Pilgrim. Pilgrim. Pilgrim. Clown.
Elias Barton's art always stood out, even in his elementary school hallways. His creations weren't like the others. Raised in an ultra-conservative family that rejected the celebration of holidays, he was taught to avoid being a part of the world. When his class was tasked with a holiday art project, Barton had to adjust. Thus, a construction paper clown stood among paper pilgrims, a spider walked among Valentine hearts, a lone boy among classmates, a sole observer with a limitless imagination.
Though the church's strict rules would've kept him in the dark, it was music and literature that peeled back the night allowing Barton to see. Art provided the mentors and counselors that he'd never found elsewhere. Barton preferred walking with the likes of Ray Bradbury, Tennessee Williams and Kurt Vonnegut, sharing meals with Orson Scott Card, Miranda July and L.M. Montgomery, and staying up late at night with Chuck Palahniuk, Charles Dickens and Neil Gaiman, all tripping his writing toward the boundlessness of fantasy and the beauty of poetry without losing sardonic musings and the recognition of life's absurdity.
Elias Barton's first novel Above the Universe Below was a semi-finalist for Amazon's Breakthrough Novel Award in 2012 and 2011 (in 2011 it was titled: Creep Crawls Toward White Light). He resides in Washington, DC with two cats which are eternally intent on keeping him from his keyboard. His next novel -tentatively titled The Circadian Ladder continues exploring parallel worlds, extinct animals, mythological beasts and messy relationships.
