ROAD TO STEPHEN GRAHAM JONES’ OFF THE RESERVATION: An Obsessive’s Fiction Review Column
As we near the end of this column series, I’ve been reflecting on why I wanted so passionately to take on a project of this size. Yes, like other fans, I am beyond excited for Stephen Graham Jones’ upcoming novel, Off the Reservation (in fact, I’ve just begun re-reading The Only Good Indians in preparation). But more than anything, as I watch (and cheer for) his growing popularity, I can’t help but think of a younger me, just fresh off discovering this new-to-me author. As I scrolled through social media pics and reviews of Mongrels and his other major titles, I started spotting the spines and covers and titles of SGJ books I’d never heard of. It was as if I were suddenly inside of the Stephen King novella Ur, stumbling across the bibliography of my favorite author but from a parallel universe. And there was so much of it. I didn’t know where to start; I didn’t know when I’d reach the end.
In that time, the man has done what he does best and released more and more bestsellers with Saga Press, but still that backlist remains. I wanted to (forgive the analogy), like some kind of amateur cartographer, map a path for readers, from his shiny new hardcovers to the backrooms of his imagination.
Today’s column could be argued to be the apotheosis of that idea. Not that these are the best of the best—in my opinion, SGJ books are so varied that no such objective list can exist—but I do believe they each exist in a stranger, more distant parallel universe. And here is a map.
The Hidden Gems of Stephen Graham Jones
THE LONG TRIAL OF NOLAN DUGATTI
Originally published 2008 by Chiasmus Press
Re-issued 2024 by Open Road Media
The Long Trial of Nolan Dugatti is my pick for Most Original of all the titles I recommend in the entirety of this column series. In today’s age, it is increasingly difficult to say that this or that story is truly singular—nothing new under the sun and all that. But give just my quick description of this book a cursory glance and tell me I’m wrong.
Nolan Dugatti is the last employee clocking in his last graveyard shift as customer service for an obsolete video game. Between mysterious, unreliable phone calls from a homicide detective and re-visiting the many increasingly inventive suicide notes his late father addressed to him, the levels of this dying game seem to be bleeding into Nolan’s reality—the 8-bit ninjas… and the interdimensional centipede monster running from the timelords of the future.*
Like… what the actual fuck?
Excuse my language, or don’t. Either way, go read this thing, and see if it doesn’t pack a surprising emotional punch that catches you as if out of nowhere… and then, wiping the tears from your face, you can’t help but laugh and realize it was all there the entire time, doing what stories do best but in a way you’ve never experienced. That is the pleasure of The Long Trial of Nolan Dugatti.
ZOMBIE BAKE-OFF
Originally published 2012 by Lazy Fascist Press
Re-issued 2024 by Open Road Media
Stephen Graham Jones is, behind the literary force of his prose and his inventive imagination and his come-off-the-page character work, also actually a pretty funny guy. This is most clear with the sarcastic wit of his characters (see: Jade Daniels), but now I would like to introduce to you what I believe to be his funniest book, Zombie Bake-Off. All three titles originally published by Lazy Fascist Press—Zombie Bake-Off, his bizarro collection Zombie Sharks with Metal Teeth, and, soon to be re-issued from Saga Press, The Last Final Girl—do a great job showcasing Jones’ humor, but this one really takes the… er… cake. (Sorry for the pun; I never claimed that I was funny.)
The What is as simple as it gets: There’s a zombie virus outbreak at a Texas coliseum hosting a bake-off and a pro-wrestling event. The exit is chained shut, which means only one thing: It’s every soccer mom, grandma, and pro wrestler for themselves!
The Why is even simpler, actually: Why not? This book is a rollicking good time. Entertaining as hell from page one. I couldn’t have said it better than Gabino Iglesias, reviewing the original 2012 release for HorrorDNA: “[Zombie Bake-Off] is what happens when an award-winning author flexes his muscles and decides to have fun with a genre while simultaneously eviscerating it.”
STERLING CITY
Originally published 2013 by Nightscape Press
Re-issued 2024 by Open Road Media
We’ve come to the shortest read on our entire 22-book map. As I understand it, Open Road Media originally only planned an ebook release for Sterling City, but fans asked them enough that they finally said, “Okay, but the spine is too small to print the title on!” (Once again, the fans thank you for your service, Open Road.)
Sterling City is a one-sitting read about the cotton farmer Lee, trying to keep his farm alive in the wake of his wife leaving him. The only problem is, there seems to be a giant caterpillar stalking his field, somehow connected to the Martian moon that blew up the night his wife left. As the moon debris gets closer to Earth, Lee struggles to maintain control of his life.
On first read of the description, I expected to go into Sterling City and find something of the Nolan Dugatti “WTF?” variety. But what I found was tightly wound, emotional prose. Mature, aching character work. And (to my chagrin) a wholllle lotta inside-baseball about irrigating cotton fields. But one thing it does have in common with The Long Trial of Nolan Dugatti? That emotional surprise at the very end; the character’s cathartic release sneaking up on the reader almost on the very last page.
To quote another author/critic, Jeff VanderMeer: “Another great example of why you should be reading Stephen Graham Jones.”
THE GOSPEL OF Z
Originally published 2014 by Samhain Publishing
Re-issued 2025 by Open Road Media
On his website’s FAQ page, when asked “Zombies or Vampires?,” Stephen Graham Jones answered, “Werewolves.” And yet, today I’ve given two of our four Hidden Gem slots to his zombie novels. The thing about SGJ, if you haven’t picked this up yet, is that he is a master of reinvention. It’s what I meant in the very first column, when I called him an engineer. You hand him an idea, a trope, an archetype, and he’ll break it down and show you inner workings you never could have imagined. With The Gospel of Z, that manifests as him saying, “Well, if I’m going to write a zombie novel, it won’t be like any other out there. Sure, there’s a zombie virus. But come with me, ten years later…”
And you’re off to the races. Meet Jory Gray, former schoolteacher, now nothing more than a suicidal grunt working for the military to build genetically modified “handlers,” the only things that can handle zombies. But then the only person he cares about anymore, Linse, up and joins the religious cult that seems to be at odds with the military for control of civilization. Jory is thrown over to the zombie disposal crew, and he learns very quickly that there is a world-shattering truth out there that may be more dangerous than any zombie virus.
One refreshing (to me) difference that sets SGJ’s zombie novel apart is how few zombies are actually present on the page. This isn’t quite a book about brain-eating zombies in the traditional sense; it’s more interested in what happens when the surviving humans let themselves just walk through what remains of their life like they’re already dead.
I would be remiss to omit the not-so-refreshing aspect of The Gospel of Z: there are little to no female characters involved on the page. It is still a gripping read, but this is a major omission that is definitely felt. I can’t imagine Jones making this world-building faux pas today, but for the sake of this column, suffice to say that some gems hide themselves. Bring your chisel and brush to find the shine.
For Extra Credit
Yes, even when choosing to limit this column series to 22 books—SGJ titles currently offered by Saga Press, Tor Nightfire, and Open Road Media—pockets of SGJ’s work seem to proliferate of their own accord. And so, with the theme of “Hidden Gems” in mind, let us briefly mention that Stephen Graham Jones also has more than a few entries in the world of graphic novels.
EARTHDIVERS (IDW Publishing, 2022) is a three-volume graphic novel series of Indigenous Futurism in which Jones and artist Davide Gianfelice imagine a future where a group of Native Americans travel back in time with the mission of reshaping their histories. The title comes from the Blackfeet creation myth, and you can expect that kind of history-heavy catharsis and high-concept thrills and horrors on every page. SGJ has always been a lover of comic books, and he sure brings that passion with Earthdivers.
Well, we’re circling the end. The final column. Get ready, folks. Get out your library cards, your highlighters, your audiobook credits. For our last trip around the sun that is Stephen Graham Jones, it’s time we tackle the Required Reading.
Spencer Hamilton
* What I’ve written is a not-great representation of the book, an intentionally disorienting synopsis… but I wanted to take a moment to, at least in a footnote, preserve the incredible back-cover description from the original 2008 paperback edition by Chiasmus Press:
If there’s a line between the real and the digital, between meat and the game, between past and present, then hold this book close to your mouth and whisper it into the pages. Please. Maybe the kid in there’ll hear you. His name is Nolan Dugatti. He’s lost, see, running down hall after hall, something both ancient and not-yet born galloping up behind him on a hundred legs, each individual footfall a sound he knows, a way of shuffling that he’s always known. His father? Except it can’t be. Unless of course this is another novel from Stephen Graham Jones. Not quite horror, not quite science fiction, but like his five or six other books, a story trembling at some pupal stage between meat and the game, where words will sometimes stop their crawl across the page and crane their neck around at the sky, nod about what they see there—you—then unfold their wings, drift up into another world altogether.
OUR ROAD MAP
All the Beautiful Sinners †
The Long Trial of Nolan Dugatti ‡
It Came from Del Rio †
The Ones Who Got Away ***
Zombie Bake-Off ‡
Three Miles Past: Stories †
Zombie Sharks with Metal Teeth ***
The Least of My Scars †
Sterling City ‡
The Gospel of Z ‡
States of Grace ***
After the People Lights Have Gone Off ***
Mongrels §
Mapping the Interior §
Night of the Mannequins *
The Only Good Indians §
My Heart Is a Chainsaw **
Don’t Fear the Reaper **
The Angel of Indian Lake **
I Was a Teenage Slasher *
The Buffalo Hunter Hunter §
Killer on the Road/The Babysitter Lives *
Off the Reservation, out October 13, 2026
OUR ROAD MAP KEY
* SGJ Starter Pack
** Slasher 101 with Professor Jones
*** Short Fiction of SGJ
† Serial Killers of SGJ
‡ Hidden Gems of SGJ
- SGJ’s Required Reading
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
SPENCER HAMILTON is a queer horror author living in Pennsylvania. His fiction includes the novel The Fear and novellas Welcome to Smileyland and Sister Funtime. His short fiction has been collected in Kitchen Sink and I Will Devour You and Other Promises, and has appeared in several anthologies, most recently Punk Goes Horror II from Truborn Press. He is the editor of the queer horror anthology There’s More of Us Than You Know. You can find him on Instagram as @spencer.hamilton.books.
