Join us on Wednesday, July 12 at 7pm PT when Ilana DeBare celebrates the release of her debut novel, Shaken Loose, with Leah Garchik at 9th Ave!
Masks Encouraged for In-Person Attendance
Or watch online at the link below
https://youtube.com/live/5uLscn1DR50?feature=share
Praise for Shaken Loose
"A propulsive, provocative novel that explores the afterlife, faith, and redemption in visceral prose. Annie's gripping story will linger with you long after reading." —Vanessa Hua, author of Forbidden City
"The Devil is tired and God is uncaring. In this wonderful novel, a small band of the damned finds that, as we have always suspected, it is easier to get into Hell than out. DeBare has created a compulsive read, a narrative full of surprises about a woman who becomes more herself after death than she ever was in life." —Karen Joy Fowler, author of Booth and a Man Booker Award finalist
“DeBare's thoroughly original romp through hell is by turns funny and unnerving, and ultimately moving.” —Yael Goldstein Love, author of The Possibilities
About Shaken Loose
Annie Maple was a 29-year-old San Francisco underachiever, a college dropout living in the shadow of her genius older brother. Then she died and went to Hell—classic Christian Hell with fire and sulfur and devils, a place she never imagined might truly exist. Annie can’t remember how she died or was sent there. But the systems governing Hell are starting to run down, giving her a chance to escape.
Joining other “shaken loose” souls from different eras in search of an exit, Annie treks across volcanic deserts, flees marauders, and confronts an existentially depressed Satan. Hell, she learns, is an unjust place filled not only with truly evil people but with billions of average souls who simply didn’t happen to be Christian. Seeking the courage to transcend her past failures, Annie must ultimately choose between returning to life and challenging this system of divine injustice.
About Ilana DeBare
A former S.F. Chronicle reporter, Ilana DeBare has also worked as communications director for Golden Gate Audubon Society. She was the founding board president of the Julia Morgan School for Girls, an all-girl middle school in Oakland that opened in 1999. That experience led her to write Where Girls Come First, a social history of all-girl education. Shaken Loose is her first published novel, although she's written one approximately every decade. (They started out awful and eventually got better.) Ilana lives in Oakland with her husband Sam and their astonishingly fluffy cat Bowie. See ilanadebare.com.
About Leah Garchik
Leah Garchik was hatched in Brooklyn before Brooklyn was cool. She arrived in San Francisco in 1971, and with her husband raised two fine sons and two fine dogs. She worked at the San Francisco Chronicle for 47 years, starting as a temporary steno-clerk and clawing and back-stabbing her way to presiding over a daily column for 35 years. Lest that sound cruel, it should be noted that she is a vegetarian.
She has written two books (“San Francisco, The City’s Sights and Secrets” and “Real Life Romance”), was a panelist on the KALW radio show “Minds Over Matter,” and played the accordion in a German band. She putters in the garden, paints, makes terrible pottery and excellent chocolate cakes.
(This book cannot be returned nor exchanged.)
Annie Maple was a 29-year-old San Francisco underachiever, a college dropout living in the shadow of her genius older brother. Then she died and went to Hell-the classic Christian Hell, with fire and sulfur and devils, a place she never imagined might truly exist. Annie can't remember how she died or why she was sent there.