Panpocalypse - by Carley Moore (Paperback)

About the Book

In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, a queer disabled woman bikes through a locked-down New York City for the ex-girlfriend who broke her heart.

Book Synopsis

During the coronavirus pandemic, a queer disabled woman bikes through a locked-down NYC for the ex-girlfriend who broke her heart.

Orpheus manages to buy a bicycle just before they sell out across the city. She takes to the streets looking for Eurydice, the first woman she fell in love with, who also broke her heart. The city is largely closed and on lockdown, devoid of touch, connection, and community. But Orpheus hears of a mysterious underground bar Le Monocle, fashioned after the lesbian club of the same name in 1930s Paris.

Will Orpheus be able to find it? Will she ever be allowed to love again? Panpocalypse--first published as an online serial in spring of 2020--follows a lonely, disabled, poly hero in this novel about disease, decay, love, and revolution.

Review Quotes

"At once timely and timeless."
--Kirkus Reviews

"A wonderfully inventive novel about love, illness, and the devastating loneliness of isolation."
--Booklist

"Evocative. . . . Moore shines when channeling readers' collective fears for the future."
--Publishers Weekly

"Carley Moore's voice is a necessary joy in our current exacting times. With each of her works, her skills get sharper and her heart cracks wider--Panpocalypse is a masterpiece of fierce queer honesty, taking on the intricacies of our bodies and our minds, the city and the state, with fearless passion and bold, political intelligence. We need this book right now, and we'll need it in all the nows to come."
--Michelle Tea, author of Against Memoir: Complaints, Confessions & Criticisms

"Panpocalypse is a rousing, eerily enchanting, and verve-filled exploration of love and life in the midst of brittle collapse and upheaval. Moore's sharp and provocative voice adds much-needed complexity to the public discourse about the impact of COVID-19 on queer and disabled communities."
--Jamia Wilson, author of Young Gifted and Black

"Here's the sexy, sad, queer, disabled, time-bending romp through the bleak pandemic landscape that you've been waiting for! No one lays herself as bare on the page as Carley Moore, and Panpocalypse is her most naked work to date. Whoever you are, and wherever you need your bike to take you, this book will speak to the universal need for love, touch, and acceptance in the hardest of times."
--Lynn Melnick, author of Refusenik

"Panpocalypse is the pandemic novel we all need--honest, raw, sexy, sad, joyful, and so, so smart. I couldn't put this book down. The prose crackles, the story line shimmers; it has the energy of a queer, disabled Elena Ferrante living in modern-day New York City. There's gritty reality, and there's also the most fun escapist fantasy (and time travel!). Panpocalypse is a must-read for anyone who has yearned for connection in quarantined times."
--Amy Shearn, author of Unseen City

"Carley Moore's stunning novel captures the haunted dreams of our present world and the dire imaginings of an uncertain future. With the main character's bicycle rides through an anxious and lonely city, Moore tells a story of queer longing that moves between past and present, imagination and memory, all the while taking pleasure and grief and hope by the hand and bringing them along as a mooring against social decay. This is a powerful story, naked and mournful, but also sharp and sensual and playful. It's a book that will linger with you for weeks and months and years."
--James Polchin, author of Indecent Advances: A Hidden History of True Crime and Prejudice Before Stonewall

About the Author

Carley Moore is the author of the essay collection 16 Pills, the poetry chapbook Portal Poem, the young adult novel The Stalker Chronicles, and the fiction novel The Not Wives, published by the Feminist Press in 2019. Her work has appeared in the American Poetry Review, Brainchild, the Brooklyn Rail, the Journal of Popular Culture, and other publications. She is a clinical professor of writing and contemporary culture and creative production in the Global Liberal Studies Program at New York University and a senior associate at Bard College's Institute for Writing and Thinking. She lives in Brooklyn.