Michelle Tea: Clowns

Cipher Press, 2026, softcover, 304 pages, 12.9 x 19.8 cm

The third book in Michelle Tea's anthology series, following Sluts and Witch, considers the many-sided splendour of the clown.

A blogging dog sitter cringes out on celebrity, Slinkys, and self-promotion. A poet experiences the clowny vulnerability of falling in love. Drunk Muppets ponder the uselessness of art. A transitioning drag queen muses on being 'the crazy one, the one who doesn't give a fuck.'

In this anthology of poetry, fiction, screenplay, and more, writers explore and explode the archetype of the CLOWN in all of its humiliating, earnest, magical, subversive glory. From fiction that reveals the humanity beneath the smeared greasepaint to psychedelic autofiction to poetry that exposes normal folk for the sickening anomalies they are, CLOWNS will get under your skin until it liberates your own inner clown, be it a smart-ass or trickster, sad sack or buffoon.