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{"id":7425236369467,"title":"Temporary Palaces","handle":"temporary-palaces","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\"A plainspoken, punk-rock hymn … This is a book that will pick you up off the floor of a mosh pit and wrap you in its arms.\" —Sean Michaels\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn the fevered summer of 2001, charismatic activist Rob and his collective set up a squat in an abandoned house. His bandmate and lover, Ben, watches anxiously as his own plans are threatened by Rob’s choice of radical politics over music. Meanwhile, photographer Alex finds herself torn between documenting the chaos of the scene and saving the friendship that binds them together. When the police break up the squat, Rob vanishes, and the dream dies.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTen years later, Alex and Ben find each other again—she’s conquering Montreal’s contemporary art world, he’s running a thriving restaurant in Ottawa. But their success feels hollow. As they excavate their shared past, they must confront the ghost of Rob’s disappearance and the trauma that pushed them apart.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePulsing with the raw energy of basement punk shows and DIY creativity, late-night manifestos and first heartbreaks, \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e is a blazing debut that captures a generation caught between idealism and survival, art and activism, the dreams that define us and the compromises that save us.\u003c\/p\u003e","published_at":"2025-07-21T13:40:45-04:00","created_at":"2025-07-21T13:37:23-04:00","vendor":"House of Anansi Press Inc","type":"","tags":["Adult LGBTQ+","Adult New Releases","By (author) Miller Jeff","House of Anansi Press","Literary Fiction","pub date: 2026-04-21"],"price":1999,"price_min":1999,"price_max":2699,"available":true,"price_varies":true,"compare_at_price":null,"compare_at_price_min":0,"compare_at_price_max":0,"compare_at_price_varies":false,"variants":[{"id":42334346870843,"title":"trade paperback","option1":"trade paperback","option2":null,"option3":null,"sku":"9781487013004","requires_shipping":true,"taxable":true,"featured_image":null,"available":true,"name":"Temporary Palaces - trade paperback","public_title":"trade paperback","options":["trade paperback"],"price":2699,"weight":352,"compare_at_price":null,"inventory_management":"shopify","barcode":"9781487013004","requires_selling_plan":false,"selling_plan_allocations":[],"quantity_rule":{"min":1,"max":null,"increment":1}},{"id":42334347395131,"title":"epub","option1":"epub","option2":null,"option3":null,"sku":"9781487013011","requires_shipping":false,"taxable":true,"featured_image":null,"available":true,"name":"Temporary Palaces - epub","public_title":"epub","options":["epub"],"price":1999,"weight":0,"compare_at_price":null,"inventory_management":null,"barcode":"9781487013011","requires_selling_plan":false,"selling_plan_allocations":[],"quantity_rule":{"min":1,"max":null,"increment":1}}],"images":["\/\/houseofanansi.com\/cdn\/shop\/files\/BNCImageAPI_a08e4dec-64ce-45ad-a3ae-ef7f19b69058.jpg?v=1758222012"],"featured_image":"\/\/houseofanansi.com\/cdn\/shop\/files\/BNCImageAPI_a08e4dec-64ce-45ad-a3ae-ef7f19b69058.jpg?v=1758222012","options":["Title"],"media":[{"alt":"Cover: Temporary Palaces, a novel, by Jeff Miller. Photograph of an abandoned two-storey house sitting on a vacant lot. The ground floor windows are covered by boards, which have been spraypainted with graffiti, while the upper floor windows have been smashed out. The title and author’s name appear in large, black letters inside a white frame around the photograph. The words “A Novel” appear beside the title in large, pink letters.","id":25761747861563,"position":1,"preview_image":{"aspect_ratio":0.656,"height":2400,"width":1575,"src":"\/\/houseofanansi.com\/cdn\/shop\/files\/BNCImageAPI_a08e4dec-64ce-45ad-a3ae-ef7f19b69058.jpg?v=1758222012"},"aspect_ratio":0.656,"height":2400,"media_type":"image","src":"\/\/houseofanansi.com\/cdn\/shop\/files\/BNCImageAPI_a08e4dec-64ce-45ad-a3ae-ef7f19b69058.jpg?v=1758222012","width":1575}],"requires_selling_plan":false,"selling_plan_groups":[],"content":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\"A plainspoken, punk-rock hymn … This is a book that will pick you up off the floor of a mosh pit and wrap you in its arms.\" —Sean Michaels\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn the fevered summer of 2001, charismatic activist Rob and his collective set up a squat in an abandoned house. His bandmate and lover, Ben, watches anxiously as his own plans are threatened by Rob’s choice of radical politics over music. Meanwhile, photographer Alex finds herself torn between documenting the chaos of the scene and saving the friendship that binds them together. When the police break up the squat, Rob vanishes, and the dream dies.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTen years later, Alex and Ben find each other again—she’s conquering Montreal’s contemporary art world, he’s running a thriving restaurant in Ottawa. But their success feels hollow. As they excavate their shared past, they must confront the ghost of Rob’s disappearance and the trauma that pushed them apart.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePulsing with the raw energy of basement punk shows and DIY creativity, late-night manifestos and first heartbreaks, \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e is a blazing debut that captures a generation caught between idealism and survival, art and activism, the dreams that define us and the compromises that save us.\u003c\/p\u003e"}
{"AlsoRecommendedISBN_0":"9781487011918","AlsoRecommendedISBN_1":"9781487012540","AlsoRecommendedISBN_2":"9781487001926","AlsoRecommendedISBN_3":"9781487001926","BASICMainSubject":"FIC019000","BASICMainSubjectLiteral":"FICTION\/Literary","BiographicalNote":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eJEFF MILLER\u003c\/strong\u003e is the author of the award-winning creative nonfiction collection \u003cem\u003eGhost Pine: All Stories True\u003c\/em\u003e. His stories have appeared in several anthologies, and he frequently publishes criticism. Jeff holds an MFA from the University of British Columbia and lives in Nova Scotia.\u003c\/p\u003e","BISACSubjectLiteral_0":"FICTION \/ City Life","BISACSubjectLiteral_1":"FICTION \/ LGBTQ+ \/ Bisexual","BISACSubjectLiteral_2":"FICTION \/ Literary","BISACSubject_0":"FIC069000","BISACSubject_1":"FIC072000","BISACSubject_2":"FIC019000","ContributorBio_0":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eJEFF MILLER\u003c\/strong\u003e is the author of the award-winning creative nonfiction collection \u003cem\u003eGhost Pine: All Stories True\u003c\/em\u003e. His stories have appeared in several anthologies, and he frequently publishes criticism. Jeff holds an MFA from the University of British Columbia and lives in Nova Scotia.\u003c\/p\u003e\n","ContributorRole_0":"By (author)","Contributor_0":"Miller, Jeff (CA)","Description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\"A plainspoken, punk-rock hymn … This is a book that will pick you up off the floor of a mosh pit and wrap you in its arms.\" —Sean Michaels\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn the fevered summer of 2001, charismatic activist Rob and his collective set up a squat in an abandoned house. His bandmate and lover, Ben, watches anxiously as his own plans are threatened by Rob’s choice of radical politics over music. Meanwhile, photographer Alex finds herself torn between documenting the chaos of the scene and saving the friendship that binds them together. When the police break up the squat, Rob vanishes, and the dream dies.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTen years later, Alex and Ben find each other again—she’s conquering Montreal’s contemporary art world, he’s running a thriving restaurant in Ottawa. But their success feels hollow. As they excavate their shared past, they must confront the ghost of Rob’s disappearance and the trauma that pushed them apart.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePulsing with the raw energy of basement punk shows and DIY creativity, late-night manifestos and first heartbreaks, \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e is a blazing debut that captures a generation caught between idealism and survival, art and activism, the dreams that define us and the compromises that save us.\u003c\/p\u003e","EAN":"9781487013011","excerpt_0":"https:\/\/biblioshare.org\/BNCservices\/BNCServices.asmx\/Samples?token=fcf85c1c1b298e99\u0026amp;ean=9781487013011\u0026amp;SAN=\u0026amp;Perspective=excerpt\u0026amp;FileNumber=0","Height":"8","HeightCode":"in","Imprint":"House of Anansi Press","MetaKeywords":"Books About Housing;Punk Music;Books About Bands;Gay Books;LGBTQ;Gifts for Gays;CanLit;Books About Masculinity;In Too Deep;Evenings and Weekends;Housing Crisis;Bisexual;Love Triangle;Underground Music;Protest;Photography;Counterculture;Punk Rock;Y2K;Books for your 20s","NumberOfPages":"320","OtherText_Accolades_0":"\u003cp\u003e“Jeff Miller writes with intensity and grace about those pitched moments in our lives when everything is changing before we quite know it. \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces \u003c\/em\u003eis a gritty, moving debut about young people finding and losing themselves—in music, in politics, in love—and realizing that since, as the saying goes, the struggle never ends, the moments of connection, joy, and integrity along the way really matter.” —\u003cstrong\u003eSam Lipsyte, \u003cem\u003eNew York Times \u003c\/em\u003ebestselling author of \u003cem\u003eThe Ask \u003c\/em\u003eand \u003cem\u003eNo One Left to Come Looking for You\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Accolades_1":"\u003cp\u003e\"Jeff Miller is a beautiful storyteller who masterfully weaves threads of the past into the delicate fabric of the present. The walls of punk houses long torn down come alive again in \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e, an impassioned elegy to the reckless passion of youth and its lingering impact on wounds still healing in the present. The world that Miller has created here feels broken in and well worn, its backdrops a vividly realized collection of derelict living spaces, back roads, and side streets, and the unforeseeable futures waiting for hardened and delicate hearts. A beautifully told story about the formative power of people and places, even and especially those that are flawed and crumbling into the dirt below.\" —\u003cstrong\u003eNiko Stratis, author of \u003cem\u003eThe Dad Rock That Made Me a Woman \u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Accolades_2":"\u003cp\u003e“\u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e is a haunting ode to youthful idealism and art-making that tracks its protagonists’ grinding pivot to the career-building and long-term relationships of adulthood. Jeff Miller welcomes readers into anarchist flop houses, music venues, and restaurant kitchens with revealing detail, gentle humour, and an open heart.” —\u003cstrong\u003eKevin Chong, author of \u003cem\u003eThe Double Life of Benson Yu\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Accolades_3":"\u003cp\u003e\"In this self-assured debut, Jeff Miller paints a vivid picture of life in the dive bars, dish pits, art spaces, and punk houses at the dawn of the new millennium. Steeped in the subcultures of punk rock and indie sleaze, \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e is full of details so authentic you'd think these fictional characters are real people. These are young anarchists, starving artists, and flawed idealists burnt out on trying to change—or even just survive—a system designed to keep them down. At its heart, though, is a story of romance and heartbreak, and all of the cuts and scrapes from youth that leave scars that last forever.\" \u003cstrong\u003e—Adam Feibel, co-author of \u003cem\u003eIn Too Deep: When Canadian Punks Took Over the World \u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Accolades_4":"\u003cp\u003e\"A deeply intimate, vivid, and thoroughly engrossing account of youth culture, punk pathos, love, ambition, and the moral entanglements that come with it. Jeff Miller's characters are confronted with the unfathomable realization faced by every young person—that the belief system that once defined you will inevitably shift and change, just as the storefronts, tenements, and city skyline of your hometown will inevitably change. Everything is temporary.\" \u003cstrong\u003e—Alex Edkins, METZ and Weird Nightmare \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Accolades_5":"\u003cp\u003e\"\u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e is a fierce and tender portrait of young people chasing their dreams. Years pass, lives change, the dreams get tattered and remade along the way—but Jeff Miller's fine writing testifies to the ties that remain. This is a lovely and memorable debut by a writer to watch.\" \u003cstrong\u003e—Alix Ohlin, author of \u003cem\u003eInside\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eWe Want What We Want \u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Accolades_6":"\u003cp\u003e“Jeff Miller’s debut novel is like a plainspoken, punk-rock hymn, singing praise and gratitude to the lovers, fighters, artists, and burnouts whose bands, art projects, friendships, and political movements were torn to pieces—but endured somehow, all the same. This is a book that will pick you up off the floor of a mosh-pit and wrap you in its arms.” —\u003cstrong\u003eSean Michaels, Giller Prize\u003c\/strong\u003e–\u003cstrong\u003ewinning author of \u003cem\u003eUs Conductors\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eDo You Remember Being Born? \u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Accolades_7":"\u003cp\u003e\"A love letter to the ones who got away, and the ones who never let go, \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e is punk enough to be tender about the way scenes form people and place. Jeff Miller has written a wise, elegiac novel about the interstices of subculture, and how memory and time comes for us all.\" —\u003cstrong\u003eMichelle Min Sterling, \u003cem\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/em\u003e bestselling author of \u003cem\u003eCamp Zero\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Long_description_1":"\u003cul\u003e\u003cli\u003eSPECTRUM OF MASCULINITY: Through characters like Rob and Ben, Jeff Miller has crafted a nuanced portrayal of masculinity and bisexuality. The men in \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e are punk, they nurture, they fist fight, they cry and experience love, rage, and disappointment.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eTHE GEOGRAPHY OF PUNK: Lovingly rooted in its dual setting of Montreal and Ottawa, these cities are vivid and instantly recognizable within the narrative of \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e, making the themes of DIY punk subculture, housing precarity, and city life even more vibrant.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eZINE CULTURE: An active participant in zine culture from the mid-nineties onwards, author Jeff Miller is the founder and curator of the popular zine rack and reading series at Dépanneur Le Pick Up in Montreal. He is also the author of the long-running underground classic, \u003cem\u003eGhost Pine\u003c\/em\u003e.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e","OtherText_Review_0":"\u003cp\u003e“A memorable debut … Miller’s bittersweet novel burns with the warmth of lasting friendship.” —\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Review_1":"\u003cp\u003e\"A loving, lamenting ode to a scrappier era.” —\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003eLiterary Review of Canada\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Review_10":"\u003cp\u003e\"In this self-assured debut, Jeff Miller paints a vivid picture of life in the dive bars, dish pits, art spaces, and punk houses at the dawn of the new millennium. Steeped in the subcultures of punk rock and indie sleaze, \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e is full of details so authentic you'd think these fictional characters are real people. These are young anarchists, starving artists, and flawed idealists burnt out on trying to change—or even just survive—a system designed to keep them down. At its heart, though, is a story of romance and heartbreak, and all of the cuts and scrapes from youth that leave scars that last forever.\" \u003cstrong\u003e—Adam Feibel, co-author of \u003cem\u003eIn Too Deep: When Canadian Punks Took Over the World \u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Review_2":"\u003cp\u003e“Jeff Miller’s debut novel is like a plainspoken, punk-rock hymn, singing praise and gratitude to the lovers, fighters, artists, and burnouts whose bands, art projects, friendships, and political movements were torn to pieces—but endured somehow, all the same. This is a book that will pick you up off the floor of a mosh-pit and wrap you in its arms.” —\u003cstrong\u003eSean Michaels, Giller Prize\u003c\/strong\u003e–\u003cstrong\u003ewinning author of \u003cem\u003eUs Conductors\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eDo You Remember Being Born? \u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Review_3":"\u003cp\u003e“Jeff Miller writes with intensity and grace about those pitched moments in our lives when everything is changing before we quite know it. \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces \u003c\/em\u003eis a gritty, moving debut about young people finding and losing themselves—in music, in politics, in love—and realizing that since, as the saying goes, the struggle never ends, the moments of connection, joy, and integrity along the way really matter.” —\u003cstrong\u003eSam Lipsyte, \u003cem\u003eNew York Times \u003c\/em\u003ebestselling author of \u003cem\u003eThe Ask \u003c\/em\u003eand \u003cem\u003eNo One Left to Come Looking for You\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Review_4":"\u003cp\u003e\"A love letter to the ones who got away, and the ones who never let go, \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e is punk enough to be tender about the way scenes form people and place. Jeff Miller has written a wise, elegiac novel about the interstices of subculture, and how memory and time comes for us all.\" —\u003cstrong\u003eMichelle Min Sterling, \u003cem\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/em\u003e bestselling author of \u003cem\u003eCamp Zero\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Review_5":"\u003cp\u003e\"Jeff Miller is a beautiful storyteller who masterfully weaves threads of the past into the delicate fabric of the present. The walls of punk houses long torn down come alive again in \u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e, an impassioned elegy to the reckless passion of youth and its lingering impact on wounds still healing in the present. The world that Miller has created here feels broken in and well worn, its backdrops a vividly realized collection of derelict living spaces, back roads, and side streets, and the unforeseeable futures waiting for hardened and delicate hearts. A beautifully told story about the formative power of people and places, even and especially those that are flawed and crumbling into the dirt below.\" —\u003cstrong\u003eNiko Stratis, author of \u003cem\u003eThe Dad Rock That Made Me a Woman \u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Review_6":"\u003cp\u003e\"\u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e is a fierce and tender portrait of young people chasing their dreams. Years pass, lives change, the dreams get tattered and remade along the way—but Jeff Miller's fine writing testifies to the ties that remain. This is a lovely and memorable debut by a writer to watch.\" \u003cstrong\u003e—Alix Ohlin, author of \u003cem\u003eInside\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eWe Want What We Want \u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Review_7":"\u003cp\u003e“An enthralling debut with a punk heart.” —\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cem\u003eLargehearted Boy\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Review_8":"\u003cp\u003e\"A deeply intimate, vivid, and thoroughly engrossing account of youth culture, punk pathos, love, ambition, and the moral entanglements that come with it. Jeff Miller's characters are confronted with the unfathomable realization faced by every young person—that the belief system that once defined you will inevitably shift and change, just as the storefronts, tenements, and city skyline of your hometown will inevitably change. Everything is temporary.\" \u003cstrong\u003e—Alex Edkins, METZ and Weird Nightmare \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_Review_9":"\u003cp\u003e“\u003cem\u003eTemporary Palaces\u003c\/em\u003e is a haunting ode to youthful idealism and art-making that tracks its protagonists’ grinding pivot to the career-building and long-term relationships of adulthood. Jeff Miller welcomes readers into anarchist flop houses, music venues, and restaurant kitchens with revealing detail, gentle humour, and an open heart.” —\u003cstrong\u003eKevin Chong, author of \u003cem\u003eThe Double Life of Benson Yu\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","OtherText_ShortDescription_0":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFor readers of Jennifer Egan and Heather O’Neill comes a blazing debut novel set in the DIY music and arts scene of the early 2000s\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","ProductFormDescription":"epub","PublicationDate":"2026-04-21","Publisher":"House of Anansi Press Inc","ShortDescription":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFor readers of Jennifer Egan and Heather O’Neill comes a blazing debut novel set in the DIY music and arts scene of the early 2000s\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","Subtitle":"A Novel","Width":"5.25","WidthCode":"in"}