Public Access Afterworld
"I stayed up all night binge-reading" SenLinYu, author of ALCHEMISED
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Public Access Afterworld
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Narrated by:
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By:
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Jane Schoenbrun
Summary
'A riot in novel form by an author with an utterly singular, original vision. Public Access Afterworld will leave you breathless and desperate for a sequel'
KALIANE BRADLEY, author of The Ministry of Time
'Jane Schoenbrun has the literary voice I've been famished for. Public Access Afterworld gave me a vertiginous thrill I haven't encountered since David Mitchell'
TORREY PETERS, author of Stag Dance and Detransition, Baby
'I stayed up all night binge-reading . . . Adroitly beautiful, funny, and scathing'
SENLINYU, author of Alchemised
On 12th June 2009, David Sawyer and Erin Morrison, two lonely, TV-obsessed suburban teens who might be falling in love, gather in Erin's basement to watch TV's analogue-to-digital transition. Beneath the static that follows, Erin catches a glimpse of a mysterious broadcast from a TV network called 'Public Access Afterworld'. Soon after that, she vanishes - changing the trajectory of David's life forever.
Fourteen years later, Bethany Peters toils through the night shift at megacorp GlobalVill's bleak Austin campus. A trans content moderator, she spends her evenings reviewing an endless stream of horrific videos. But gradually a pattern emerges from the ocean of digital violence in the form of a young streamer, Jules, calling out the same words: Public Access Afterworld.
When Bethany ignores the guidance of her corporate overseers and sets out to rescue Jules, she begins an epic journey that sweeps from rural Texas to the heart of American darkness in 1940s Los Alamos - and all the way back to that basement where David and Erin first encountered a world at the edges of reality itself.©2026 Jane Schoenbrun (P)2026 Penguin Random House Audio
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Critic reviews
A riot in novel form by an author with an utterly singular, original vision. Public Access Afterworld will leave you breathless and desperate for a sequel (Kaliane Bradley, author of THE MINISTRY OF TIME)
Jane Schoenbrun has the literary voice I've been famished for. Public Access Afterworld gave me a vertiginous thrill I haven't encountered since David Mitchell; the kind of epic book that doesn't just warp reality on the page but goes on warping when you look up - you read it and the world glints with secrets anew. (Torrey Peters, author of STAG DANCE and DETRANSITION, BABY)
Public Access Afterworld is an immersive and chilling journey that I stayed up all night binge-reading. Schoenbrun's skill and confidence as a storyteller are made clear by the deft way they play with both genre and form as the book bends and warps across time and mediums. Adroitly beautiful, funny, and scathing, Public Access Afterworld is a book from a talented storyteller with much to say, who's not afraid to say it (SenLinYu, #1 New York Times bestselling author of ALCHEMISED)
In Jane Schoenbrun's electric Public Access Afterworld the American dream is refracted through the lens of the history of television to show its true nightmare self. Thrilling, heart-wrenching, hilarious, visionary, and so damned smart, this novel is a major work from a major talent (Paul Tremblay, author of A HEAD FULL OF GHOSTS and DEAD BUT DREAMING OF ELECTRIC SHEEP)
A thriller unlike any other. Strange, urgent, utterly hypnotic - once you start reading Public Access Afterworld, you won't stop (Lev Grossman, #1 New York Times bestselling author of THE MAGICIANS)
Constantly yanking the magical carpet out from under the reader's feet, this epic quest for the source of all television is psychedelic horror of the first order (Grady Hendrix, author of WITCHCRAFT FOR WAYWARD GIRLS)
Praise for I Saw the TV Glow, written and directed by Jane Schoenbrun
'Jane Schoenbrun was born to make cult classics' GQ
'An atmosphere so intoxicating, it feels less like the creation of a movie and more that of an entire world' Guardian
'What's most effective, and staggering, is Schoenbrun's storytelling' New York Times
'Jane Schoenbrun was born to make cult classics' GQ
'An atmosphere so intoxicating, it feels less like the creation of a movie and more that of an entire world' Guardian
'What's most effective, and staggering, is Schoenbrun's storytelling' New York Times
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