The Pilo Family Circus

"You have two days to pass your audition. You better pass it, feller. You're joining the circus. Ain't that the best news you ever got? The fuck it ain't."Gonko, on behalf of Doopy, Goshy, Winston and Rufshod. Clown Division, Pilo Family Circus.Somewhere just above the searing flames of hell, The Pilo Family Circus is playing at a town near you. This darkest of carnivals has preyed on the souls of its audience for centuries and young Jamie has unfortunately just come the attention of the star turns - the baddest, most psychotic clown troupe you could never hope to meet.What's more, they want him to join up... and these are not the kind of folks who take no for an answer.The Pilo Family Circus dances along the tightrope that hangs between grotesque nightmare and the blackest kind of comedy you can imagine. It is a novel of perilous pratfalls, freakshow fates and sideshow surrealism.It is also an exploration of what any one of us might do were we to don the white face-paint, were our inhibitions to be stripped away and a full menu of anarchic delights laid out before us for sampling.Will Elliot's debut novel won the inaugural ABC Fiction award and went on to be awarded two of Australia's most coveted genre accolades - the Ditmar and the Golden Aurealis. It was short-listed for the 2007 International Horror Guild award for best novel.Not recommended for coulrophobics. Cover art by Chris Roberts.