This Year

‘An illuminated manuscript. These songs, released from their recordings, stand even more vividly as stories: self-contained, richly coloured, extending their private inks into the wider world.’

-- Patricia Lockwood, author of Will There Ever Be Another You

‘This lovely book is both a beautiful collection of songs and a fascinating guide to the strange work of making art in the world. A bountiful gift from one of our greatest songwriters.’

-- John Green, author of A Fault In Our Stars

‘[These] lyrics are brilliant; Darnielle is one of the best songwriters of his generation, and his words are achingly beautiful … [This Year] offers a look into Darnielle’s inspiration and songwriting process, and the result is even more impressive than one might expect … An inspired project that’s far better than a typical lyrics collection.’

-- Kirkus Reviews, starred review

‘John Darnielle is the beat lyricist of his generation. And he is one of only two writers — the other being Scott Walker — whose song lyrics I would want to read in a book. These lyrics are as linguistically concentrated, rhythmically astute, and surprising as any contemporary poem, and Darnielle’s commentary, itself beautifully written, is a fan’s dream come true. I have hoped for such a book, but this book is more than I hoped for.’

-- Shane McCrae, author of New and Collected Hell

Praise for Devil House:

‘Quietly, as if stealing in on cat’s paws, [John Darnielle has] become, as a novelist, unignorable … His third novel, Devil House, is terrific: confident, creepy, a powerful and soulful page-turner. I had no idea where it was going, in the best possible sense … It’s never quite the book you think it is. It’s better.’

-- Dwight Garner * The New York Times *

Praise for Devil House:

‘Masterful … Often tense, lyrically dazzling, and iced with a thick layer of irreverent affinity for the fringes of pop culture, the result is top-notch storytelling … Suspenseful, brilliant, and chaotically addicting, Devil House triumphs as a page-turning metafictional treatise on the power of narratives cloaked in the trappings of a certifiable true crime classic.’

-- Zack Ruskin * San Francisco Chronicle *

Praise for Universal Harvester:

‘A captivating exploration of the vagaries of memory and inertia in middle America … [Universal Harvester] serves as a stellar encore after the success of [Darnielle‘s] debut novel, Wolf in White Van … Beneath the eerie gauze of this book, I felt an undercurrent of humanity and hope.’

* The Washington Post *

Praise for Universal Harvester:

‘A slow-burn mystery/thriller whose characters are drawn together by an eerie discovery … Darnielle adeptly juggles multiple stories that collide with chaotic consequences somewhere in the middle of nowhere.’

-- Publishers Weekly, starred review

Praise for Wolf in White Van:

‘A delicately written first novel, poignant and sinister, that probes the creative and destructive potential of the imagination.’

-- Cameron Woodhead * The Sydney Morning Hera