Tideland - Mitch Cullin

Darkly surreal cult novel about a modern-day Alice alone in the Texan wilderness - now a major movie

Moving from Los Angeles to rural Texas with her junkie father after her mother's death, Jeliza-Rose drifts from the harsh reality of her childhood into a new life. Escaping into the fantasies of her own over-active imagination she discovers fireflies with names, bog men who awaken at dusk, and monster sharks swimming down railroad tracks. Her collection of disembodied Barbie heads share in her adventures along with her real friend Dickens.

Set in a landscape populated with singular characters and stark imagery, TIDELAND illuminates those moments when the fantastic emerges from seemingly common occurrences and lives - and a lonely child discovers magic and danger behind even the most mundane of events.