James Chapman (born 1955) is an American novelist and publisher. He was raised in Bakersfield, California, has lived in New York City since 1978, and is the author of nine novels to date.
His work combines experimental technique with a direct emotionality, often dealing with the anguish inherent in human communication.
Excerpted in many print and online magazines, his work has won a Notable Stories in StorySouth's Million Writers Award, and been nominated four times for the Pushcart Prize.
Don’t Give Up & Die, Don’t Push Me Into the Blackness, No, Life Is Impossible, We Agree, Stay With Me in Hiding, Exile Together Is Better than Death, They Won’t Find Us, They Won’t Mock at You Again, They Won’t Kick Me Again, We’ll Float Above Them, We’ll Feed Each Other with Fruits They Don’t Know How to Find, We Won’t Speak Their Language Anymore, Our Lungs Will Fill with Light (ML Press, 2008)
Chapman also operates Fugue State Press, a publisher of "advanced and experimental fiction" which has published a peculiar assortment of work by André Malraux, W. B. Keckler, Prakash Kona, Noah Cicero, Eckhard Gerdes, Joshua Cohen, and others. Chapman has referred to the press as "an orphanage for the unpublishable", indicating that the work is not commercially viable in the current publishing marketplace.