{"id":304736,"date":"2026-01-22T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/electricliterature.com\/?p=304736"},"modified":"2026-03-29T16:22:38","modified_gmt":"2026-03-29T20:22:38","slug":"exclusive-cover-reveal-of-a-bad-deal-in-mormon-land-by-t-i-m-wirkus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/electricliterature.com\/exclusive-cover-reveal-of-a-bad-deal-in-mormon-land-by-t-i-m-wirkus\/","title":{"rendered":"Exclusive Cover Reveal of \u201cA Bad Deal in Mormon Land\u201d by T.I.M. Wirkus"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Electric Literature is pleased to reveal the cover of <\/em>A Bad Deal in Mormon Land<\/a> by T.I.M. Wirkus, which will be published on October 1, 2026 by Type Eighteen Books. You can <\/em>pre-order your copy<\/em> here<\/em><\/a>!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s 1908, and itinerant spirit medium Madame Ilsa von Hoffmann is at the end of her professional rope, facing down two unappealing options: join an ill-conceived commune founded by some fellow trans ex-vaudevillians, or take on a high-paying but mysterious job offered by a religious extremist in Salt Lake City. Madame Ilsa opts for Utah and the employ of one Roger Marsh who, it turns out, wants her to summon the ghost of Joseph Smith, Mormonism\u2019s founder, to give his blessing to Marsh\u2019s fledgling offshoot of the mainstream church.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unsure how she\u2019ll pull off this near-impossible task, Ilsa finds an ally in Francie Bream, an East Coast journalist in town to profile Mormon women at the dawn of the twentieth century. Bream\u2019s motives remain obscure to Ilsa, though she begins to suspect the journalist has an agenda far more sinister than she could have imagined. Complicating the situation further are an inept and volatile henchman, a relentlessly orthodox Mormon apostle, a copper magnate with a fetish for polygamists, Marsh’s rogue third wife, and a vengeful private investigator from Ilsa’s past. As dead bodies accumulate around her, Madame Ilsa worries less and less about saving her career, and more about making it out of Salt Lake City alive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Here is the cover, designed by Roderick Brydon:<\/p>\n\n\n

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T.I.M. Wirkus: <\/strong>One of the hardest parts of writing a novel is getting the finished book into the hands of its ideal readers. Like many novels, A Bad Deal in Mormon Land<\/em> has elements that are broadly appealing (suspense, murder, intrigue, s\u00e9ances, jokes), as well as more idiosyncratic (its audience exists at the Venn overlap of people who want to read an anti-capitalist novel with a messy trans protagonist, and people looking for a story about a moment in Mormon history that\u2019s obscure even to most Mormons).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How do you even begin to convey all that during the micro-instant of attention any book is likely to receive from a weary reading public?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was thrilled when I first saw Roderick Brydon\u2019s design, because his cover does that work so beautifully. The colors convey both the drama and playfulness of the novel, the hand-drawn look reflects the weirdness, and the images\u2014the beehive, the angel, the praying figures\u2014evoke Mormonism and Utah at the beginning of the twentieth century. I can only hope people enjoy reading the novel as much as I enjoy looking at this cover.<\/p>\n\n\n