Prologue to Fiction by Alex Austin

(***Prefatory Note: I've lived near the beaches of Southern California forever.  I've witnessed on shore or while in the water, the hard to capture images Alex Austin has strikingly captured so well in his prologue to Fiction.  For a few days every year, select California coastlines put on their best North Shore of Oahu act, and crowds gather beachside, hooting and cheering those courageous (or crazy enough) to take the drop into Big Waves.  Collective groans follow wipeouts, and then silence: onlookers hold their collective breath until the surfers resurface, sometimes a minute or longer after disappearing in the crunching white crash.  Big Days at the beach, when south swells rumble north -- the mammoth offspring of Mexican hurricanes -- make the local news or front page of the L.A. Times routinely.  But there's nothing routine at all in Alex Austin's Fiction.  Enter the watery depths of his prologue's wonderful prose ... and hold your breath.***)

Well, I knew the day was coming when I'd have to remove Alex's story due to its impending publication elsewhere, and I'm sad to see the story go, but am quite grateful to Alex Austin for letting it have a temporary home here in The Forum.  Once the prologue has found its permanent home, I will link it here.
~ Enrique, Dec. 18th, 2011

Alex Austin spent a month being interviewed by Le Salon in LibraryThing in February, 2010.  Read the full interview.

Alex Austin's previous novels include The Perfume Factory (2005) and The Red Album of Asbury Park Remixed (2009).  I've yet read The Perfume Factory, though I hear Austin will be re-releasing it under a new title in the near future, and I'll definitely be buying myself a copy of it then.  I have read The Red Album, a brilliant novel, and I've written briefly about it (too briefly; I'll need to amend that) here.  Austin has also authored plays that were staged in Los Angeles.  He's been published in numerous journals, including Westways and Rose & Thorn.  Lovers of Haruki Murakami can't help but love Alex Austin's Fiction.  It's a privilege featuring his work here in the Forum.

Thank you, Alex!

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