This volume collects all seven of Mishka Shubaly's bestselling Kindle Singles: Shipwrecked, his true-life account of getting shipwrecked in the Bahamas in 2001; Are You Lonesome Tonight, a heartbreaking tale of online love gone horribly wrong; Beat the Devil, an elegy for Shubaly's first addiction, rock 'n roll; Bachelor Number One, his misadventures on a reality TV dating show; Of Mice and Me, in which Shubaly raises a one week old orphan mouse and winds up interrogating everything about his life; This Van Could Be Your Life, when Shubaly and his family drove a crumbling 1976 Chevy camper van thousands of miles to their family reunion in northern Saskatchewan, and, of course, The Long Run, Shubaly's origin myth, a gritty and profane story following his transition from alcoholic burnout to ultra runner.
The collection opens with a foreword by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and an introduction by plant-based renaissance man Rich Roll. In addition to all of Shubaly's Amazon works, the book also includes some early pieces from his time writing for the NYPress, a couple of love letters to Mark Lanegan records, and various other 'bonus tracks' in print for the first time.
"Spending time with Mishka Shubaly on the page is like a long road-trip you don't ever want to end: the gas stations are dirty, the floor is covered with empty cigarette cartons and candy wrappers, and the car engine is doomed, but the company is spellbinding. Mishka's voice is full of restless wit and desperate tenderness, and he's got some great stories to tell: about surviving a shipwreck and a reality TV show, about the terror of slow-suicide-by-substances and the terror of giving up slow-suicide-by-substances, about the even deeper terror of loving other living creatures: family, lovers, even a tiny baby mouse. But Mishka isn't just telling great stories, he's investigating how we tell stories-specifically, how we live and die by the stories we tell ourselves about who we are, and the risk and thrill and possibility of changing the narratives that confine us." - Leslie Jamison, New York Times bestselling author of The Empathy Exams
"Mishka Shubaly is a king. His stories read like a crazy-quilt of heartbreaking honesty and ball-busting comedy." - Mark Lanegan, recording artist and author of the international bestselling Sing Backwards and Weep
"Mishka Shubaly is not only my favorite author, but he is also my favorite singer/songwriter. He writes the kind of prose that gets stuck in your head for an entire weekend. He has such an amazing way with words." - Bert Kreischer, comedian
"Mishka Shubaly loves existence as much as he loathes it. For this? We get the grunge and the glory, the funny, and the fear. There's a sense here that Shubaly took the stairs to Life's basement, touched the concrete floor to be sure he knew where it was, before beginning the magnificent climb up, often laughing at his own propensities. Full of grit, guts, spirit, and truth; is there a better storyteller than the one who has lived as many lives as this? You will relish the spectrum, the gamut, the life Mishka Shubaly has lived." -Josh Malerman, New York Times bestselling author of Bird Box and Pearl
"We all mythologize our youths, in order to survive them. Mishka Shubaly's youth was more mythic than most-including seductive enchantresses, protean monsters, miraculous transformations, punishments both ironic and just, and a literal shipwreck-and he's also a better self-mythologizer than most. As with most myths, his stories serve as metaphors for our own more mundane plights and follies. They make you shudder with unwelcome recognition, and relief that we all survived." - Tim Kreider, author of We Learn Nothing
"Poet, ex-drunkard and degenerate Mishka Shubaly's storytelling is fearless, beautiful, gritty and most of all human." - Amy Dresner, author of My Fair Junkie
