The Good Pornographer

Brian Bouldrey (Author)

9780299355845

Paperback / softback, published 21 April 2026

372 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 2.5 cm, 0.454 kg

"Bouldrey effortlessly shifts focus among all the assorted personalities. Digressive yet gloriously character-driven, this eccentric narrative will keep the reader's head spinning." (Publishers Weekly)

“Hilariously chaotic, with a wonderful panoply of characters. This novel combines the wild inventiveness of Infinite Jest, the brilliant characterizations of the meth-head Ratliffs in The Little Friend, and the sharp humor and sharper truths at the heart of the Patrick Melrose trilogy. Tumultuous and compulsively readable, with a big and bittersweet heart, it will soon join these books as one of the premier novels about addiction.” - Naeem Murr, author of Every Exit Brings You Home

“This brilliant novel of addiction, recovery, and found family matches passages of hilarious wit with moments of piercing sadness—a wise, wild, and utterly beguiling tale, full to brimming with unforgettable characters.” - Dan Chaon, author of One of Us

“Bouldrey’s The Good Pornographer is the only drug you can smoke, snort, huff, drink, or otherwise consume without the least fear of being visited by the grim specter of death, the crushing menace of shame, or the Purgatorial ennui of rehab. Bouldrey has created here a high you’ll never want to come down from, and, thankfully, you don’t need to.” - Andrew Farkas, author of The Great Indoorsman

“The Good Pornographer is showy and knowing, unexpectedly tender and hilariously rude, pinballing between tones, characters, and genres with a velocity that is thrillingly original.” - Patrick McGinty, author of Town College City Road

“The deceptively titled The Good Pornographer morphs from being a comedy about campus life and the cliches of fantasy writing into being a deeply moving novel about people wounded by addiction and the limits of love. Bouldrey is a genius, all right, not only of desire, but also its heartbreaking aftermath.” - Rebecca Brown, author of You Tell the Stories You Need to Believe

“This epic novel—part naughty Tolkien, part Denis Johnson, and set in an eccentric, decrepit mansion worthy of the most beloved gothic novels—is about more than the comforts of fantasy; it’s about how fantasy can enable us to build real relationships. It’s also about addiction and how you can’t compel people to change, but you can give them a warm bed and an unwavering dedication to recognizing their full humanity, which sometimes can do quite a lot. Bouldrey has written a treasure, cast with fascinating characters and delightful metafictional characters, be they elf, dwarf, or sasquatch. I loved spending time in these pages." - Mary South, author of You Will Never Be Forgotten

Walace Weiss, a famous fantasy novelist struggling with drug addiction, sets himself on a twofold quest: to finish his first book in more than a decade and, like the immortal elves of his stories, to try to remember what, in his long life, he should not have forgotten.

While many have come to view Walace as a bad influence on children, literature, and himself, his impact sweeps across worlds both fantastic and real, leading to his establishing a new kingdom in his neglected McMansion, Summerheim. The result is a mock-epic in rehabilitation, starring such friends and enemies as Cal, Walace’s dealer and private jester; Dragon, a porn star turned guidance counselor; Epiphany, a lunch lady and stripper in recovery; her son, Tuffy, planning everyone’s funerals at age nine; Jackal, newly sober and in touch with his emotions for the first time; and Wolf, Walace’s socially withdrawn twin brother and reluctant doppelgÄnger.

Brian Bouldrey piles on the laughs and absurdity alongside dollops of humanity. With brilliant recklessness, he praises and pokes fun at genres, conventions, fandoms, and critics, offering a Deadpool-like exploration of an upside-down world filled with epic quests, epic mistakes, and epic characters.

Book I. The Sorrow of the Elves
Chapter 1. Here Comes the Sun King
Chapter 2. New Life
Chapter 3. Patience Is a Virtue
Chapter 4. The Sorrow of the Elves
Chapter 5. A Hero’
s Welcome
Chapter 6. A Hero’
s Quest
Chapter 7. Always Darkest Before the Dawn
Chapter 8. Slaying the Dragon
Chapter 9. Our Hero at Rest
Book II. The Truculence of the Dwarves
Chapter 1. A Hero’
s Death
Chapter 2. The Truculence of the Dwarves
Chapter 3. His Name Is His Curse
Chapter 4. His Name Is His Vow
Chapter 5. His Name Is His Home
Chapter 6. His Name Is His Tribe
Chapter 7. His Name Is His Trothplight
Chapter 8. His Name Is Mud
Book III. The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Sasquatch
Chapter 1. Cryptozoology
Chapter 2. The Lost Duchy of Free Sasquatch
Chapter 3. In the Garden of the Bigfoot Suicides
Chapter 4. The Founding of the Nation of New Sasquatch
Chapter 5. Klonopin Eats Darkness but Time, Ever Always, Passes
Chapter 6. Godboxer and the Invention of “
Meanwhile”

Chapter 7. The House That Bigfoot Built
Book IV. The Twilight of the Fauns
Chapter 1. Prelude to a Twilight After the Afternoon of a Faun
Chapter 2. Twilight After the Afternoon of a Faun
Chapter 3. The Actual Afternoon of a Faun Everybody Keeps Talking About
Chapter 4. The Rummage Sale of a Faun
Chapter 5. Twilight After the Rummage Sale of a Faun
Book V. Sanctimony the Cat’
s New Fables for Now
Chapter 1. The Chick, the Duck, and the Dog
Chapter 2. The Cat and the Mouse
Chapter 3. The Chicken and the Fonz
Chapter 4. The Country Raven, the Town Raven, and the Drunk Cousin Raven
Chapter 5. The Raven and the Hare
Chapter 6. The Three Dogs
Chapter 7. Chanticleer, the Farmer, and the Dog
Chapter 8. The Dog Named Meow and the Dog Named Pork Chop
Chapter 9. The Old Clam and the Sea
Chapter 10. The Novelist and the Beaver
Chapter 11. The Raven and the Eagle
Acknowledgments