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There’s a thin line between memoir and fiction, and Peter Cherches walks it in Autobiography Without Words. We follow the main character, variously known as Pete, Mr. Cherches and Peter Cherches, through the big and small adventures of life, from childhood crimes and punishments to trips to India and Mars. A departure from the cool minimalism of Cherches’ previous collection, Lift Your Right Arm, this book will break your heart, mess with your head and have you rolling on the floor, all at once.


“Peter Cherches’s collection of flashes, Autobiography Without Words, has a lot of words in it. It is also not a typical autobiography—more a hallucinatory romp through Jewishness, New York City, and the surreal side of satire.... [I]f you like funny, if you like wry, if you like a healthy dollop of rather un-nostalgic nostalgia, this book is perfect.” Jonathan Cardew, Flash magazine (eds. Ash Chantler & Peter Blair)

Called “one of the innovators of the short short story” by Publishers Weekly, Peter Cherches is a writer, singer and lyricist. Over the past 40 years his writing, both fiction and nonfiction, has appeared in dozens of magazines, anthologies and websites. His first recording as a jazz vocalist, Mercerized! Songs of Johnny Mercer, was released in 2016. He is the author of three previous prose collections, most recently Lift Your Right Arm, which Pelekinesis published in 2013. Cherches is a native of Brooklyn, New York.