Coming July 29, 2025. Available for pre-order:
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An Oral History of Atlantis
A deadpan, wildly imaginative collection of stories that slices clean through the mundanity and absurdity of modern life, from the author of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize–winner and Pulitzer Prize finalist Same Bed Different Dreams
In “Machine City,” a college student’s role in a friend’s movie causes lines to blur between his character and his true self. In “Slide to Unlock,” a man comes to terms with his life, via the passwords he struggles to remember in a moment of extremis. And in “Weird Menace,” a director and faded movie star discuss science fiction, memory, and lost loves on a commentary track for a film from the ’80s that neither seems to remember all that well.
In Ed Park’s utterly original collection, An Oral History of Atlantis, characters question the fleetingness of youth and art,reckon with the consequences of the everyday, and find solace in the absurd, the beautiful, and the sublime. Throughout, Park deploys his trademark wit to create a world both strikingly recognizable and delightfully other. All together, these sixteen stories have much to say about the meaning—and transitory nature—of our lives. And they are proof positive that Ed Park is one of the most insightful and imaginative writers working today.
Praise
“Park’s delightful tales, which are driven by provocative ideas, strange occurrences, and gripping plots, pay tribute to the legacy of Kurt Vonnegut in the best ways. This pitch-perfect collection will linger in readers’ minds for a long time.”
—Publishers Weekly (★ starred review)
“To speak of Park’s creativity is also to speak of his humanity—empathy is a function of the imagination, of course, and it makes sense that a mind capable of dreaming these worlds and sisterverses would also be able to endow them with spirits as vivid and complex as our own. It’s dazzling, this steady carousel of delight and stunned awe. Park is one of the funniest writers working today, and among the most humane.” —Kaveh Akbar, New York Times–bestselling author of Martyr!
“The James Joyce of Korean-American literature, and of our times.” —Ilyon Woo, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Master Slave Husband Wife
“An Oral History of Atlantis is a snapshot of who we are and where we are, as well as an offbeat map to where we might dare to go. The stories are mordant, inventive, heartbreaking, and above all else, profoundly human, and I’m already looking forward to a re-read.”
—Paul Tremblay, New York Times–bestselling author of Horror Movie and A Head Full of Ghosts
“Ed Park is a magician of storytelling. These stories explore the multiplicity of time and space—artistic, historical, and psychological—and confront once and again the shapeshifting border between reality and unreality. With sly humor and deep understanding, Park makes the reader laugh from disquiet, and tear up from being seen.” —Yiyun Li, author of Wednesday’s Child
“Park infuses his debut story collection with the same extraordinary inventiveness that made his novel Same Bed Different Dreams (2023) a Pulitzer Prize finalist … Throughout his 16 stories, [he] deftly upends quotidian expectations, encourages discomfort, and presents surreality with biting humor.”
—Booklist (★ starred review)
“What’s the collective noun for a school of stories so bright and brilliant, they ripple with humor, compassion, and wonder? Call them an ‘Ed Park.’ An Oral History of Atlantis will continue to delight us, long after the flood.”
—Samantha Hunt, author of The Dark Dark
“Funny, tragic, winsome screwball science-fiction prose poetry of ‘maximum lexical density’ that’s pure pleasure to read.”
—Sarah Manguso, author of Liars
“[Park looks] for the ways that human idiosyncrasies manage to poke up to the surface even while technology tries to keep us tidy and algorithm friendly … A collection that revels in its quirks, smart and sensitive in equal measure.” —Kirkus