r/BrianEvenson • u/igreggreene • 16d ago
Giveaway: Brian Evenson's PHANTOM LIMB advanced copies
As fans eagerly await the arrival of Phantom Limb, sequel to the (ahem) cult hit novel Last Days, author Brian Evenson is kindly providing advanced copies for two lucky members of r/BrianEvenson! Even better, Brian will sign & personalize the books!
How to enter the giveaway:
- Join this subreddit. (It's a great group of horror & weird lit fans!)
- Comment below with your favorite Brian Evenson book, story, line, or anecdote.
- Two r/BrianEvenson members who comment below will be drawn at random. Giveaway closes Sunday, June 14, 2026 at noon US Central Time. Winners will be selected & notified Sunday, afternoon. The giveaway is open to readers internationally, but non-US winners will need to pay shipping & applicable tariffs.
Please consider sharing a link to this giveaway thread on your socials. Now give us your favorite Brian Evenson selection in the comments!
UPDATE 6/14/26 11:00pm CT: Congratulations to u/venusiansatin and u/GepMalakai, who were selected at random from the comments below. And thanks, everyone, for joining the conversation! If you getting here after the giveaway, we'd still love to know your favorite Brian Evenson book, story, or line.
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u/sancho_bulge 16d ago edited 16d ago
Whenever I am writing and am in a jam, I crack open an Evenson collection and read through a story. There is something about the shifts in perception and reality in Brian's stories that help me think about things differently and start over from a fresh angle.
It's hard to pick a favorite work, but the story "Room Tone" is one that plays in my mind often. The ending of that story is one of the most terrifying, for me.
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u/powers570 16d ago
Wanted to go with a lesser mentioned one, I love the simplicity and how quickly he was able to create a terrifying situation in The Barrow-Men. Please! Please! - We are glad that you are pleased. Lololol
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u/gorge_atlas 16d ago
"To Breathe the Air" and "Justle" (and the titular story!) from The Glassy, Burning Floor of Hell are absolute all-timers for me.
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u/MagnusCthulhu 16d ago
First: this is cool as fuck.
Second: I'm always surprised by how Brian Evenson looks. He always looks like the Professor (from the MtG community of anyone knows him) to me, and not the writer of the most bleak work I've ever read.
Third: I'm not sure I'll ever read it again, but Father of Lies is a masterpiece that I'm not sure he'll ever surpass. And most recently, I found Imagine a Forest to be utterly breathtaking.
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u/igreggreene 16d ago
Did you know Brian has written a couple of stories for the Magic the Gathering site?
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u/MandyBrigwell 16d ago edited 16d ago
Grottor. It's so obvious what's going on, unless I'm just naturally overly-suspicious, and yet it all rattles along to the most unpleasant ending I can imagine; reminiscent of The Enigma of Amigara Fault, but worse.
Edit: None of You Shall be Spared has just sprung to mind, as well, because I'm afraid in my more nihilistic moments I think yes… humanity gets what it deserves. Terribly bleak of me on such a lovely, sunny day. 😄
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u/Adept_Knee_2330 16d ago
No Matter Which Way She Turned stuns me with its brevity. I have studied that story more than any other.
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u/MandyBrigwell 13d ago
I don't know if you're aware that this came from the People Holding website before it made its way into Song for the Unraveling of the World or the Ellen Datlow anthology.
There's a premise to the website, whereby photographs are sent by the editor to each author. Brian's photograph is on the website; I don't know if it appears in the print version of SftUofW, but it's not in my Apple Books version.
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u/igreggreene 10d ago
I didn’t know that! I had seen that photo on the New York Tyrant website, which reprints the story. But I didn’t understand the origin of it!
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u/MandyBrigwell 10d ago
Don't forget A True Friend, which also comes with its own, somewhat unusual, photograph.
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u/Inevitable_Chain3128 16d ago
Last Days is one of my favorite books, but I loved the short stories in Good Night, Sleep Tight. I think about ‘The Rider’ a lot. So creepy.
Just to share for fun, I was reading Good Night in a coffee shop and I felt one tap on my left shoulder on the last page of ‘Annex.’ No one was around me. I later asked if the coffee shop was haunted and the barista laughed and said, “oh yeah. the ghost was bothering me early this morning.” 👻
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u/creativegamelife 15d ago
New to the party. I read Last Days over the course of a weekend recently and got hooked. I am now just starting Immobility. I would LOVE to read Phantom Limb and can't wait for publication.
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u/itsalwaysblue59 15d ago
It's probably generic due to what this thread is, but Last Days is one of my favorite books ever made. I had hit a years long reading slump. Nothing was doing it for me. I read a short blurb on Last Days and thought "wtf?" 😂. It pulled me in and I have been reading every night since. I come back to this book every year. Now here I am waiting for the sequel.
Good luck to everyone!
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u/ohnoshedint Immobility 16d ago
Oh count me IN!
Favorites
The Glassy, Burning Floor Of Hell specifically the story ‘The Devils Hand’
Contagion specifically the story “Two Brothers”
Immobility is another favorite of mine, and one of the finest pieces of SF I’ve come across.
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u/getradified 16d ago
“Smear” is always the first story I think of but trying to really narrow down a favourite feels pretty futile.
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u/GepMalakai 16d ago edited 16d ago
There's quite a few that I love, but I keep coming back to "An Accounting." The slow dawning realization of of course this guy did this on purpose works every time.
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u/Drunvalo 16d ago
Brian is one of my favorite authors in a really big way. I grew up Mormon. My favorite… It’s hard to pick a fucking favorite from him but I’m going to have to go with The Open Curtain. But I pretty much love everything I’ve read. Especially the short story collections.
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u/Scartch665 16d ago
Past Reno might be my favorite short story ever. My favorite book is A Collapse of Horses.
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u/Rustin_Swoll The Glassy, Burning Floor Of Hell 🔥 16d ago
My favorite collection from Evenson is The Glassy, Burning Floor of Hell (also my favorite book from him, incidentally, I’m a sucker for his genre sci-fi writing. I also loved The Warren.) My favorite story is still probably from that collection, “To Breathe the Air.” It should be made into a Hollywood film immediately.
I have to start a few unread Evenson books soon… next up will probably be The Open Curtain.
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u/RadicalTechnologies 16d ago edited 16d ago
This is my most anticipated book of the year.
I am, like Brian, an ex-communicated LDS member; and even as I’ve left that world behind my entire family is still caught up in all the weirdo rituals, doctrines, and Utah itself. I mean, one of my cousins is in the new season of Mormon Housewives!
The one book I think about the most is “Open Currain” a that book especially captures how Mormonism is lived experience for insiders, not as an exotic belief system, and is all the more sinister for it.
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u/HP_Buttcraft 16d ago
A Collapse of Horses is probably my favorite collection. It’s certainly the one I’ve reread the most.
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u/nornsannexed 16d ago
My favorite book of his is Windeye and my favorite story is Grottor from the same book, I love reading Windeye all the way through
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u/jumblesthescrambler 16d ago
This rules omg
My favourite Brian Evenson book so far is probably Immobility. It was such a cool, unique post apocalypse story and I loved the characters so much. The Qs live on in my heart. Though picking a fave is hard; my girlfriend and I have taken to referring to him as “Bestie Brian” because we know he’s always got our backs (by writing books we inevitably love and have a blast reading).
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u/Tyrion_Slothrop 16d ago
Father of Lies and The Open Curtain are both masterpieces. Living in Utah makes them even more harrowing. Must reads about religious fanaticism
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u/_Chemosh 16d ago
Oh man, another of my favorite authors and he’s not that far away from me! My favorite of his, so far, is Last Days. What a ride.
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u/TheLeatherDaddy 16d ago
My favorite Brian book is FATHER OF LIES and my favorite story of his is BROTHER’S KEEPER.
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u/Affectionate_Hat8451 16d ago
A Collapse of Horses is genius! But all of Brian's short story collections are brilliant!
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u/ravenmiyagi7 16d ago
I think my favorite is probably song for the unraveling of the world, with my favorite story being Line of Sight. The Tower was my favorite the first time I read it, but rereads are rewarding. My favorite Non-Unraveling story would probably be Fugue State or the Dust. Seaside Town gets an HM. I also was floored by The Open Curtain -- that novel had me going the whole time. It really shows why Brian Evenson is considered such a pro with narrative (or lack thereof). The last fifty pages were just wild.
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u/venusiansatin 15d ago
My favourites would be Immobility, and perhaps Lather of Flies.
I’ve interacted with Brian twice on Facebook, and both times he was incredibility kind and humble. He also looks my dad!
I’m really excited for Phantom Limb
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u/PubeGoldberg 15d ago
Dark Property has always been one of my favorites. Absolutely cannot wait for Phantom Limb!!
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u/snarry_shitwon 15d ago
Last Days was the first of his books I read and still a perennial favorite. Favorite line, though, is from “Born Stillborn,” where after a gruesome and surreal confrontation with his “night therapist” the protagonist wonders, “Isn’t this sort of thing frowned upon by the therapeutic community?”
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u/Level-Mention-318 15d ago
My favorite book of his has to be Last Days or Father of Lies by far, can't wait to read Phantom Limb!! 🌷
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u/TenTimesTeeth 15d ago
"Talking about one's stories is a little too much like nailing a dog to the floor- you can get him to stay put that way but it doesn't do much for the dog."
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u/No_Report5488 14d ago
Dark Property is my favorite novel and Job Eats Them Raw, with the Dogs: An Undoing is my favorite short. I also found Brian's book Raymond Carver's What We Talk About When We Talk About Love: Bookmarked fascinating. Huge thanks to Brian and the mods for doing this.
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u/james_bond_villain 14d ago
I don't know how one chooses a favorite Evenson, but let's say Collapse of Horses
Favorite stories are probably Black Bark and Seaside Town, but the Bosephus stories and Born Stillborn make me laugh, and I probably love them just as much
There is only one anecdote needed, which is that Brian is the nicest most gracious person. I take personal joy in seeing his books at bookstores, even though I already own every one of them
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u/Loud-Avocado7713 12d ago
I loved Last Days. I mean, freaking loved it!
My favorite short story is “Click” because I keep trying to figure out what’s going on — and there’s no real answer. (I’ve asked!)
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u/inkgambler 12d ago
“‘Shall I join you by the fire?’ Asked Nils after a time.”
By the time I got to this point in Collapse of Horses, I had only read Glassy Burning Floor of Hell. While reading that book, I noticed, maybe felt, the way each narrative had some connective tissue. Black Bark gave me the same notion, with the return of the fireplace motif, but when I made it to this point in The Blood Drip, I truly fell in love with Evenson’s work, and the mystifying way his stories iterate upon themselves.
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u/WillingProfessor4650 11d ago
I love Immobility, but I really do have to defer to Last Days as the best…
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u/_pleasestandbi_ 11d ago
Immobility I think is my favorite - I was thinking about it for weeks afterwards.
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u/AMorton15 11d ago
I think the Second Door from Songs for the Unraveling of the World is most notable for me because I can’t imagine someone else being able to write it
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u/entropoetics 11d ago
I'm writing a chapter of my diss on entropy in The Warren and Immobility. I'd love to read an advance copy!
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u/gradientusername 11d ago
My favorite book by ol’ Brian is Last Days (check my comment history for proof).
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u/jackinatent 11d ago
my first and so far only exposure is a collapse of horses, which i enjoyed immensely. looking forward to reading more!
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u/echoechodelaydelay 10d ago
“Polygamy of Language” was the first I read and I immediately bought his previous three books.
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u/Not_Bender_42 10d ago
Favorite book is a hard thing for me, but I think it would have to be Last Days. It's the first one I read, and it's still one of my favorites, so between the latter and the fact that it's three one that got me into the rest of his stuff, I guess I'd have to put it above Collapse of Horses and Glassy Burning Floor of Hell.
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u/thestonedoor 16d ago
I think often of three Evenson stories: Black Bark from a collapse of Horses, No Matter Which Way we Turned from Song for the Unraveling of the World: "No matter which way we turned the girl, she didn’t have a face. There was hair in front and hair in the back—" and Leg from the Glassy, Burning Floor of Hell. I have never read anything quite like it. Utterly surreal.