With Julie Seabaugh

On Sale: Jul 14, 2026
Page Count: 288 pages
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
ISBN-13: 9780306828454

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From a fearless comic known for tackling uncomfortable topics, a revealing and subversive memoir that explores Bowers’ life from his difficult childhood in Georgia up to his rise in the LA comedy world

Byron Bowers is a Comics’ Comic. A veteran of stand-up known for gripping material covering spirituality, race, socioeconomics, gender roles—and for delivering a fair chunk of it completely unrehearsed. All good comedians can spin gold out of life’s cruel realities, but Byron defies the rules of reality themselves. And it was his paranoid-schizophrenic father who unwittingly showed him the way.

Byron grew up an illegitimate child in conservative Georgia. After testing into a white school, he became the target of racism from his classmates and faced bullying from his own community, who considered him a traitor. At age twelve, Byron’s father threatened him at gunpoint and was institutionalized for paranoid schizophrenia. Realizing that the only person he can depend on was himself, Byron vowed to do whatever he could to reshape his life and get the hell out of Georgia—including but not limited to: winning a basketball scholarship, selling crack at his Christian college, stealing cars, committing insurance fraud, and valeting at a sex club. He became a criminal several times over. He was shot and found himself on the verge of either suicide or homicide. He teetered on the brink of insanity. But unlike his father, he refused to let the delusions take control.

Determined to not let his arduous past stand in the way of success, Byran made it his life’s mission to become a comedian, slowly rising up the ranks in the Atlanta comedy scene before moving the West Coast where he became a regular performer at the hallowed Sunset Strip Comedy Store, won a strategic comedy competition, and even landed himself a few television credits. After years of struggle, Byron is finally where he has always dreamed of being: on the cusp of achieving success on his own terms.

Beyond the Promised Land dismisses the conventional wisdom that reality’s rules can’t be rewritten. Byron’s is a story that educates, enlightens, and inspires anyone who refuses to let adversity stand in the way of not only their dreams, but of finding peace in the journey.

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Byron Bowers is a stand-up comedian, writer, and actor. He’s best known for his roles in Concrete Cowboys, Honey boy, The CHI, and as the voice of Nelson on HBO’s animated series, Ten Year Old Tom, for which he also writes. He is currently busy writing an autobiographical series he recently sold to Amazon Originals. He’s based in Los Angeles, CA.

As a professional comedy journalist of two decades, Julie Seabaugh has contributed to The New York Times, TheLos Angeles Times, Rolling Stone, TheHollywood Reporter, Variety,GQ, The Village Voice, LA Weekly, and numerous other alt-weeklies. Her coverage of modern roasting culminated in 2018 book, Ringside at Roast Battle, and her love of Mitch Hedberg led to producing/hosting 2020’s Hope on Top: A Mitch Hedberg Oral History for SiriusXM. With Emmy-nominated filmmaker Nick Scown, she co-directed September 2021 feature documentary Too Soon: Comedy After 9/11 for Vice. The 50 Years of the Comedy Store six-LP vinyl box set (2022) features her liner notes; her Positive Connections: A Brody Stevens OralHistory debuted on SiriusXM in February 2023. The collection A Tight 20: Two Decades of Comedy Journalism is available now.

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Byron Bowers

About the Author

Byron Bowers is a stand-up comedian, writer, and actor. He’s best known for his roles in Concrete Cowboys, Honey boy, The CHI, and as the voice of Nelson on HBO’s animated series, Ten Year Old Tom, for which he also writes. He is currently busy writing an autobiographical series he recently sold to Amazon Originals. He’s based in Los Angeles, CA.

As a professional comedy journalist of two decades, Julie Seabaugh has contributed to The New York Times, TheLos Angeles Times, Rolling Stone, TheHollywood Reporter, Variety,GQ, The Village Voice, LA Weekly, and numerous other alt-weeklies. Her coverage of modern roasting culminated in 2018 book, Ringside at Roast Battle, and her love of Mitch Hedberg led to producing/hosting 2020’s Hope on Top: A Mitch Hedberg Oral History for SiriusXM. With Emmy-nominated filmmaker Nick Scown, she co-directed September 2021 feature documentary Too Soon: Comedy After 9/11 for Vice. The 50 Years of the Comedy Store six-LP vinyl box set (2022) features her liner notes; her Positive Connections: A Brody Stevens OralHistory debuted on SiriusXM in February 2023. The collection A Tight 20: Two Decades of Comedy Journalism is available now.

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