In The Wax Boy, printed by Barbara Henry of Harismus Press in an edition of 50, a small boy finds a dragon in his right shoe. This book reminds the reader of how inexorably strange and perilous childhood can be. Only $50 for a signed copy.

Title page:

The Wax Boy / CHINA MARKS

New York City / 2018

Page 2:
One morning a small boy was getting dressed for school. When he crawled under his bed to retrieve his school shoes, he discovered that a fierce dragon had taken up residence in his right shoe. If he put on his shoes and disturbed the dragon, it would eat him alive. Crawling out from under the bed, he ran into the bathroom and threw up.

P. 3:
The boy lay in bed all day with an upset stomach, worrying about the next day, when he would have to put on his shoes and be eaten alive. He couldn’t tell his parents. He half-suspected they had put the dragon there themselves.

P. 4:
The next day the boy was well enough to go to school. He ate breakfast in his stocking feet, put on his school shoes, and left the house. As the boy walked the half-mile to school, the dragon ate him alive, strangling the boy’s cries and replacing his living flesh with colored wax so that passers-by noticed nothing.

P. 6:
The wax boy arrived at school and walked into the classroom. The teacher noticed only that the boy looked a little pale and was better behaved than usual. But he did his schoolwork and ate a good lunch.

P. 7:
The dragon flew away as the wax boy walked home from school. In the kitchen the boy’s mother, who had a splitting headache, was grimly fixing dinner. The boy poured himself a glass of milk which slipped from his clumsy wax fingers and shattered on the floor. His mother screamed at him.

P. 8:
Her scream ignited the wax,
the boy flared incandescent,
catching his mother’s clothes on fire,
exploding the gas line.
The whole house burned fiercely.
Before long, there was nothing left.

Set in ATF’s Lightline Gothic and printed onto Zerkall Book paper by Barabara Henry in an edition of 50.

This is number 01.