{"product_id":"mr-yay-isbn-9781368116046","title":"Mr. Yay","description":"\u003cb\u003eA hilarious, genre-blending speculative novel about rappers and dogs, love and marriage, private detectives, nostalgia, and embracing your true self, in a world where the past is different than what you remember.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBudding musician Fatty Bratty wakes up in his terrible apartment to a random dog. A dog that acts like he belongs there. Except Bratty doesn’t own a dog. He always wanted to but never did. So maybe this random dog is a sign: screw his parents’ expectations. Forget business school. Instead, over a manic week, he and his best friend write and record their first rap album. They call themselves Mr. Yay.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBratty’s therapist, Miriam, remembers a different Mr. Yay, the one from the old children’s TV show, the washed-up actor turned first mate who sailed a boat captained by a dog and taught people to be themselves. To just \u003ci\u003ebe\u003c\/i\u003e. But strangely, her husband, Jack, has no memory of the old show at all.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs Mr. Yay climbs the charts with his rap songs, Miriam watches her life unravel. Jack is increasingly absent, more secretive, reckless—he hardly resembles the man she married. Their friends start acting weird, too: drinking excessively, splurging on motorcycles, quitting their jobs, not washing their hair, harboring raccoons. Jack also doesn’t remember things he should about his relationship with Miriam. But he suspects his memory hole is more than it seems. It’s not just that he’s forgotten the Mr. Yay show—it’s that, on the internet, and according to the studio and half the population, there is no Mr. Yay. There never was.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWitty, heartfelt, deeply weird, and utterly original, \u003ci\u003eMr. Yay\u003c\/i\u003e explores how we grapple with inexplicable sudden shifts in the world around us and the identity crises they birth. If the past we remember has changed, are we who we think we are? Is anyone?\"Emily Jane’s writing is witty, buoyant, and sincere. This genuine cast of characters tackles my favorite rabbit hole of parallel universes and collective memory while skillfully relating it to finding our place in the world, and how our choices shape us. Such a fun and delightfully bizarre ride of a book!\" \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Natalie Sue, bestselling author of \u003ci\u003eI Hope This Finds You Well\u003c\/i\u003e \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Equal parts whimsical and weird, \u003ci\u003eMr. Yay\u003c\/i\u003e asks us to consider the nature of reality itself. Is it out there somewhere, or are we each lost in our own little hallucination, groping blindly for something to hang onto? Buckle up! You're in for a wild ride.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Mark Waddell, author of \u003ci\u003eCarl Gets Promoted and Dooms the World\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A delightfully weird book about what might be in other universes and what could've been in this one. \u003ci\u003eMr. Yay \u003c\/i\u003ehad me captivated at every turn, from the mystery of This Random Dog's appearance to Holly's breakdown to Miriam and Jack investigating together. \u003ci\u003eThe Adventures of Mr. Yay\u003c\/i\u003e may not exist in our universe, but I will never forget Mr. Yay.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—E.M. Anderson, author of \u003ci\u003eThe Keeper of Lonely Spirits\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A fascinating read that grabs you from the very first page and straddles a few genres in order to create a story that’s unique and utterly heartwarming. It’s a little bit women’s fiction, a little bit \u003ci\u003eStranger Things\u003c\/i\u003e, but it gave me the hopeful, aching sense of wonder that I got from watching \u003ci\u003eE.T. the Extra-Terrestrial \u003c\/i\u003ethe first time. Loved every page!”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Ruby Dixon, \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e bestselling author of \u003ci\u003eBy the Horns\u003c\/i\u003e on\u003ci\u003e Here Beside the Rising Tide\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Heartfelt, witty, and secretly romantic . . . A delightful and poignant story about what it is to be human and what we owe each other.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Christina Lauren, \u003ci\u003eNew York Times \u003c\/i\u003ebestselling author of \u003ci\u003eLove and Other Words \u003c\/i\u003eon \u003ci\u003eOn Earth as It Is on Television\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Like a science-fiction novel that runs in the margins of I Can Has Cheezburger? memes.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eScientific American \u003c\/i\u003eon \u003ci\u003eOn Earth as It Is on Television\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Jane juggles the fantastical with the ordinary, and readers will relish this clever, heartfelt story about friendship and family.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eBooklist \u003c\/i\u003eon \u003ci\u003eHere Beside the Rising Tide\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Quirky and wise and scarily relevant—a must-read for fans of Grady Hendrix.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e—Shannon Morgan, author of Her Little Flowers\u003c\/i\u003e on \u003ci\u003eAmerican Werewolves\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Weird and sweet . . . Like a 2020s \u003ci\u003eWhite Noise\u003c\/i\u003e: loud and colorful Americana with a sprinkle of apocalyptic doom—plus cats. It takes aliens (or an Emily Jane) to help us see our society for the bizarre, sugary, microplastic-poisoned dream it is.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Edgar Cantero, \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e bestselling author of \u003ci\u003eMeddling Kids \u003c\/i\u003eon \u003ci\u003eOn Earth as It Is on Television\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eEmily Jane\u003c\/b\u003e is the \u003ci\u003eUSA Today\u003c\/i\u003e bestselling author of \u003ci\u003eOn Earth as it Is on Television, Here Beside the Rising Tide, \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eAmerican Werewolves\u003c\/i\u003e. She grew up in Boise, Boulder, and San Francisco. She earned her BA in psychology from the University of San Francisco and her JD from UC Law San Francisco. She lives on an urban farm in Cincinnati with her husband, Steve; their two children; their cats, Scully and Ripley; and their husky, Nymeria.\u003cu\u003eBradford and the Dog\u003c\/u\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMaybe \u003ci\u003eThis Random Dog\u003c\/i\u003e was why he dreamed of the dog. Him and the dog on a boat, waves sloshing all around them, water the color of a blue-raspberry slushy. A pod of dolphins swam alongside the boat, except the dolphins were also dogs. Dogphins. A man rode one of the dogphins. He wore a denim jumpsuit and a fat gold chain. He waved and said, \u003ci\u003eWe’re making it stronger! \u003c\/i\u003eThe Dream Dog gave a thumbs-up, even though he didn’t have thumbs. The Dream Dog wore a captain’s hat. Bradford had seen this dog before. This dog got to captain his own ship. The dog decided when to set sail. Which port. What they ate next. No one said \u003ci\u003eC’mere, boy. Roll over. \u003c\/i\u003eNo one said he had to be a Good Dog. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMaybe he was a good dog, but that was beside the point. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eThis Random Dog\u003c\/i\u003e had a cold wet nose. It used the nose to wake him up. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNot a good-dog move. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBradford opened his eyes. The dog’s eyes stared back. The dog’s eyes were glossy brown, and way too fucking close.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“What . . . the . . . fuck,” Bradford managed to say, before his brain caught up with his eyes and mouth. He scrambled back, into the corner of his bed, up against the peeling wallpaper. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“What the \u003ci\u003efuck\u003c\/i\u003e.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe dog’s tongue slopped out. The dog’s bright pink tongue had two black spots, and later he named these spots Zoey and Ernestina. But right now, the spots were both called: \u003ci\u003eWhat the fuck. \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe dog was a pit bull type. A full-bred pit bull? He didn’t know. He hadn’t majored in dogs at Canine Academy. It had the stocky bod of a pit. The \u003ci\u003eI-will-crush-you\u003c\/i\u003e jaw. Floppy triangle ears. Its fur was sleek, dark brown with a white tuxedo.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe thing was, Bradford Pierson didn’t have a dog. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe thing was, Bradford Pierson lived in a studio apartment on the third floor of an old building on the boarded-windows-and-graffiti side of downtown, with a big sign in the lobby that said no smoking – no pets. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn case the sign wasn’t clear enough, the month-to-month lease that Bradford had signed in exchange for a key to that craptacular apartment said no pets, and then specified all the animals a pet might be. He couldn’t even own a fish or a hamster. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIronic, given the rats in the basement and the cockroaches in the walls. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut Rules were Rules. Just like his dad always said. \u003ci\u003eSon, the Rules are the Rules. You can’t just pick up your golf ball and drop it in the hole. \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBradford had tried to tune out the Dad Platitudes and get on with his life, and yeah, maybe in his heart he’d always wanted a dog, but he didn’t have the cash to feed a dog or de-flea a dog or get the bones and treats that a dog deserved. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe didn’t own a dog.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis Random Dog seemed to disagree. It stared at him like, \u003ci\u003eYou know you want to feed me now. Let’s take a walk. I know I’m a good dog, so you don’t need to say it\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt stared at him like it knew him well, and why was he getting so weird about their morning routine? \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTechnically, it was afternoon. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBradford inched around the side of the bed. He slipped out. He walked over to the sink. The dog trotted after him, tongue out, goofy smile. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Dude. Dude, stop. You’re freaking me out.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe turned on the faucet. It gurgled out some brown water, but after a minute the water turned clear. He filled a glass, drank. The dog sat. It stared up at him.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“What, you want water?” The dog didn’t answer. “Fine. But I’m warning you—I know it tastes bad, but you better not spit it out. This isn’t a resort. Dogs don’t get bottled water.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe opened the cupboard. On the shelf, next to the bowls, was a bag of dog food. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“What . . . the . . . fuckity fuck . . .” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBradford reached for the bag. Value-Kibbles. Lamb flavor. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Really? That’s what you like? Lamb flavor?” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe dog barked once.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Shhhh! Shut up! You can’t bark in here! You tryin’ to get me kicked out?” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe dog gave a pathetic whimper. Oh, woe is hungry dog. Bradford filled one bowl with food and another with water. He set them on the floor. The dog scarfed down the kibble. It slurped up the water. It got water all over the floor. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBradford shook his head. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis dog.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt followed him around the apartment, even though there wasn’t much apartment to follow him through. Just a box with two dirty windows, a kitchenette, a tiny bathroom tiled in pastel pink and blue. There was one dresser that Bradford had found discarded on the street, a couch abandoned by the prior tenant, and an air mattress that a dog’s claws could easily pop.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Hey, you!” He turned to the dog. “Yeah, you. You better not get on my bed. That’s \u003ci\u003emy\u003c\/i\u003e bed. Capisce?” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBradford had moved to the apartment from a dorm. He had moved to the dorm from his parents’ house. He had taken nothing from his parents’ house, because he was doing this himself. Whatever \u003ci\u003ethis\u003c\/i\u003e happened to be. He didn’t want their strings. Their guilt. Their disdain. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe had, as a child, wanted a dog. He drew a picture of said dog on the front of his letter to Santa. He was nine. He had, he thought, been good enough at least, despite what anyone said. He had good grades and washed his dishes and made his bed. He didn’t set fire to ants with a magnifying glass or pour salt on the garden slugs for fun. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe had found the letter to Santa in the trash, crumpled up, beneath a sprinkle of coffee grounds. He dug it out, brushed it off, and stuck it in the mailbox. But he forgot about postage, and no dog ever came. Until now. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“What? Why do you keep staring? Why are you following me around? Bozo.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOn his heels. Would not leave him be. That damned tongue with its two black spots. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThen it occurred to him that, of course, the dog wanted to go out. And if he took it out, it would be out instead of in here, threatening his lease. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe didn’t own a leash because he didn’t own a dog. But whoever this shitty apartment belonged to—\u003ci\u003enot him\u003c\/i\u003e—had dog food, so maybe they had a leash too.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOh, damn. They did. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eRight there, hanging from a nail by the front door. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“This is fucked up,” he told the dog. “You get that, right? You and me, we’re not a thing.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe dog had a collar, plain blue, nondescript, no name or address tag. Bradford clipped the leash to the collar. But he couldn’t just march out the door, down the stairs, past the No Pets sign in the lobby. He and the dog would have to sneak out.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn his closet, he found an old hiking backpack that looked big enough to fit a pit bull–type dog. He picked up the dog. He slid the dog, hind legs first, into the backpack. The dog didn’t struggle. It hung limp, like it knew how this worked. Like it rode in this backpack \u003ci\u003eall the time\u003c\/i\u003e. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBradford buckled the top, leaving a gap for the dog’s eyes and snout to peek out. He put the backpack on.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Damn. You weigh like a thousand pounds. You need to chill on the dog food.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe opened the window. Cold air plowed through. He had forgotten his coat. He took off the backpack and set it on the couch. The dog didn’t try to escape. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe put on his coat, shoes, and hat. He checked his pants pockets. His phone and wallet were both still there, where he had left them. He checked his phone. The screen said 2:19 p.m., December 21. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe had not jumped forward in time to a magic, dog-filled future. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs far as he knew.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe strapped on the dog-backpack. He stepped out the window onto the fire escape. He climbed down the ladder, one floor, two floors, ready for each rusty step to crack beneath his weight, which was, his dad said, \u003ci\u003enot appropriate for a man his size\u003c\/i\u003e. This was a generous translation of Helena Pierson’s words. \u003ci\u003eGrotesque\u003c\/i\u003e, she said. Not to his face, but in earshot. \u003ci\u003eDisgustingly fat. \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYeah, but no. He was not. He straddled the line between standard-fat and chubby. Big-boned. \u003ci\u003eImpressively boned,\u003c\/i\u003e Tommy said. He tried to embrace it. His parents had named him Bradford Pierson III. But screw them, he was Fatty Bratty. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBradford—or Bratty—hopped down from the last ladder rung. He shoved his frozen hands in his pockets. He walked around the building, to the street. The sky was drizzle gray. The ground was damp and littered with cigarette butts and broken bottles. Cold wind whistled through the boards that covered the windows of the building across the street. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Festive as fuck,” Bratty said, remembering the date. December twenty-first. The winter solstice. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e* * *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“He has to go,” Bratty told the receptionist at Happy Paws Veterinary Clinic. “I mean, he’s all right. But I have no idea where he came from. He just showed up. And I can’t have pets. So can I just like, leave him here?” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Um, no,” the receptionist said. “Sorry. We’re just a vet. We don’t take strays.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Oh. You know where I can take him? ’Cause like I said, I can’t keep him.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Hmm.” The receptionist looked at the dog head poking out of Bratty’s backpack. “Yeah. So. The thing is . . . he’s a pit bull.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Yeah. So? I mean, is he?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Looks like a pit bull to me,” the receptionist said. “And most of the shelters don’t take pit bulls.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Oh. That’s, what, they’re like, anti–pit bull?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“That’s just their policy.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“So they’re prejudiced against pit bulls.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Yeah, I guess so.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“So what, they just turn them away? Or—”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Um, not exactly. . . .” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe receptionist didn’t want to say it. But Bratty knew exactly what she meant.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“That’s fucked,” he said.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Yeah. Yeah it is. Pit bulls get a bad rap. But they can be really nice. Unfortunately, there’s only one shelter around here that takes them, and they’re full right now.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Oh. So, um . . . you want a dog?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe receptionist laughed. “I’d take all the dogs if I could. But I already have two at home.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“What am I supposed to do with him?” Bratty asked.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“You said he just showed up?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Yeah.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“But he looks healthy. Maybe he’s not a stray. Maybe he’s lost. Let’s see if he has a chip and we can scan him.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBratty took off the backpack. He let This Random Dog out. The receptionist scanned the dog with some scanner. Bratty shuddered at the thought of under-skin microchips, body scanners, registries of numbers embedded under the skin. The dystopia toward which they were all headed, dogs first. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Yep,” the receptionist said. “He’s got a chip. Let’s look him up. I bet someone’ll be glad to have this nice boy home for Christmas.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBratty rubbed the nice boy’s head. The receptionist looked him up in Big Brother’s National Doggie Database, or whatever it was called.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Yep,” she said. “There he is. Looks like he lives less than a mile from here. It says his owner is Bradford Pierson. Should I—”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Stop.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBratty froze. He looked over his shoulder, down at the dog, up at the receptionist. This was the moment he wondered whether he had somehow accidentally ingested an entire sheet of acid and hallucinated this new reality. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“What?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“You said— What was the name. Say it again. Please.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Bradford Pierson,” she said, slowly.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Bradford Pierson.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Yeah. What, do you know him?”","brand":"Hyperion Avenue","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48233405841637,"sku":"NP9781368116046","price":18.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781368116046.jpg?v=1767733057","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/mr-yay-isbn-9781368116046","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}