I, LLOYD STOLLMAN
Genre:
Literary & General
Author:
Rob Sullivan
Publisher:
Black Heron
Language:
English
AUTHOR BIO:
A playwright, poet, actor, and geographer as well as a novelist, Rob Sullivan has written and performed three critically acclaimed solo shows: Flower Ladies and Pistol Kids, The Long White Dress of Love, and Thicker Than Water, Thinner Than Ice. He also wrote the play, The Killing Floor. He was the collaborating writer of Lady Beth: The Steelworkers’ Play, co-written and performed by steelworkers and staged throughout the United States. I, Lloyd Stollman is his first novel.
Pages:
185
Publication:
2023
Rights available:
All except sold
DESCRIPTION:
Lloyd Stollman is retired from the Dept. of Motor Vehicles. He lives in almost total social isolation in a bungalow of the edge of South Central Los Angeles.
His isolation and his sense of being contained by forces beyond his control are so relentless that one day he outfits himself as a cowboy, and presents himself to the world as a bit player in famous movies. His success in passing himself off as another person is liberating, and encourages him to explore other personas he can inhabit.
But there is a downside, which he realizes when one of his characters turns out to be a killer.
Rather than Lloyd's portraying a character of his own creation, he is being inhabited by his characters. If he thought he could control them, that they allowed him liberation from social repression, he is ultimately disabused. He is no more in control of them than he was of himself, the anonymous, middle-aged white man known as Lloyd Stollman.
The "character" of Lloyd Stollman is often sympathetic, even likable, sometimes funny in his surprise when things go wrong. This is a sinister book, but one also laced with humor, a thoroughly enjoyable read.
REVIEWS:
"The psychological and social revelations permeate a story so revealing that even acts of cross-dressing are realistically presented and thought-provoking at every step of the way. It's intense, riveting, and hard to put down." —Midwest Book Review “Sullivan is an iconoclast on many levels—a grinning, gap-toothed, Irish good-looker who knows how to juggle words as well as things…. He spins comedy out of hateful encounters…” — Sylvie Drake, Los Angeles Times “Schizophrenia never looked so good. Well…assuming an alter ego isn’t exactly mental illness, and until one’s fictional personality takes the reins and commits murder. “That’s the dilemma of mild-mannered, isolated clerk retiree Lloyd, whose successful act of being a movie cowboy proves so empowering that he enters into ...
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