Tallahassee, FL – What does it mean to be different? From Mark Mustian, founder of the Word of South Festival of Literature and Music and award-winning author of the international bestseller “The Gendarme,” comes the new Southern gothic novel, “Boy With Wings” (March 15, 2025, Koehler Books).
About the book: Johnny Cruel is born with strange appendages on his back, frightening his neighbors and leaving him struggling to find a home. Johnny ends up in a “freak show” traveling the 1930s South, where he bares his back to onlookers who come to gape and fawn. Is he a horror or an angel? Should he hide himself to live his life?
As Johnny comes to grips with his uniqueness, he embarks on a journey of love and finds the miracles that give our lives meaning. Mustian’s thrilling and emotional story of self-discovery is perfect for book clubs and fans of historical fiction.
“Boy With Wings”
Mark Mustian | March 15, 2025 | Koehler Books | Literary Fiction, Historical
Hardcover | ISBN 979-8-88824-429-6 | $28.95
Paperback | ISBN 979-8-88824-427-2 | $19.95
Ebook | ISBN 979-8-88824-428-9 | $7.99
Praise for the Author…
“In this propulsive tale of the magic lurking inside our mortality, Mark Mustian has conjured a surreal hero. Here is a translucent rendering of boyhood and aberration, of the fault lines of race and the frailty of religion. In sentences that are equally primal and poetic, Mustian transports us through the shacks, camps, circuses, and back alleys of the Depression-era South, asking a still-resonant question: what’s the price of belonging in a society that’s already broken?”
–Katy Simpson Smith, author of “The Everlasting,” for “Boy With Wings”
“Novelist Mustian writes relentlessly, telling [Ahmet’s] haunting story in brief bursts of luminous yet entirely unsentimental prose and reminding us that, when life gets bloody, we had better watch out for our own humanity.”
—Library Journal (Starred Review), for “The Gendarme”
“Every decade or so, I find a novel that I sense, just by reading the basic description, will become unforgettable; after reading only 20 pages of ‘The Gendarme,’ my impression was confirmed with great force. For this decade, and this reader, ‘The Gendarme’ is that extraordinary, unforgettable novel…”
—BookPage, for “The Gendarme”
“A well-plotted, well-told story with a powerful, moving message…”
—Baton Rouge Advocate, for “The Gendarme”
“A brilliantly conceived and carefully crafted novel…”
—Southern Literary Review, for “The Gendarme”
About the Author…
[©Cyndi Chambers Sports / 2024]
Follow Mark Mustian on social media:
Facebook: @MarkMustianAuthor | Twitter: @MarkMustian
In an interview, Mark Mustian can discuss:
- What being a Southern writer means to him, and why he founded the Word of South Literary Festival in Tallahassee
- How themes of ignorance, superstition and spirituality play into the novel
- How race and religion are portrayed in the novel
- How the 1930s setting for the novel reveals contemporary issues in society, both in the American South and beyond
- What “Southern gothic” means in 2025: its history and resurgence
- Why “weirdness” both fascinates and repulses people, and what our complicated reaction really says about us
An Interview with Mark Mustian
1. What inspired you to write “Boy With Wings”?
I’ve thought about writing this book for quite some time. I’ve started it, stopped it, begun again, made revisions. I wanted to dig into what it means to be different, and how that truly feels.
2. Although there are no “freak shows” today as there were in the 1930s, do you believe there’s a contemporary equivalent?
There actually are still a few traveling freak shows, but oddities today are shown mostly on the Internet and TV. Just as in the 1930’s, there’s much that is fake, and some that is real.
3. What is the significance of ignorance and superstition in this book?
Ignorance and superstition are related in certain ways to belief (and religion). We tend to equate anything we don’t or can’t understand to God, but at the same time we fear it. Human oddities seem a perfect example—we’re fascinated even as we’re repelled.
4. What role does spirituality play in the book?
The main character, Johnny, struggles with his body and his belief. Is it God he believes in, or the Bible, or even something else? He struggles also with the role society seems to want him to play. I think those struggles are there for all of us, and spirituality is the path (with its many branches) that can lead us through.
5. As a Southern writer, how do race and religion connect to the book and reflect the region you call home?
It’s hard to write as a Southerner without addressing race and religion, or at least it is for me. Each so permeates life here, and arguments can be made that we’ve come a long way on both, or that we haven’t come very far at all (and don’t want to). Dichotomies are everywhere: the hypocrisies of the Church, the unwillingness to look past oneself, the tribalism that’s in our blood, the absolute beauty of the land and its people. All fertile ground for a writer.
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A former award-winning journalist with national exposure, Marissa now oversees the day-to-day operation of the Books Forward author branding and book marketing firm, along with our indie publishing support sister company Books Fluent.
Born and bred in Louisiana, currently living in New Orleans, she has lived and developed a strong base for our company and authors in Chicago and Nashville. Her journalism work has appeared in USA Today, National Geographic and other major publications. She is now interviewed by media on best practices for book marketing.
