“Riding the bus out there, I counted rings of urban renewal. Clouds burned off and new streets ticked by on my right, Car Parts Lane, Value Town Outlet Parkway, Pay Day Loan Road, Bank of Nations Plaza and Paul of Damascus Court. On my left was the long and windowless side of the box-mall-church…”

Download:
ZAZEN, Chapter 6 — “Aerial Map of Carnage” (pdf, 76k)

ZAZEN, Chapter 5 — “1 800 buy COAL” (pdf, 88k)

ZAZEN, Chapter 4 — “Asian Market” (pdf, 56k)

ZAZEN, Chapter 3 — “New Haiku” (pdf, 64k)

ZAZEN, Chapter 2 — “Pregnant Rats” (pdf, 81k)

ZAZEN, Chapter 1 — “Burning Ants” (pdf, 79k)

The Story: It’s the very near-future, somewhere in the Pacific Northwest—or a neighborhood near you. 27-year-old Della Mylinek has suffered some kind of breakdown after failing to stop the construction of a local Wal-Mart. In an attempt to regain psychological, financial and emotional stability, she’s moved in with her brother and his pregnant wife and taken a job waiting tables at a vegan restaurant. But her anger remains, and one thing leads to another…

“Zazen” Keywords: geology, veganism, the apocalypse, urban planning, yoga, sex parties, bombs, anarchism, aging new-left revolutionaries, strip malls, paleontology, dark hippies, transcendentalism, lavender hair dye.

The Author: Vanessa Veselka is a writer and musician living in Portland, Oregon. She has been, at various times, a teenage runaway, a sex-worker, a union organizer, a student of paleontology, an expatriate, an independent record label owner, a train-hopper, a waitress and a mother. Her work has appeared in Bust, Bitch, Maxmum Rock ’n’ Roll, Yeti Magazine and Tin House. Zazen is her first novel. She is online at vanessaveselka.wordpress.com

The Serial: Chapter 6 of ZAZEN will be posted Tuesday, November 3. There are 30 chapters in all.