A Thousand Natural Shocks

Hussain debuts with an unconventional thriller that powerfully probes questions of family, death, and memory. Dash Hassan wants to forget everything. A reporter for California’s Monterey Coast News, he’s abusing a cornucopia of prescription pills in an effort to permanently erase his trauma-filled past. He’s also joined a wellness cult called the Liberty Subterraneans, which is led by Rocket, a pale, dreadlocked man who promises his followers that “God is a bomb and can detonate the past to liberate your future.” With layoffs at the newspaper looming, a desperate Dash pitches a series of stories about being stalked by an assailant he decides—somewhat dubiously—is the Coast Killer, a serial murderer who last struck in the late 2000s. His article incites the killer to come out of retirement and launch a new murder spree. Meanwhile, Dash learns the dark truth behind the Liberty Subterraneans’ mission and must confront his most traumatic memories before the drugs erase them—because doing so could hold the key to ending the Coast Killer’s bloodshed. Hussain effectively channels the surreal paranoia of Philip K. Dick’s A Scanner Darkly and the dark absurdity of Thomas Pynchon’s Inherent Vice to craft a wholly original serial killer tale. It’s an auspicious first outing. (May)