Places called Babylon don’t usually meet excellent ends: Tom Lin on Babylon, South Dakota

Jacob Wynkoop — Fri, 10 Jul 2026 18:57:54 +0000

In the midst of his small office on the fourth floor of the EPB, looking out onto the Stanley Museum of Art, surrounded by two well-populated bookshelves and a Kym Day painting of a cowboy feeding a horse lo mein, Tom Lin reclines in his swivel-back chair. He invites me to take a seat.

Lin recently released Babylon, South Dakota, his second full novel and first novel in five years. The novel was released on May 26, 2026.

Babylon, South Dakota tells the story of the Hsiu family, who, upon their move from China to the United States, inherit a 160-acre farmstead, an acre of which is quickly co-opted by the United States Government for the construction of a missile silo. But over time, the family is plagued by strange events and with even stranger abilities, all of which seem related to the government’s shadowy “Project Methuselah” in a spellbinding fable rife with Cold War tensions and a heaping of magical realism.

“Every book is different,” Lin said about his experience writing Babylon, South Dakota. “You never feel as though you’ll be able to write the next one. Every book is its own unique project, and I don’t know if there’s a way that I could have changed my approach to make it more or less difficult to write.”

Even though he has not published a new book in half a decade, Lin has not been on break. He completed his Ph.D. studies at UC Davis in 2024 and moved halfway across the country to assume the role of assistant professor at the University of Iowa, where he teaches the Undergraduate Honors Fiction Workshop.

Not to mention, Lin did not stop writing in that time: the process for writing Babylon, South Dakota has been long and exhaustive.

“It takes me all day to write 400 words,” Lin said. “It’s really grueling. I’ll write a sentence, and then I’ll look at it, and then it doesn’t look quite right, and I’ll delete it. Or I’ll keep going, and it looks right when I have it, but then I’ll add two more sentences, and then the whole thing will look wrong, and I’ll go back.”

Another thing Lin’s been doing in that time? Listening to the King James Bible.

Tom Lin currently serves as Assistant Professor at the University of Iowa. Photo courtesy of Tom Lin and University of Iowa.

“I’ve always really loved the cadence of the King James Bible. It’s actually how I sleep, because the audiobook is free, it’s 80 hours long, and you don’t have to pay attention. I find its rhythm and cadence very familiar. I think that language undergirds so much of modern Western imaginaries.”

The King James Bible played an important role in the composition of Babylon, South Dakota. In our discussion, Lin detailed how various religious texts, such as the King James Bible, the Tibetan Book of the Dead, and the Quran, impacted the writing process:

“I think there’s a lot of power in these religious texts,” Lin said, pointing me towards the thick volumes living on a shelf behind his desk. “I think there’s something about the things they’re concerned with, because religious texts are already so secure in their power. They don’t have to demonstrate it or prove it to you. They can say things which are kind of huge and sweeping, and they’re so confident in the way that they present those ideas and those objects that I think that was something that I wanted to carry over, this feeling of saying things as they were and having that carry the weight of it.”

Of course, Babylon is a place and title packed with religious imagery. Babylon, the name of the fictional Air Force base in Babylon, South Dakota, appears many times throughout the King James Bible.

“Babylon shows up again and again in all of these different settings,” Lin said, “and it means something different for everyone who uses it. I find that really evocative and useful.”

Babylon, South Dakota takes place on a 160-acre farm in South Dakota. Photo courtesy of Kade Grierson (not a photo of South Dakota).

Beyond the King James Bible, Babylon, South Dakota features far more recent influences: documentation of nuclear weapons and science-fiction novels of the latter 20th century.

“A lot of the material for this book came from my doctoral dissertation research on nuclear weapons and science fiction. A lot of the basis for this story is rooted in these really extensive accounts of what a missile is like in flight or what the effects of nuclear weapons are. And I have to thank Octavia Butler or Frederic Jameson for that, people who are concerned with the possibility of life otherwise.”

This idea—christened by Lin as “life otherwise”—is incredibly important to the new novel. By the time the dust settles and the novel’s final pages roll around, nothing in Babylon, South Dakota is as expected.

And as for the ending? It’s like Lin himself hinted:

“Places called Babylon don’t usually meet excellent ends.”

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Places called Babylon don’t usually meet excellent ends: Tom Lin on Babylon, South Dakota