Keynote
A multigenre debut novel tracing one woman’s quest for faith across the American West during the Space Age
Book Title
The High Heaven
Subtitle
A Novel
Cover Image
“Joshua Wheeler’s debut novel has got me rethinking my stake in the universe. . . . Oliver and Izzy’s buddy exploits are the most entrancing first 100 pages of a book I’ve read in some time. . . . Even when Izzy’s journey descends into dark territories, Wheeler . . . writes like he’s having a blast.”—Rien Fertel, The Times-Picayune
Body
In 1967, on the night of the first Apollo mission, a child named Izzy is orphaned when the doomsday cult she was born into clashes with the sheriff in the high desert of New Mexico. She’s taken in by a struggling rancher who is trying to keep his mind from falling apart as NASA rocket tests encroach on his outer range. Inspired by the true story of a UFO cult in a village near White Sands, this novel traces Izzy Gently’s whole life: from tragedy on the ranch, through addiction and a rich cast of eccentrics in Texas, to New Orleans, where Izzy is haunted by her past even as she uses lessons from childhood to counsel people who have lost the ability to see the moon.
In The High Heaven, Joshua Wheeler explores American piety as it mutates over the course of the Space Age, as technology changes notions of both humanity and the heavens. Shot through with the speculative while paying homage to three iconic genres—neo-Western, picaresque, and Southern gothic—Izzy’s life story becomes a mirror for the warping of manifest destiny and, ultimately, a testament to the human will to seek meaning from the universe.
Suffused with the absurdist history of American space travel and the wide-open landscapes of the Southwest, The High Heaven chronicles a larger-than-life adventure of one extraordinary woman who, despite tragedy, never loses sight of redemption.
In The High Heaven, Joshua Wheeler explores American piety as it mutates over the course of the Space Age, as technology changes notions of both humanity and the heavens. Shot through with the speculative while paying homage to three iconic genres—neo-Western, picaresque, and Southern gothic—Izzy’s life story becomes a mirror for the warping of manifest destiny and, ultimately, a testament to the human will to seek meaning from the universe.
Suffused with the absurdist history of American space travel and the wide-open landscapes of the Southwest, The High Heaven chronicles a larger-than-life adventure of one extraordinary woman who, despite tragedy, never loses sight of redemption.
List Price
$28.00
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About the Author
Credit: Adrienne Battistella
Upcoming Events
Joshua Wheeler reading and in conversation about THE HIGH HEAVEN at Louisiana Book Festival
Date:
Location:
Louisiana Book Festival in Baton Rouge, LAview map
LOCATION: State Library, Fifth Floor, Serials. “Fiction After the End: Building, Surviving, and Seeing the World Anew,” featuring Joshua Wheeler, Eiren Caffall, and Malaika Favorite, moderated by Serena Puang. A book signing will follow from 3:15 to 4:00 PM in the Cavalier House Books tent. Click here for details.
Praise
“As school goes back in sessions and the cicadas slow their screaming, is there anything better to read than a bildungsroman? How about a Space Age bildungsroman by Josh Wheeler, gonzo-genius author of the radioactive essay collection Acid West?”—C. Morgan Babst, Garden & Gun
- “In [Wheeler’s] first novel, composed in weird and luminous prose and based on a true story, he interrogates powerful ambivalence about religion and explores the possibilities of transcendence.”—Brendan Driscoll, Booklist, starred review
- “Stunning. . . . Izzy’s tale is strange and wild, but it’s also one that illuminates our national obsession with new highs, and new heights.”—Kirkus Reviews
“True Grit meets Philip K. Dick as Wheeler expertly limns his heroine’s space-age travels in prose that skitters between lyrical and vernacular and sticks the landing.”—Paul Wilner, Alta Journal
