SLU-Madrid Professor Timothy Ryan Day Releases New Novel "Leaven"
Timothy Ryan Day, Ph.D., professor of literature and creative writing at Saint Louis University-Madrid, has released a new novel, "Leaven," a speculative work exploring neuroscience, artificial intelligence and what it means to be alive.
The novel follows a neuroscientist whose life's work comes online just as the world begins to collapse around her. As communication systems fail and society changes in unexpected ways, she struggles to understand what has emerged on the other side. Centered on themes of bread, intelligence and consciousness, "Leaven" blends literary fiction with philosophical and scientific questions about humanity and technology.
Day launched the novel May 21 at Secret Kingdoms, an English-language bookstore in Madrid that hosts literary events and author talks.
"Leaven" is Day’s fifth book. His previous publications include the novels "Outside Athens" (2024) and "Big Sky" (2020), the poetry collection "Green & Grey" (2019), and the scholarly work "Shakespeare and the Evolution of the Human Umwelt" (2021), published by Routledge.
His fiction, essays and criticism have appeared in literary, academic and popular publications in the United States and Europe. He was also an early contributor to the creative nonfiction magazine The Nervous Breakdown.
Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Day was raised in Chicago after spending parts of his childhood in Colorado, Texas and Georgia. He has taught at universities in the United States, China, France and Spain.