Author’s Corner

Nick Gardner works as a beer and wine monger, book reviewer, and writing teacher in Washington, DC. His writing and criticism has appeared in Adroit Journal, BarrelHouse, Epiphany, and many other journals and his books include So Marvelously Far, (Crisis Chronicles Press, 2019), a collection of sonnets about addiction and recovery in the Rustbelt; Hurricane Trinity (Unsolicited Press, 2023), a climate change novella; and a collection of linked stories, Delinquents and Other Escape Attempts. He’s received support from the Elizabeth George Foundation, Vermont Studio Center, the De Groot Foundation, and DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities.

“Westinghouse, Ohio is a Rust Belt shell of its former self, passed over by industry and ravaged by religion, cults, and the opioid epidemic. Returning home after years away, “Captain Failure’s” Dunk, the former Deadhead, seeks sobriety, yet is confronted with the trauma of his past life. In “Digging,” Nate chases validation within his fraught relationship with a homophobic transient man named Tucker, but, too late, realizes that Tucker has been playing him all along. The stories are “escape attempts” for characters trapped by relationships, addiction, family, and the world’s perception of their regional identity.”

PSYCHEDELICIOUS

By the time Allen fired up the grill at the Great Midwest Beer Fest, we were already food truck experts, smash burger virtuosos, burrito hotshots, savants of kimchi slaw. When I glanced out the service window, the crooked queue of beer enthusiasts stretched out past the kegerator tents, proving Psychedelicious Street Food’s weird allure.

Allen told me, Who doesn’t like beer and greasy grub? What could go wrong?

A culmination of his batshit dreams and our grueling effort, of nights where Allen killed his beer and hit the hay, leaving me to soak and scrub the dishes alone. This was success, and we shared the pride between us. What could go wrong, I wondered, when Allen always won? A question I, the loser, could not properly ponder.

We traded food for sample pours from Dad Bod Beer, the festival’s host, their brews named things like Double Dry-Hopped Terpene Dream. Live bands droned from the stage in the meadow and heads swarmed with woozy vibes. I told the customers it was a twenty-minute wait. Twenty-five. Thirty. Allen said: Catch up. I mangled a name barely audible above the psych rock background din and passed the paper tray to the appropriate hungry hands. My mouth was dry, so I tipped the last sip of beer foam and felt wings fumble around my mouth before the stinger pierced my tongue. I screamed and the wasp missiled out, undamaged. The taco tray hit the ceiling and I lurched into Allen. His palm sizzled on the grill. We spun, tumbled, collided, the space too tight to dance out of one another’s way. 

He said, What the fuck?

I said, Mfhfmblfth.

The swinging slapbox of Allen’s hands. The dodge and mumble of my swelling face.

#

The plan for the summer was to stuff myself in a space too hot, too cramped to think. A relief. My philosophy was that if I kept busy I could clear my head, but my thoughts continued to reel. I’d been listless since April, before I defended my thesis and graduated with a master’s and a mountain of debt. PhD rejections piled on and my partner, Callie, signed up for a doctorate out West, said we should take time to ourselves. I was hesitant and lacked focus. I broke my lease, drove the six hours from DC to Ohio, and took up residence with the wolf spiders in my parents’ basement. Academia was a ladder, but what happens when you run out of rungs? The answer: I laid in bed for a week. No clear direction, no definite point. I’d put so much effort into drawing a line between my promising future and my more troublesome past. New number, no social media, a jumble of addresses without forwarded mail. I’d never considered my mom handing me the cordless, another relic. I didn’t expect Allen’s voice in the receiver, my best friend from a life forgotten. I answered with a frown. He said, Welcome home, Billy Boy! Good timing. I had a dream!

I sat up. Riveted. I said, What?

He said, Listen. We gotta act fast. Come by.

Sure, I said. I had nothing better to do.

We formulated a plan. Two days later, he pulled out the Hide-A-Bed in his spare room and offered me a place to stay.  

“Nick Rees Gardner’s Delinquents is fierce and funny and beautiful. These stories offer a tonal echo of Sherwood Anderson’s Midwest, along with Denis Johnson’s recognition that addiction and storytelling provide different but related escape hatches. Gardner’s sentences destroyed me, again and again. An excruciating, gorgeous debut.”

— Emily Fridlund, author of History of Wolves and Catapult: Stories

“Nick Rees Gardner’s Delinquents and Other Escape Attempts immerses us in middle America’s opioid crisis with raw and riveting stories. Each narrative pulses with the urgent rhythms of lives on the edge, where hope and despair collide in a bang, presenting us with the possibilities of living that one precious life. The characters in these stories are so alive, so real—their struggles, laid bare with stark honesty, are never exploited to gain emotional connection. This is a testament to Gardner’s immense storytelling talent. The stories here are firecrackers: you don’t know it going in, but you will once they blow and crackle and jump start your unknowing heart back to feeling alive. Gardner has crafted an enduring and indelible masterpiece, a journey into the soul of our shared community of humanity. Simply put, Delinquents and Other Escape Attempts is a triumph of literary brilliance, and it is one I will never forget.”

– Morgan Talty, national bestselling author of Night of the Living Rez and Fire Exit: A Novel

“A dazzling debut. Golden with gorgeous language and grimy with the stench of the real. I shit you not, set this down with Trainspotting and Basketball Diaries and Jesus’ Son as among the most beautiful elegies to addiction. It is shatteringly strong. It searches for, and finds, that jolt. Highly, highly recommend.“

–Brian Allen Carr, author of Opioid, Indiana and Bad Foundations