American Values and the Industrial Spirit, or, Still Waters, by Wesley P Davis

Prose, chapbook, 36 pages, from Bottlecap Features.

Mr. A believes in the power of teaching. Every morning, he wakes to the same comforting hum of faculty housing, takes a sip from his water bottle, and steps into a classroom full of archetypal high schoolers eager to learn about American history. But when a recurring glitch in the daily schedule forces him to look closer at his students, the polished veneer of his school begins to chip away. What starts as odd coincidences reveals a sinister, mechanized reality hidden in plain sight.

Surreal, oppressive, and deeply hypnotic, American Values and the Industrial Spirit captures the slow-burn horror of systemic control and forced complacency. Through a tightly wound cycle of daily repetition, the narrative unravels the thin line between routine and captivity. It is a haunting exploration of institutional burnout, corporate assembly lines, and the terrifying cost of refusing to drink the water.

Aside from being an aspiring husband, father, and musician, Dr. Wesley Davis is also a professor based in the Carolinas. He has spent years teaching structured forms, including the tanka and free verse, and aims to bring that same rigor to his own writing in the genre of weird fiction. Jay Asher, author of Thirteen Reasons Why, called his writing “...so precise with language that it’s basically a novel’s worth of feelings and senses, condensed and pressed together until you get a diamond.”