by Tom Franklin
Published by William Morris
Finished 9/14/16
M, i, crooked letter, crooked letter, i, crooked letter, crooked letter, i, humpback, humpback, i.
That spells Mississippi if you're from the South, so they say. Not sure if I ever heard the humpback version before. The Mississippians in this book are probably not much like most folks you know, with highly dysfunctional families, a mean or absent father in every one, kids that are oppressed and depressed. Then we have snakes in mailboxes, preteens playing with guns, in a town where blacks are in the majority and whites the minority. Larry Ott, suspected in a girl's disappearance in his teenage years but never charged, grows up lonely and ostracized in their little town. Silas was his friend at one time, but not since he moved away and came back as the Constable. Now Larry is friendless --and alone since his mother moved into a nursing home.
Did I mention guns? Guns everywhere, like the kudzu strangling the forest and everything in it. To these people, "Gun control means hitting where you aim."
This was a slow starter for me; took me a while to get used to the odd words used and the slow build up, and to the awfulness of Larry's father and Cindy's step-father. Larry is a bit of a nerd who needs to grow on you. Silas made some poor choices but was redeemed in my eyes. The current-day mystery I figured out in no time; the other one I did not. By the end it was unputdownable (stole that word from someone, sorry). Really good read!
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