Losing Graceland Cover Art
  • “Nathan presents the reader with several fantastic characters in this rollicking, adventurous tale. Readers will pore through this fast-paced, adrenaline-filled novel and eat up the fantastic dialogue that brings Elvis back to life in a new, deliciously lascivious way.”
    — Julie Hunt, Booklist
  • “…engaging…a blend of the slapstick and the slapdash, the ironic and the painfully sincere…a wild road trip, a yarn spiced with plenty of humor and romance….”
    — Michael Lindgren, The Washington Post
  • “A novel of lost souls and a lost America . . . the idea of Elvis Presley hiding in plain sight as an Elvis impersonator is a stroke of genius. Losing Graceland is pure entertainment.”
    Tottenville Review
  • “Less about the hip-swiveling sex icon and more about friendship, Losing Graceland isn’t just a tall tale of another Elvis impersonator, but about life’s journey through bumps in the road….The road to Memphis is an interesting, if not endearing one, for the pair, who — gold rings and jumpsuit aside — find themselves to be surprisingly similar.”
    — Kelci Shipley, Marie Claire
  • "…Ben has undreamed-of experiences on this strange journey….with quirky characters and homespun wisdom, this will appeal to fans of literary coming-of-age-stories.”
    — Cheryl Conway, Library Journal
  • “In all the commercial and cultural carryings-on that are likely to happen in this, Elvis’ 76th birthday season, one of the richest may be Micah Nathan’s second novel Losing Graceland….a highly entertaining and rambunctiously readable second novel.”
    — Jeff Simon, The Buffalo News



  • “The duo’s adventures—brawling with the biker gang Hell’s Foster Children, competing in Elvis impersonator contests, visiting hillbilly oracles—are entertaining…”
    Publishers Weekly
  • “Micah Nathan’s first novel, Gods of Aberdeen, was a critically acclaimed story of adolescent angst. His follow-up, Losing Graceland, mines similar thematic territory as it follows another central male character, Ben Fish, on a wild and weird road trip….a fun, fast read for Presley devotees and coming-of-age fiction fans alike.”
    — Lizza Connor Bowen, Book Page
  • “Thus begins the weirdest of buddy adventures, with feckless Ben playing first mate to the is-he-or-isn’t-he Elvis, a superannuated hillbilly with the unearthly self-possession of a Zen master. En route to points south, the adventurers tangle with a one-eyed pimp, a trio of roadhouse sirens, a backwoods soothsayer, and other low-rent variations on a Homeric theme…[with] antic originality [and] the near-magic realism of Elvis as a geriatric Ulysses….”
    — Amanda Heller, The Boston Globe




  • “…a rambunctious coming-of-age tale…”
    — Colette Bancroft, St. Petersburg Times


  • “Micah Nathan’s low- and high-spirited, rambunctious road novel is an exploration of loss, faith, and human frailty—and as befits a story involving a character who just might be Elvis Presley, it’s also sad, unpredictable, and rather tragically funny.”
    — Brian Groh, author of Summer People
  • “Micah Nathan is a hell of a writer. Losing Graceland is a postmodern picaresque, overflowing with sly wit, pop culture icons, contemporary fretfulness, authentically touching revelations, and, most important, plain old good writing. Nathan writes with a grace and eloquence that is all too rare. He understands the awesome power of storytelling and myth making, and has written a book as much about that power as it is an example of it. A textured and deeply gratifying literary journey.”
    Alden Bell, author of The Reapers Are the Angels
  • “Losing Graceland is an alluring parable for a generation forced to find adulthood in the wreckage their elders have left behind in Great Recession America…Micah Nathan—his perspective pleasantly off-kilter, his voice spare, wry, and occasionally down-right evocative—has created a confident narrative for Ben Fish’s road trip of introspection and self discovery.”
    Stephen White, author of the NYT bestselling Alan Gregory series

The question is, not does love exist but when she leaves, where she goes.

June 27, 2010

Such a long post title. For those of you who remember DLR sprechstimme-ing his way through Secrets, well…there you go. The hotel room is quiet. I left my shoes outside the door last night and this morning they are polished. Summer school officially ended Friday. I had an anxiety dream about my final exam—I’m sitting [...]

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Groan…

June 24, 2010

So the NYT has another good article about another good Asian film festival, and they use the phrase “genre-bending” which raises my hackles. As always. Asian cinema–itself a sloppy distinction, as if all of Asia can be lumped together–is frequently referred to as “genre-bending” meaning they aren’t afraid to combine different “genre” elements into one [...]

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An Arrogant Stance

June 19, 2010

Some select pics from the Nemeth photo shoot, including this self-satisfied shot. Twenty-seven minutes later Tibor asked how work was going on the next book. The resulting stance is obvious. Anyway. Next week I’m posting an essay on an old David Mamet play, concurrent with publication in a UK theater mag. Everything old is…well, still [...]

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Rain, Scudder, Rotting Mouse

June 12, 2010

Tibor Nemeth said photo shoots are weird. He’s right. Yesterday I sat for my author photo, courtesy of the aforementioned Tibor. It wasn’t a terrible time—thanks to Tibor, he of the Lance Armstrong/Michael Jordan/Tiger Woods photo shoots—but still. I kept reminding myself to relax and breathe and think about something other than the camera. A [...]

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Make That Tonight

June 6, 2010

No, you didn’t miss the game last night, and yes, I got it wrong. Yuri Foreman was terrific, btw. Not as skilled as Cotto, but any fighter who wills their way through a bum leg–even in a losing effort–gets HBO on their side. We’ll see him again. On a darker note, I’m not sure how [...]

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Viewer Mail

June 5, 2010

Tonight I’ll be flipping between Jewish boxer/Rabbi-in-training Yuri Foreman and Game 2 of Celts vs. L.A. I can’t imagine a better Saturday night. Go ahead and insert your mid-30′s joke here, except I’ve always been this way. In college I loved doing laundry on Friday nights. Wash, dry, fold…ah, bliss. Micah, Congratulations on winning the [...]

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Dog Days

May 27, 2010

I threw. Scout ran. I threw again. Scout ran some more. And now he waits. Evidently when one uses “cyclobenzaprine” in a post, worry ensues. Fear not–my back is almost all better. I resume boxing next week. This link to a Boston Globe article about my good friend Steve Trefonides is long overdue. He’s an [...]

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Ramble On

May 21, 2010

Cyclobenzaprine is one hell of a drug. I now understand why they called it Mellow Yellow. But it’s gotten the back spasms under control. On that note (really?) I have some long-overdue pics taken by my (un)official photographer, Vincenzo Colecchia. Short story shorter: Met Enzo while on book tour in Como. He runs a small [...]

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And So it Begins

May 20, 2010

The pre-order is here for LOSING GRACELAND. Barnes & Noble has the best price point, but the others work fine as well. Along with your local bookstore, let’s not forget, and they probably need the business. Pre-order from Random House. Or Amazon. Or Barnes & Noble. Nine consecutive days of chin-ups turned my back into [...]

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Some Late Night Stuff

May 13, 2010

Frank Frazetta died. He introduced me to Conan. The barbarian, that is. Without Frazetta we would not have this: Almost every sci-fi/fantasy cover of almost every pulp mag post 1960-ish has that Frazetta composition: the thick-legged damsel in distress (often in foreground, dagger in hand), the broadsword-wielding hero in midpoint (broad shouldered, vein-strewn biceps), the [...]

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