Locust House
By Adam Gnade
Published by Three One G and Pioneers Press, 2016
80 pages, paperback
In his 2016 novella, Locust House, San Diego-born author Adam Gnade writes about his homeland in the tradition of regionalists like Louise Erdrich and Willa Cather. Gnade’s California is a place of border clash, of a glimpse of stormy sea from a top coastal hills or rollercoasters, of ratty beach apartments and punk shows. A collaborative release by Three One G and Pioneers Press, this is a story that asks, “What does it mean to hold fast to your dreams, ethics, and beliefs while the whole world tries to tame you?”
Praise for Locust House
"Though the San Diego hardcore scene of the late ’90s and early 2000s has as many detractors as it does champions, Locust House doesn’t attempt to defend or deride it. Instead, writer Adam Gnade’s most recent work of fiction uses a house party featuring scene favorites (The Locust, The Blood Brothers, De Facto) as a way to explore the lives of the people who crammed themselves into a sweaty house together. In under 80 pages Locust House deals in sharp, affecting portraits of hopeless kids using spastic noise-punk as a bonding agent. It explains what brought these characters to the same show, and how those radical ideas either stuck with them as they aged or became a distant memory. Gnade doesn’t exalt either side; instead he uses Locust House as a way of exploring the myriad ways people can grow together or grow apart after being steeped in a subculture. In many ways, Locust House ends up functioning like a song by one of the aforementioned bands: short, chaotic, and hyper-resonant. That is, if you’re willing to look for the beauty hidden beneath the racket." -David Anthony, AV Club
"Honestly, I’m at a complete loss for words. This single book blew me away hardcore. My friend, Rebecca, was the one to first show me the work of Adam Gnade and I was totally shocked. The rawness and the realness of the words I was reading made me squeal at some points while reading, because I don’t think I’ve ever read something quite like this before. I was underlining and tagging this book like crazy and I’m so glad that it exists. Agnes’s story was a hard thing to read, rough times are always hard to read, but it was so great. Frances, James, and Tyler were all so different but so connected in ways I couldn’t even imagine. This view of America and society and community, it’s like all the things I’ve wanted to try to say right on the page in front of me. Although it’s short, it’s not sweet. It’s a look at the reality of relationships, the past, present, future, and world from the point of view of people living it, told through Gnade. Adam, you rock dude. This book is truly LIFE CHANGING." -Plague of Books blog
"Locust House is a novella-length rumination on a time, a place, and a culture. It’s an impressionistic love letter to San Diego’s fringe music scene, circa 2002. It is beautiful, unsettling, and immersive. Gnade presents readers with a handful of misfit characters who orbit San Diego's gritty noise-punk milieu and frequent the Locust House—a home-turned-concert venue, rented and operated by the members of The Locust during the early 2000s. Some of these characters know each other, some don’t. However, they’re all drawn to The Locust's extreme, envelope-pushing music. They are propelled by feelings of alienation, deep political convictions, existential angst, and shitty relationships. They desire something raw and extraordinary in a society brimming with flatlining culture and post-9/11 paranoia. These characters, I should mention, are all secondary to the sights, sounds, smells, and ephemeral feelings that are lyrically detailed in the novella." -Neon Grisly blog
