The funniest award-winning novel
of 2020.

 

Try BELL HAMMERS
by Lancelot Schaubert
 
for free.


"Schaubert recounts a mischievous man's eight decades in Illinois's Little Egypt region in his picaresque debut. Remmy's life of schemes and pranks and a lifelong feud with classmate Jim Johnstone and the local oil drilling company proves consequential. This is a hoot."
- Publisher's Weekly

πŸ†  Finalist for Glimmer Train's Fiction Open.

 

  • 10,0000
    want-to reads on Goodreads 
    β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜… 4.63 in ratings and reviews

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"Wonderful... truly a great story."

β€” Glimmer Train.

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"Excellent piece of writing... reminds me of Mark Twain’s works. It is sardonic at times, taking a sarcastic tone and mocking the reader while delivering an important piece of the story at the same time.."

β€” Scribbes

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"This is a story that needed tellin, simple as that. You see, my people from way back when are just like these people, so I grew up hearing stories and tall tales just like the ones in this here book. And they are told just like they were said, in that wonderful spoken vernacular of those wonderful people. It brought me back to when I was a little girl listening to my PaPaw talk about the coal mines and how hard it was for a regular guy to get ahead when the company men had all the power and money. And the pranks they would play, just to break the monotony of everyday life. Nobody writes stories about β€œhillbillies”, which is what my people were called, and told the truth. Nobody has written a story about Remmy, until now, and told the truth. This will feed your soul so just read it alread."

β€” Carla B., daughter of a Coal Miner

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"Interesting look at life in middle America as big business and the common man face off. Realistic characters bring to life an informative novel."

β€” Doug Y., High School Teacher

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"Myth, regret, the lore of our heritage and the subtle displays of our castes β€” no one so accurately and imaginatively captures the joys and sorrows of life in the Midwest as Schaubert does here. BELL HAMMERS is a Tree Grows in Brooklyn as told by Gabriel Garcia Marquez if Marquez lived in rural Illinois and only told stories to his grandkids. Seriously a delight to read."

β€” Colby Williams, author of the Axiom Gold Medal winning Small Town Big Money

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"BELL HAMMERS is written in a style not unworthy of John Kennedy Toole and William Faulkner – the vivid characterization of Southern ethnography commingled with stark, episodic spectacle breathes with the spirit of quintessential Americana. It is a text I would happily assign in an American Novel class and would expect it to yield satisfying discourse alongside works in the canon, whether beside the sardonic prose of Mark Twain or the energetically painful narratives of Toni Morrison."

β€” Dr. Anthony Cirilla, Boethius + Literature Scholar

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" Bell Hammers by Lancelot Schaubert was the book I needed recently. I'd been struggling with anything I had picked up to read... until Bell Hammers."

β€” High School Teacher + Librarian

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"One of a kind book that tells serious issues in a funny way. While reading the first chapter, I knew how special the main character Remmy is. Humorous and heartfelt throughout. The relationship between Remmy and relatives is very relatable. I loved the use of local slang and scenarios and found the language mimicking some classic authors. "

β€” Monika's Book Blog



PRANKS.
OIL.
PROTEST.
JOKES BETWEEN NEWLYWEDS.

 
 

AND ONE HILARIOUS SIEGE
OF A MAJOR CORPORATION.

 


 

Remmy grows up with Beth in Bellhammer, Illinois as oil and coal companies rob the land of everything that made it paradise. Under his Grandad, he learns how to properly prank his neighbors, friends, and foes. Beth tries to fix Remmy by taking him to church. Under his Daddy, Remmy starts the Bell Hammer Construction Company, which depends on contracts from Texarco Oil. And Beth argues with him about how to build a better business. Together, Remmy and Beth start to build a great neighborhood of "merry men" carpenters: a paradise of s’mores, porch furniture, newborn babies, and summer trips to Branson where their boys pop the tops of off the neighborhood’s two hundred soda bottles. Their witty banter builds a kind of castle among a growing nostalgia.
 

Then one of Jim Johnstone’s faulty Texarco oil derricks falls down on their house and poisons their neighborhood's well.
 

Poisoned wells escalate to torched dog houses. Torched dog houses escalate to stolen carpentry tools and cancelled contracts. Cancelled contracts escalate to eminent domain. Sick of the attacks from Texarco Oil on his neighborhood, Remmy assembles his merry men:


"We need the world's greatest prank. One grand glorious jest that'll bloody the nose of that tyrant. Besides, pranks and jokes don't got no consequences, right?"

Try BELL HAMMERS now!