Janice Deal
Books: New
Is a parent responsible for a child who commits a crime? If so, how can she deal with that burden?
These are the questions that haunt Flo when her daughter Teddy plans to visit after a long separation. The prospect of seeing Teddy brings back painful memories of Teddy’s troubled past—a young teen imprisoned for committing murder. Can Flo find the strength to support or even cope with her daughter as she is now? Can she resurrect hope for either of them?
Flo must thrash through these questions alone; her dear friend and confidant has just died. Then, as she's grappling with grief and guilt, her dog goes missing, and she takes a long walk to find him. On the surface, this is all that happens: A simple walk through a desert town. Encounters with people who uplift or unsettle her along the way. But for Flo, this journey becomes much more—a personal odyssey, as profound and disorienting as Ulysses’. She remembers an old folktale passed down by her family, about a young woman’s mythical journey to find her place in the world. Echoes of this tale play through the current story, and the hunt for Dog turns into a metaphysical search for meaning.
Some readers will recall Flo and Teddy from Strange Attractors, the linked story collection focusing on the denizens of fictional Ephrem, Illinois. This sequel to their mother/daughter story once more reveals the extraordinary depths of unpretentious people.
VIDEO: Listen to Janice talk about The Blue Door, available April 22, 2025.
Books: Previous
Praise
"... the writing is consistently witty and clear, occasionally humorous and often beautiful, delivered in short sentences and simple language with the resonance of a fairy tale."
“Not since the abrupt—and welcome—rediscovery of Lucia Berlin’s short fictions in 2015 have I read such a marvelous story collection as Janice Deal’s Strange Attractors. In a quietly luminous and deceptively steady voice, Deal mines the lives and burdens of the generally overlooked citizens of Ephrem, Illinois, a semi-rural community college town near the Wisconsin border. She makes her gallery of strangers our intimates in the way Willa Cather once did.”
JAMES MAGRUDER, author of Vamp Until Ready
"Deal’s sensitive stories reflect both the hope and the despair experienced in a small town where not much will ever truly change."
“The characters in Ephrem lead mundane lives, until [Janice] Deal telescopes in to moments of revealed truths, sudden outbursts and hidden traumas, making the residents more complex and deeply relatable. The challenges they face in this Wisconsin border town are universal: loneliness, financial insecurity, strained family relationships, alcohol abuse, a persistent feeling of restlessness.”
"Who can encounter misfits without remembering Flannery O’Connor? Deal’s voice and people are uniquely her own, but share something of O’Connor’s eerie magnification, a hallucinatory exposure of evil within the quotidian."
"Because it is set in a small town, it is tempting to compare Deal’s collection to Sherwood Anderson’s Winesburg, Ohio. There are certain similarities. But Deal seems a little closer to Anton Chekov than Anderson. She handles fine grades of emotion with humor and wistfulness, and with a surgeon’s delicate touch . . . These strange stories stay with you, attracting more meaning when they’re read again."
Chicago Review of Books has named Janice's linked story collection Strange Attractors from New Door Books one of the 12 must-read books of September. Michael Welch writes, "These intricately written stories come together to shed light on the uncertainties that exist in the modern American heartland." Click below for the complete list!
The Sound of Rabbits is a heartfelt novel of fragile love between sisters, estranged through distance and grudges, striving to find their bond, even if they don’t have the words to express it. With keen insights and spot-on descriptions, Janice Deal animates her novel with characters from a small town in Wisconsin where parents struggle to make ends meet, children seek their passions, nature is cruel, and the past is never really past.
An unflinching, yet loving, portrait of a complicated family.”
JAN ENGLISH LEARY, author of Thicker Than Blood, Skating on the Vertical, and Town and Gown
"Original, entertaining, thoughtful, and thought-provoking, The Sound of Rabbits is an impressive work of literary fiction and highly recommended for community, college, and university library Contemporary Literary Fiction collections."
“[Janice] Deal deftly entwines Ruby’s and Val’s introspections with slice-of-life perspectives of other characters, creating a nuanced exploration of the complications of identity, regret, family, and community.”
Below is a link to the (gated) review for those of you who subscribe to Booklist.
“Deal’s prose style is pretty and compact. She moves easily between voices old and young, male and female. The individual character studies shine with specificity and insight. With the introduction of each character, we see more of the picture ... The Sound of Rabbits is superbly crafted.”
Chicago Tribune Books Editor Christopher Borrelli says, “Janice Deal, another story ace from Chicago, goes the novel route with The Sound of Rabbits, a palpably homesick story about two sisters reuniting in their small Wisconsin town, drawn back into a place they once either wanted to escape or forget.” (For those lacking a Chicago Tribune subscription, click here for the syndicated version of the column that appeared in Yahoo! News.)
In The Decline of Pigeons, Janice Deal leads us deep into the heart of human nature to reveal the turmoil, self-delusion, and moments of unexpected clarity that accompany profound loss. I love these characters—flawed, real, and marked by compassion. And I love Deal’s voice: arresting, brave, uniquely her own. I will return to this book again and again, for the joy and sense of solace it brings me.”
KATHERINE SHONK, author of The Red Passport
and Happy Now?
Bio
Janice Deal is the author of two novels (The Blue Door and The Sound of Rabbits) and two story collections (Strange Attractors: the Ephrem Stories and The Decline of Pigeons). The recipient of an Illinois Arts Council Artists Fellowship Award for prose, Janice has won The Moth Short Story Prize and the Cagibi Macaron Prize. Her books have also been finalists for the Chicago Writers Association Book of the Year, the Flannery O’Connor Award, the Black Lawrence Press Big Moose Prize, and the Many Voices Project annual competition. She lives with her husband in the Chicago area.
Events & News
Janice's linked story collection, Strange Attractors, has been named a finalist in Traditional Fiction for the Chicago Writers Association (CWA) 2024 Book of the Year Award. Click here for more information.
Articles
& Media
From The Handsome Family to Max Richter's reinterpretation of Vivaldi: music evokes the places, characters, and themes in Janice's novel The Blue Door. Enjoy the playlist she created for Largehearted Boy!
Deborah Kalb and Janice confab about Geordie Greep and why certain characters just . . . have a hold.
Flo, the protagonist of The Blue Door, spends some time with Janice in a Q&A published by Women Writers, Women['s] Books. Flo shares her thoughts on good and evil, navigating adversity, what it means to be brave, and more!
Read the interview here.
Eileen MacDougall, host of Book Stew, and Janice chat about Janice’s linked story collection Strange Attractors. To check out their wide-ranging confab, which touches on why maps are cool, how characters live on in our brain pans, and more, visit here.
Janice’s linked story collection, Strange Attractors, has placed as a semifinalist for Adult Fiction in The Midland Authors awards competition, which honors books by Midwestern authors. Click here for more information.
Musical artists ranging from Japanese Breakfast to Kurt Vile appear on a Strange Attractors playlist, created by Janice for Largehearted Boy
Janice and Deborah Kalb talk about patience, Flannery O'Connor's misfits, and the ways in which revelations can hide in plain sight.
Janice talks writing with Karen Halvorsen Schreck for Hypertext Magazine; their wide-ranging confab covers the influence of music on creativity, Janice's literary pilgrimages, how the Midwest has informed her writing, and more.
Lou Reed. Lana Del Rey. David Bowie. Weyes Blood. They (and many more artists) appear on a Sound of Rabbits playlist, created by Janice for Largehearted Boy. The playlist consists of 11 songs associated with the principal characters in the book — even a cat named Jellybean. Happy listening!
"These extraordinary tales offer a masterful snapshot of life in today’s small-town America": Michael Welch weighs in on Strange Attractors, including the title on a Chicago Review of Books list of the most anticipated Chicago books of 2023.
New podcast: click here to view/listen to a podcast from Book Stew featuring a discussion of The Sound of Rabbits.
How does place inform fiction? Read Janice's essay for Women Writers, Women's Books.
Janice and Regal House get down to brass tacks and discuss the big issues — such as the importance of chocolate to writing. Read here.
Upcoming Events
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Contact
To email Janice, click here
For any media inquiries, please contact publicist Sheryl Johnston:
Tel: 773-472-2254 | sheryljohnston@aol.com
Publishers:
For The Blue Door and Strange Attractors, Douglas Gordon, New Door Books
For The Sound of Rabbits, Jaynie Royal, Regal House Publishing
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