Your Name Here: A Novel of Literary Labor in the Digital Age

Helen DeWitt and Ilya Gridneff's collaborative novel 'Your Name Here' has been published by Dalkey Archive Press in 2025, eighteen years after its initial conception. The 600-page work is a metafictional satire of the publishing industry, structured around the email correspondence between the two authors as they struggle to get the novel into print. It incorporates multiple genres, including Gridneff's tabloid journalism anecdotes and DeWitt's part-novel 'Lotteryland,' a critique of Blairite Britain. The book explores themes of artistic labor, clinical depression, and the obstacles posed by editors, agents, and financial pressures. DeWitt has been open about her suicide attempts and clinical depression, which feature prominently in the narrative. The novel was stalled for eighteen years; DeWitt posted it online seeking donations. It was eventually acquired by Dalkey Archive, now a Deep Vellum imprint. The work draws comparisons to David Foster Wallace, Thomas Pynchon, and William H. Gass, and is described as a historical novel of the mid-to-late 2000s, capturing the rise of digital culture and celebrity journalism. Gridneff's globe-trotting from London to Berlin to Iraq provides a backdrop of imperialist ventures and media degeneration. The novel's delayed publication is seen as fitting, as it now reads as a period piece.