The structure of the natural and manufactured world may be a nodal web of endless coequal expansion, but if enough people accept a longitudinal hierarchy as their shared reality, mass hysteria ensues, and a social ladder becomes solid enough to climb. Such has been the case since the dawn of human imperialism, and ever since, those of us who can see the undressed emperor have always easily picked one another out in the crowd. I picked journalist and author Tea Hačić-Vlahović out from this crowd the first time I read her work. So, too, did Giancarlo DiTrapano, the late and legendary editor/publisher of Tyrant Books. A beloved champion of young and daring writers, DiTrapano resuscitated an indie lit scene that had been idling on life support for nearly a generation. He saw the hidden potential in writers like Hačić-Vlahović, whose unpolished prose needed just the right amount of elbow grease to elevate their natural patina. It was only a month before he passed in March of 2021 when Tea texted to tell me that he was planning to publish her second novel, A Cigarette Lit Backwards, and that she had incorporated a small anecdote I had shared with her a year earlier. Her third and most recent novel, Give Me Danger, builds on this lived reality, only in this fictionalized version, her lead character Val’s first novel is a lowbrow bestseller, and her dreams of gaining clout in the indie lit scene are dashed by the news of her would-be publisher’s demise. Val struggles to wade through the gatekeeping social climbers who constitute his outer entourage so that she can simply pay her respects, and her experiences navigating the pomp and circumstance of those who consider themselves the cultural elite are a left-of-center mirror reflecting under an alternating strobe of moody and halogen lighting. Read more.
Tea Hacic-Vlahovic Celebrates The Launch Of A Cigarette Lit Backwards
On September 22, Tea Hacic-Vlahovic and friends celebrated the launch of her second, brutally honest coming-of-age novel, A Cigarette Lit Backwards, at Ace Hotel in Los Angeles, following the smash success of her 2020 debut novel, Life of the Party. Hosted by Paper Work, the night included a performance by ZAESOTERIC aka Isiah Edwards, as well as CPR guidance and safe drug using instructions by Narcan Nate, who distributed fentanyl testing strips, Narcan, and business cards for neverusealone.com. The book is out now and can be purchased in select book stores and abramsbooks.com. photographs by Michael Krim