This novel's southern gothic Texas tragicomedy is hung on a skeleton of a murder mystery around whose gravity vortex swirls a potent mix of family, redemption, guilt, poverty, ignorance, pride, drugs, corruption, and small town East Texas life. The reviewers who have likened it to Breaking Bad meets Joe Lansdale with a touch of Faulkner are spot on.
For some (scheduling) reasons this book kept getting shoved around in my reviewing queue and I missed reviewing it at release. I sat down this weekend and read it start to finish and found it funny, sad, nostalgic, and human. The characters are well written and flawed and remain in character throughout. The plot drew me in from the beginning, and developed slowly but inevitably. The language and situations are rough in places, but not gratuitous.
This is a well written, intelligent, and engaging narrative, well delivered. It certainly doesn't read like a debut novel.
Five stars.
Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.
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