Hot on the heels of his latest novel, Alma Mutters, Julio Varela has announced that he will be hosting an author event at Books & Books in Coral Gables.

Come See Julio Varela, Author of Alma Mutters
When: June 30, 2019 @ 6:30 p.m.
Where: 265 Aragon Avenue, Coral Gables, FL 33134

Alma Mutters is a hilarious and scathing satire of the private school system. After twenty years teaching in the frying pan of higher education, philosophy professor Xavier Mas Penoso (“Most Bashful”) leaps from the skillet and straight into the forest fire of his alma mater. Back in the 80s, Bellarmine Jesuit Preparatory School had taught him to analyze and synthesize in a school with little patience for slackers. However, in the intervening thirty years, Bellarmine’s old school Jesuits have been supplanted by a new breed of media savvy priest, long on ambition, short on integrity. In a school where volitional acts have no consequences, Xavier resolves to dispense wisdom, even if it takes rocket-propelled grenades, a Kevlar helmet, and more holy water than The Exorcist.

​Julio Varela teaches undergraduate literature, humanities, film, and philosophy courses in South Florida, where he began teaching in 1993. Dr. Varela’s writing credits include Vortex to Virus, Myth to Meme: The Literary Evolution of Nihilism and Chaos in Modernism and Postmodernism, published in 2009 by VDM Verlag, as well as a number of book reviews for Bridges: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Theology, Philosophy, History, and Science. He received his doctoral degree in humanities from Florida State University in 2004. Dr. Varela lives in Miami, Florida. This is his first novel.

The executive board of Darkwater Syndicate has announced that the company will be taking a new direction. After much deliberation, and a few drunken fistfights in the boardroom, the company has decided to publish cookbooks exclusively. Beginning  April 1st, 2019, it will publish cookbooks in the genres of fantasy, science fiction, horror, comedy, and thrillers.

"It wasn't an easy decision, but we think it's the best way forward," said Antonio Simon, Jr., Darkwater's Head of Business Development. "The market for cookbooks - sci-fi cookbooks in particular - is up 537% since 1988's Julia Childs's Cookbook for the Modern Martian Household. And let's not forget Edgar Allan Poe's horror cookbook classic: Quoth the Raven, Feed Me More!"

Not everyone was on board with the decision to shift into the cookbook market. The company's Head Acquisitions Editor, Ramiro Perez, was markedly irate. A longtime fan of hack-and-slash fiction in the vein of Robert E. Howard's Conan the Barbarian stories, Perez joined the company in 2014 for the stated reason of wanting to read more contemporary fiction. When asked for his opinion on the changes in the company, Mr. Perez stated: "Get these ****ing reporters out of my ****ing office!" The seventy-seven year old then flipped a desk and threw an empty rum bottle at the reporters. The cantankerous Cuban was not available for further comment.

"I sure don't like it," said Apara Moreiya, the company's resident dragon and unofficial mascot, when asked about the change. "I didn't sign up to edit cookbooks; they're sooo boring! What's more, they've replaced me as company mascot!"

The company's beloved fire-breather was informed on the morning of April 1st that he would no longer serve as the company's mascot. The change of mascot is scheduled to coincide with a company logo and name change. To better suit their shift into the cookbook market, "Darkwater Syndicate, Inc." will henceforth be known instead as "Rosewater Syrup Cake, Inc." The new mascot will be the company's namesake, a lovely rosewater syrup cake. New logos and corporate images have been devised in accordance with the re-branding. See below.

The fourth and final member of the former Darkwater team, Douglas Fairbanks, could not be reached for comment. In much the same way salmon return to the rivers in which they were spawned, Mr. Fairbanks is believed to have absconded to the South American oil platform off the coast of Belize where he was conceived.

Look to Rosewater Syrup Cake, Inc. for the very best in new and exciting genre cookbooks.