I was 19 and floating aimlessly in that post-high school miasma of uncertainty and misdirected angst. I was helping a drug dealer sell stolen jewelry near the beach when my friend Ricky showed up and invited me to hang out. We could go for a walk or pack a bowl or visit someone else or drive around or get food because everything was more or less the same to us and everything sounds good when you have no plans and […]
Violence, Place, and “Exquisite Grit”: A Review of David Joy’s “The Weight of This World
There is a profound, substantially nuanced relationship between people and the geography they inhabit. When it comes to rural noir, a good understanding of this correlation usually means the difference between a narrative that exudes authenticity and understanding and one that reads like something a well-off author from the suburbs wrote while he or she imagined life on the wrong side of the tracks. David Joy’s The Weight of This World belongs to the first group. Joy’s novel deals with […]
Where Language and Government Meet: A Review of Valeria Luiselli’s “Tell Me How It Ends”
This is what happened when author and essayist Valeria Luiselli asked children in immigration court why they came to the United States: Their answers vary, but they often point to a single pull factor: reunification with a parent or another close relative who migrated to the U.S. years earlier. Other times, the answers point to push factors—the unthinkable circumstances the children are fleeing: extreme violence persecution and coercion by gangs, mental and physical abuse, forced labor, neglect, abandonment. It is […]
A Fear Both Allegorical and Real: Notes on “The Twenty Days of Turin”
Giorgio De Maria’s The Twenty Days of Turin is more than a book; it is a literary event. For starters, the novel has a track record of decades spent on the mouths of its fans as they excitedly pass around used copies because the novel has been out of print, and that certifies it as a cult classic. Second, the almost palpable paranoia, strange happenings, eerie atmosphere, bizarre elements/characters, and superb writing make comparisons to Jorge Luis Borges and H.P. […]
Deconstruction Towards Violent Ends: A Review of Jon Boilard’s “Settright Road”
There is something powerful in literature that truly captures ugliness in a perfect way. Think about the work of Daniel Woodrell, the filthiest, booziest Charles Bukowski poems, or the grittiest, most brutal passages of Cormac McCarthy’s oeuvre and you’ll get a sense of what I’m talking about. Encountering that captured and exposed unattractiveness, that unbelievable, painfully dirty reality, is something that only happens in fiction when a talented author sets out to create work that isn’t afraid to deconstruct humans […]
Nestled Narratives and Cosmic Horror: A Review of John Langan’s “The Fisherman”
John Langan’s The Fisherman is the great-grandfather of all fishing stories. From its action-packed pages and the fact that it contains a narrative within a narrative to its taut, emotionally gritty atmosphere and its flawless touches of cosmic horror, this is one of those rare novels that immediately carves a space for itself on the list of great American horror novels that will be talked about and discussed for a very long time. Ripe with pain, hearsay, and monsters, The […]
An Unexpected Narrative of Loss: Constance Ann Fitzgerald’s “Glue,” Reviewed
I usually check my email, Facebook, and Twitter right before leaving my car to go to the gym because I like to stay on top of things. Once in a while, I find a new digital advanced reading copy of a book I’ve been eager to dig into. A couple of weeks ago, that book was Constance Ann Fitzgerlad’s Glue. I opened the document, checked out the layout, and decided to read the first chapter to get a taste […]
Dreams and Revelations: A Review of Wendy C. Ortiz’s “Bruja”
Sometimes I finish a book and feel sorry for whichever volume I will be starting next because the odds of it matching the brilliance of its predecessor are slim. That’s how I felt after finishing Alejandro Jodorowsky’s Albina and the Dog-Men. Luckily, what I started devouring a few hours later was Wendy C. Ortiz’s Bruja, which is packed with surreal imagery, emotional moments, and recollections that walk a fine, blurry, every-shifting line between memory and imagination. Jodorowsky’s pshycomagic is absolutely […]