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Mar 25, 2013nickabe57 rated this title 4.5 out of 5 stars
I love reading the gothic, particularly the southern variety. And when I first began reading novels written in this tradition, many of them didn't seem to have many dimensions. The characters and narrative lean a little too hard on Flannery Oconnor, Faulkner's darker works, Mccarthy's Appalachian novels, or Carson Mccullers small town loneliness. Some have stood out. If you haven't read Breece D'J Pancake you should run to your nearest amazon.com and order a collection of his works. Its breathtaking. I mention Pancake because there are moments in Devil that remind me of his short story Trilobites. Capturing the yellow film of tobacco smoke and stale coffee ambiance of small town cafes, patrons nursing hangovers and leering at young, disheveled waitresses. It's a simple enough image and mostly used to establish setting, local color, usually not integral to the central narrative. But when written effectively, these types of nuances skilfully project a mood, here casting a sickly pallor on characters and place. By and large, Pancake is far too sentimental to be compared to Pollock. Most 'hillbilly noir' makes you squirm a bit, makes you feel grimy, but has dead aim on the heart while doing so. This book is almost all darkness. There are scenes that could be cut from Daniel Woodrell's oeuvre, if Oliver Stone hijacked the scene for a rendition of Natural Born Killers. One needs to really read between the lines, to squint really hard to find any redemption.