An uncanny and eye-opening journey into a mysterious building, adapted from a short story by Jeff VanderMeer
To the west: trees. To the east: a mall. North: fast food. South: darkness. And at the centre is The Building, an office building wherein several factions vie for dominance. Inside, the walls are infiltrated with vines, a mischief of mice learn to speak English, and something eerie happens once a month on the fifth floor. In Secret Life, Theo Ellsworth uses a deep-layered style to interpret Nebula award-winning author Jeff VanderMeer's short story. What emerges is a mind-bending narrative that defamiliarizes the mundanity of office work and makes the arcane rituals of The Building home.
This is a vision of office life gone very surreal, with warring tribes who develop their own language and mice who learn to speak English.--New York Times
The incendiary collision of two singular talents... Ellsworth adapts VanderMeer's tale of a mysterious building where 'office culture' connotes secret languages and unspoken rituals, and a cherished desk plant with a tantalizing fragrance grows to menacing proportions.--Poets and Writers Magazine It's impossible to look away.--Alex Dueben, Orion Magazine Secret Life captures the dark pulsing horror of office life with a bizarre honesty found only in bad dreams and good nightmares. An engrossing, unsettling, beautiful work.--Patrick McHale, Over the Garden Wall This bizarre, fantastical vision will charm art comics and surrealist lit fans alike.--Publishers Weekly Unique, striking, and surreal... Corporate culture, capitalism/consumption, social hierarchies, and domination notwithstanding, only a vine flourishes here.--Booklist An allegory about work life like no other.--NOW Magazine