Rajesh Parameswaran launches his debut fiction collection here at powerHouse.

About I Am An Executioner:

An explosive fiction debut from an astonishing new voice: darkly funny, wildly original stories about the power of love, and the love of power—two urgent human desires that inevitably, and often calamitously, intertwine. The unforgettable opener, "The Infamous Bengal Ming," is narrated by a misunderstood tiger whose affection for his keeper goes horribly awry. In "Demons," a woman tries to celebrate Thanksgiving after the sudden death of her husband, even though his corpse is still sprawled on their living-room floor. In "The Strange Career of Dr. Raju Gopalarajan," an ex-CompUSA employee sets up a medical practice in a suburban strip mall armed only with textbooks from the local library and fake business cards. The heroes—and anti-heroes—of I Am an Executioner include a railroad manager in a turn-of-the-century Indian village, the newlywed executioner of the title, and an elephant writing her autobiography-the creations of a riotous, singular imagination that promises to dazzle the universe of American fiction.

About James Peterson:

About Rajesh Parameswaran:

Rajesh Parameswaran is a graduate of Yale Law School. His stories have appeared in McSweeney's, Granta, Zoetrope: All-Story, Fiction, and Book. "The Strange Career of Dr. Raju Gopalarajan" earned McSweeney's a National Magazine Award and was anthologized in Best American Magazine Writing 2007. The author has held residencies at Yaddo, the Ucross Foundation, and the MacDowell Colony.

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