Gun Church (October 2012, Tyrus)

Kip Weiler is a former ’80s literary wunderkind who has fallen on hard times. Due to his foibles and insecurities and twenty years removed from his last novel, he’s teaching creative writing at a rural community college. One day Kip prevents his class from being slaughtered by a gun toting student. This gets Kip a second fifteen minutes of fame and, more importantly, relights his desire to write. Little does he realize the novel he’s working on may well be the blueprint of his own demise. He gets deeply involved with two of his students and a cult-like group who are obsessed with the intrinsic nature of handguns. Things really get funky when art begins to imitate art imitating life.

It's Wonder Boys meets Fight Club with guns.

REVIEWS

“Reed Farrel Coleman is again operating at a very high level in Gun Church. Narrated by a failed writer who has notions of literary redemption suddenly sparked awake again, it is an audaciously plotted adventure in the unglamorous America. Coleman has a lot to say about the psychology of a writer's life, ethics or their absence, and a great eye for the world around us. It is a confessional but propulsive novel, bizarre at times, touching, expertly paced and fresh.” - Daniel Woodrell, author of Winter’s Bone and Tomato Red

“If this is church, I might start going. Sign me up as a parishioner.”- Don Winslow, New York Times best-selling author of Savages

“Coleman’s Gun Church is wonderful. His protagonist, Kip Weiler, is one of the most fascinating characters in years.” - David Morrell, New York Times best-selling author of The Brotherhood of the Rose

"... Community college teacher Kip Weiler, who was “a writer to watch” in the 1980s before drug addiction and an utter lack of self-discipline ended his career and his marriage, gets a second chance in this superior crime thriller from Shamus Award–winner Coleman (Hurt Machine and six other Moe Prager novels). When Frank Vuchovich, one of Weiler’s creative writing students, pulls a gun and holds him and the rest of the class hostage, Weiler manages to temporarily disarm Vuchovich so the others can escape. Weiler’s heroism attracts the attention of a publisher interested in reprinting his work; a sexy blonde finds a way into his bed; and another student, an unabashed fan, invites him to join a secret group that gathers to shoot guns at each other wearing protective vests. As Weiler’s new relationships progress, the line between his reality and his fiction blur. Coleman keeps readers guessing to the end. Agent: David Hale Smith, Inkwell Management." - Publishers Weekly

WHERE TO BUY

From any bookstore, Amazon, Barnes & Noble - hardcover and paperback

Audible.com - recorded version