Three Women, One Battle

A world gone mad. Cities abandoned. Dreams invade waking minds. An invisible threat lures those who oppose its otherworldly violence to become acolytes of a nameless cult. As a teenage girl struggles for autonomy, a female weapons director in a secret research facility develops a living neuro-cognitive device that explodes into self-awareness. Discovering their hidden emotional bonds, all three unveil a common enemy through dissonant realities that intertwine in a cosmic battle across hallucinatory dreamscapes.

Time is the winning predator, and every moment spirals deeper into the heart of the beast.

I’m awestruck by Joanna Koch’s nonstop spellbinding, almost paralyzingly inventive and yet propulsive, ultra-focused prose. The Wingspan of Severed Hands is a truly amazing find.

• Dennis Cooper (The Marbled Swarm, The Sluts)

Koch’s latest novella is what might have happened if Robert W. Chambers had been a surrealist with a penchant for body horror. A strange trip to Carcosa offered in thickly evocative language, The Wingspan of Severed Hands is a highly original hallucination.

• Brian Evenson (Song For the Unraveling of the World, A Collapse of Horses)

Joanna Koch is a stunning and talented writer, and their new book, The Wingspan of Severed Hands, is a horror story that opens new vistas in the genre.

• Jack Zipes (Literature and Literary Theory: Fairy Tales and the Art of Subversion AND LITERARY THEORY: FAIRY TALES AND THE ART OF SUBVERSION)