Two Hands (forthcoming July 2022)—Novella—Fruit Bat Press
Staying Busy is an absurdist novellete about a person with disobedient autonomic severed hands, or maybe it’s about creating art under capitalism, or maybe it’s about watching too much TV during the day.
Burnt Sienna—Chapbook
Burnt Sienna is a hybrid cocktail book and story collection. Originally published as an unbound art book, these recipes have been recollected in a new edition for the trade.
“These stories of loss, awkwardness, childhood memories, and subliminal messages from a beach boy, each attached to a drink recipe, will stick with you long after you read this collection. This hits too close to home in the best way. Scorching, like a cocktail down the throat. Honest, like the words from your mouth after too many drinks. Joshua Bohnsack, barkeep and wordsmith, is in a category of literary fiction all his own.”
—Chase Griffin, author of What’s On the Menu?
Shivers (forthcoming)—Chapbook—No Rest Press
Written while managing an ice cream shop in rural Illinois, Shivers is a collection of small stories debating work, aging, and happiness through food service.
“Shivers is so fun and deep and tragic and moving and poetic and utterly real all at once. It reminds me that sometimes deep meaning can be found in burritos or a random customer who says the same thing to everyone or a thought you keep having and you don’t know why. Finding beauty in those small moments is my favorite kind of feeling.”
—Chelsea Martin, author of Caca Dolce
Shift Drink (forthcoming)—Story Collection
Shift Drink is part cocktail book, part story collection, and wholly encompassing of a world in which characters attempt and fail to connect with one another.
An agitated bartender learns of his immigrant co-worker’s past, a priest recounts his sister’s death, a young skater looks into his uncertain future, a man attends a wedding following his lover’s unforeseen death, Brian Wilson sends subliminal messages to a fan, a young mother must decide between her boyfriend and the safety of her child, a man attempts to recall misconstrued incidents from his childhood, and more moments in this collection highlight the absurdity of life with accompanying drink recipes.
“In Joshua Bohnsack’s Shift Drink, he has created something wholly new: a story collection you can drink to. In these stories full of flip phones and tiny moments, school memories and face tattoos that say STARE, Bohnsack dives deep into what we consume and what consumes us. Complete with drink mixes that complement the text, Bohnsack shows us more than just what we drink, but the true ingredients of our lives.”
—Scott McClanahan, author of The Sarah Book
“Something like Jacob and the angel Joshua Bohnsack’s characters wrestle until morning with the eternal passions of the heart — romance, faith, and the desire to be redeemed. In the spirit of Leonard Michaels and James Salter, Joy Williams and Stu Dybek, Bohnsack’s Shift Drink marks a luminous new chapter in the book of American short fiction.
—Tim Taranto, author of Ars Botanica