Craig, a struggling cable service tech, lands a deal on a brand-new house in an under-construction Orlando neighborhood. It’s supposed to be his family’s ticket to the elusive middle class, the cure for an embittered marriage, the thing that maybe even helps his strange step-son Taylor to finally accept him as a father. But there are a lot of things that Craig can’t see. Taylor, for starters, is troubled. He’s involved in unusual incidents, drawing images where all the homes in the neighborhood are burning and sneaking off to someplace, deep within the woods. Something’s wrong with the neighborhood, too. It’s Central Florida in 2009, the housing market is collapsing, the construction equipment is gone. Will the neighborhood that seemed like such a dream ever become anything more than just unfinished roads and empty plots in the middle of nowhere? The Things I Don’t See is the story of a fractured family on the fringes of America’s happiest vacation destination. It is the story of what takes place outside the comic panels and cartoon frames and family photos, and what it means when we finally encounter the truth behind our lies.
Author
Nathan Holic lives and writes in Orlando, Florida, where he teaches writing courses at the University of Central Florida, and drives from 7-Eleven to 7-Eleven in search of the perfect fountain-poured Diet Coke. He is the author of the novel American Fraternity Man (Beating Windward Press) and the novella The Things I Don't See (Main Street Rag), and he is the editor of the annual anthology 15 Views of Orlando (Burrow Press), a literary portrait of the city featuring short fiction from fifteen Orlando authors. He also serves as the Graphic Narrative Editor at The Florida Review. Holic's short fiction has appeared in a number of print journals, magazines, and anthologies, including Iron Horse, The Portland Review, The Apalachee Review,and the young adult collection Daddy Cool (Artistically Declined Press); his work also appears online at Hobart, Necessary Fiction, Barrelhouse, and a number of other web sites. His comics and graphic narratives include the serialized adaptation of Alex Kudera's novel "Fight For Your Long Day (available monthly at Atticus Review), and "Clutter," a story structured as a home décor catalogue (available at Nailed Magazine). Other comics, which have appeared in Welter, Sweet: A Literary Confection, Palooka, and the anthology The Way We Sleep (Curbside Splendor Press), have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize.
