read The War Begins in Paris. Whatever support you can give, I appreciate it, truly, knowing what it takes.

Best wishes. Yours in solidarity. Keep up the good fight.

James Han Mattson Blurb

| Ted Wheeler

It’s such an honor to have the amazing James Han Mattson lend his support to my new novel, The War Begins in Paris!

We went on a short book tour together in 2018 when both of our debut novels were new and both edited by Vivian Lee, though we hadn’t ever met in person until that first reading at Beaverdale Books in Des Moines. I’m happy to count Jim as a friend now. His novel Reprieve was a powerhouse and he has a new one out next year to add to his debut, The Lost Prayers of Ricky Graves.

“Propulsive, immersive, and beautifully rendered, Theodore Wheeler’s The War Begins in Paris is that rare novel that’s both contemplative and energetic, pulse-pounding and utterly devastating. Through Mielle and Jane, Wheeler deftly illuminates themes of friendship, love, sacrifice, and heroism, and shows us how loyalty and conviction can move in unpredictable patterns under wartime duress. This is a major gut-punch of a novel, and I, for one, am thankful it exists.”

—James Han Mattson, author of Reprieve

The War Begins in Paris will be published on November 14, 2023, but you can pre-order your copy now. (Order a signed copy here and have you shipped to you in November.)

The war begins in paris

| Ted Wheeler

While things may have looked slow around here the last couple years, I’ve been busy writing away on a new novel. With that in mind, I couldn’t be more pleased to share that my fourth book will be published by Little, Brown & Company! 

The War Begins in Paris is a suspenseful work of literary noir, equal parts Patrick Modiano and Lara Prescott, about two female foreign correspondents—a provocative American fascist and an introverted young pacificist—whose fates intertwine behind enemy lines during World War II. As hostilities intensify following the November Pogrom, Mielle’s life is propelled by a series of prophetic visions that take her from a Mennonite farm in Iowa, to a job as a foreign correspondent in Paris, to what she comes to see as a secret mission to assassinate a Nazi propagandist in wartime Germany. Similar to my previous work, The War Begins in Paris blends historical and fictional characters amid a backdrop of true events. 

I started writing this book in earnest in 2020. The project was aided by fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Nebraska Arts Council, which funded research trips to Paris and Germany. The War Begins in Paris will mark my “Big Five” publisher debut and a reunion with editor Vivian Lee, whom I previously worked with at Little A. Vivian made the move to Little, Brown a couple years ago, and I feel very lucky to be following her.

More to come. Much, much more. In the meantime, CHEERS!

Book Deal!!!

| Ted Wheeler

deal
The listing in Publishers Marketplace!

I’m very excited to share that my next novel will be coming out with Little A in the Spring of 2020! It’s a pleasure and a privilege to again work with editor Vivian Lee on the book.

This is the novel I started working on in 2014 when on fellowship that summer at Akademie Schloss Solitude. I began with the basic idea that I wanted to tell a story from the perspective of an NSA spying investigation after reading about how government contractors became so acquainted with some targets of surveillance that it became like a reality TV show for them, except surreptitiously through a web cam, and without consent. And not just the vulgar things they witnessed, but when relationships started and ended, when siblings or children died, jobs were lost, etc. I’d just read Uwe Johnson’s Speculations About Jakob, a novel that features a Stasi detective who becomes enmeshed with the lives of the East German family that’s the object of his surveillance, and the premise seemed so alive and relevant that I had to try my hand at the contemporary American equivalent. My novel didn’t exactly end up like Johnson’s, and it was turned by dozens of additional influences, but Speculations made for an invigorating model, particularly as I wrote that first draft of the book in Germany.

A much-deserved thanks goes to my agent Stephanie Delman for her tireless work in helping me get to the heart of this story and working out a deal to have the book published with Little A, my second with them, of course, after Kings of Broken Things. Many thanks to those who helped this book along with notes and emotional support, including Nicole Wheeler, Amy O’Reilly, Drew Justice, Kassandra Montag, CCB, Ryan Borchers, Felicity White, Bob Churchill, Ryan Norris, Doug Rice, Jean-Baptiste Joly, Jeff Alessandrelli, Trey Moody, Brent Spencer, Dave Mullins, the creative writing program at Creighton University, and many others I’m surely forgetting. More soon!

Fun with Alternate Covers

| Ted Wheeler

Omaha1919_S.gifEarlier in the process of putting together Kings of Broken Things as a book, there were a number of sketches from artist Christina Chung that we went through before the team zeroed in on the concept that would become the image that’s on the cover. Personally, I really fell in love with the idea of the riot igniting a fuse that runs under the institutions of the city, in particular the level of detail that went into depicting actual buildings from that era of Omaha. The kind of attention makes the cover so very special to me, and, along with the image being mirrored on the actual hardcover itself, takes the packaging to a new level. All the great work put in by Christina, my editor Vivian Lee, and title sequence designers Faceout Studio is very much appreciated. Still, it’s interesting to think about the other early concepts we didn’t pick and what it would have looked like if one of them had evolved into the final cover.

Talking over email this week, Christina Chung sent me a gif of another of the sketches that she developed into a full-fledged piece of art. It’s so cool I wanted to share it with you all as well!

Of the image, Christina said, “A personal piece drawing parallels between the events of the summer of 1919 in Omaha, Nebraska to the problems we face as a society in 2017.” Check out a sharper version of “Omaha, 1919” on more of her work at www.christina-chung.com/2017/2/7/2017/2/7/omaha-1919, and, in the meantime, wonder what might have been.

Have a great weekend! I’ll be back with much more in this space soon, including some photos from my book launch party and my first Kings of Broken Things reading at the Bookworm on Sunday!

Author Copy Jackpot!

| Ted Wheeler

img_4652Check out all the author copies and other amazing goodies that were waiting for me at home when I returned from Lisbon. As you can see, the hardcover, paperback, and audio editions of Kings of Broken Things are ready to go for the formal launch date of August 1. In the meantime, a couple weeks remain in this month’s Kindle First program, if you want to get a digital version of the novel early for only $1.99.

I’m so happy with how the book turned out, in all its different mediums. From the small details on the cover (and on the inside hardback) to the feel of the paperback to the cadence of the audio edition. It really is a touching experience to see the level of attention paid to getting these things right. Thanks and kudos to my editor Vivian Lee and everyone on my Little A team.

Kings of Broken Things is a Kindle First Selection!

| Ted Wheeler

wheeler-kings-of-broken-things-final-front-coverThis is some special news I’ve been sitting on for several months–so it’s with great pleasure that I share that my novel Kings of Broken Things is a Kindle First selection for July!

For those who don’t know, Kindle First is a free program that offers early access to select books from across Amazon Publishing at a discounted price. So, while my publication date remains August 1 for the print and audio editions, anyone in the US can get the Kindle edition early for $1.99, or for free if you’re a Prime member.

Anyway, click on the link for more information. It’s a great deal and a special honor for APub authors. Only six books a month are chosen and they must be nominated by their edition to be considered. Thanks so much to my amazing editor Vivian Lee and the rest of the team at Little a for pulling this together.

Here’s what Vivian had to say about Kings and why she nominated it for the program:

“It is 1917 and Omaha is home to a diverse array of refugees and immigrants from war-torn European countries. Jake, Karel, and Evie are coming of age in a time of increasing nationalism, xenophobia, and political corruption. And with wounded soldiers returning from war but finding their jobs have been filled by black migrants from the south, Omaha now looks to be a tinderbox of racial resentment, gleefully stoked by the corrupt, moneyed politicians running the town. Wheeler masterfully creates multiple layers and hidden depths in these characters and the worlds they inhabit in restrained, yet powerful language. Intertwining scenes of the annual Interrace baseball game, a town navigating a false accusation that leads to the real-life lynch mob that burns down parts of Omaha in what is now called the Red Summer of 1919, and the characters’ acts of love and survival in all their complicated forms, Kings of Broken Things is heavy, yes, but will stay with you for a very long time. To quote PEN/Faulkner finalist Julie Iromuanya, ‘This book’s relevance, in the context of today’s concerns, cannot be overstated.'”

 

Kings of Broken Things Cover Reveal!!!

| Ted Wheeler

I’m so excited to share with you the front cover of my new novel Kings of Broken Things, out from Little A on August 1!wheeler-kings-of-broken-things-final-front-cover

The cover turned out so well, I couldn’t be more pleased and excited to share the book with you all this summer. Thanks are due to Christina Chung, who did the illustration, and Vivian Lee, my editor at Little A, who painstakingly worked through many versions until this was just right. Their hard work paid off big time, in my opinion. What do you all think?

The book is now available for pre-order in hardcover, paperback, Kindle, and audio editions. The audio edition is a new addition, for all you road warriors and commuters out there. If you’re so inclined, put in your order now and have the book arrive on August 1.

 

Bad Faith Blurb Preview

| Ted Wheeler

12400715_10102357215153903_1410032962247269600_nAs the July release date for my story collection, Bad Faith, inches ever closer, we’ve been pulling together some of the promotional materials. Here are the blurbs, if you’re interested. Thanks so much to Jonis, Amina, Brent, and Mark for their generosity in taking the time to plug my book! (And check out below for a teaser of the front cover that I’ve been sending out on postcards.)

“These stories turn the reader’s expectations on their head as Wheeler spins stunning arabesques, scoring the surface of his characters’ reality to reveal the malice, confusion, and ultimate frailty of us all.”     – Jonis Agee, author of The Bones of Paradise

“Theodore Wheeler’s debut collection of fiction Bad Faith is a perfect lesson in perfidy, deception, and duplicity, a contemplative exploration of the vagaries of the double-minded human heart.”     – Amina Gautier, author of The Loss of All Lost Things

“Wheeler’s characters occupy the edges of their lives, the gray places of the heart. They yearn for inclusion at the same time that they feel pulled into isolation. At the heart of this brilliant book is the desire to connect—with others, with the world around us, and with the lost parts of ourselves. Filled with powerful insights and a nuanced understanding of human nature, Bad Faith is a major achievement, and Theodore Wheeler is a writer to be reckoned with.”     – Brent Spencer, author of Rattlesnake Daddy: A Son’s Search for His Father

“Superbly chiseled prose conveying extraordinarily hardscrabble lives, Bad Faith explores dark alleys within the epiphany that some of us are more fated to hell than heaven on earth. Theodore Wheeler is the real deal and then some.”     – Mark Wisniewski, author of Watch Me Go