Real Small Town Irish People
Elmore Leonard is dead. He certainly is not creating full-blooded criminals in a small rural town in western Ireland. The maestro of crime drama left us in 2013. But thoughts of him kept emerging as I saw so many things I loved about his work in "Wild Houses." The characters here are so real-- the dialog rings so true. The economy of language is so sharp.
We open with a simple kidnapping caper involving drug dealers trying to force payment owed when their merchandise was lost. On the surface, it does not sound all that complicated, just a bare-bones skeleton of a plot, something familiar sounding.
And then, we meet the characters. "Doll" English has been kidnapped so that his brother will pay off the thugs. His girlfriend, Nicky, is seventeen and just about ready to break out of the restrictive chains of this little town. The Ferdia brothers are the "masterminds" behind this whole thing, prone to violence with hair trigger tempers. Dev is an unwitting accomplice, pressured into holding the hostage at his house. He is the surprising treasure of the story, sowing his point of view into the action. He befriends the hostage and consistently questions what all this is leading to.
The backstory on Dev is that he has been a loner-- recently losing his mother and having been deserted by his father. Socially impaired, he was routinely bullied at school before being ignored altogether. "...he began to miss (the) beatings, because the beatings at least involved human contact." Now he spends his time alone in his house, trying to get a grip on himself with antidepressants and anxiety medications. "He could feel the pill working its sedating magic, calming his blood and thickening his thoughts, making them slow and settle like silt at the bottom of his darkening mind."
This is Colin Barrett's first novel. He has published two acclaimed short story collections, "Young Skins" and "Homesickness," both also depicting life in rural Ireland. Those sets, while brilliant, seem to have a darker tone than "Wild Houses." The darkness is here, with life's struggles and the sense that abandonment is a burden most of the characters share. There is a lot of humor here, however, and the plot races along with a captivating energy.
I began by invoking the name of Elmore Leonard. No, I am not seriously banding the two together-- that would not be justified at this time. My point is that I miss reading another new Leonard offering-- and this book, albeit strongly of the Irish world, brought back many of those same qualities. I missed them. I cannot wait to read more Colin Barrett.
I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.
Elmore Leonard is dead. He certainly is not creating full-blooded criminals in a small rural town in western Ireland. The maestro of crime drama left us in 2013. But thoughts of him kept emerging as I saw so many things I loved about his work in "Wild Houses." The characters here are so real-- the dialog rings so true. The economy of language is so sharp.
We open with a simple kidnapping caper involving drug dealers trying to force payment owed when their merchandise was lost. On the surface, it does not sound all that complicated, just a bare-bones skeleton of a plot, something familiar sounding.
And then, we meet the characters. "Doll" English has been kidnapped so that his brother will pay off the thugs. His girlfriend, Nicky, is seventeen and just about ready to break out of the restrictive chains of this little town. The Ferdia brothers are the "masterminds" behind this whole thing, prone to violence with hair trigger tempers. Dev is an unwitting accomplice, pressured into holding the hostage at his house. He is the surprising treasure of the story, sowing his point of view into the action. He befriends the hostage and consistently questions what all this is leading to.
The backstory on Dev is that he has been a loner-- recently losing his mother and having been deserted by his father. Socially impaired, he was routinely bullied at school before being ignored altogether. "...he began to miss (the) beatings, because the beatings at least involved human contact." Now he spends his time alone in his house, trying to get a grip on himself with antidepressants and anxiety medications. "He could feel the pill working its sedating magic, calming his blood and thickening his thoughts, making them slow and settle like silt at the bottom of his darkening mind."
This is Colin Barrett's first novel. He has published two acclaimed short story collections, "Young Skins" and "Homesickness," both also depicting life in rural Ireland. Those sets, while brilliant, seem to have a darker tone than "Wild Houses." The darkness is here, with life's struggles and the sense that abandonment is a burden most of the characters share. There is a lot of humor here, however, and the plot races along with a captivating energy.
I began by invoking the name of Elmore Leonard. No, I am not seriously banding the two together-- that would not be justified at this time. My point is that I miss reading another new Leonard offering-- and this book, albeit strongly of the Irish world, brought back many of those same qualities. I missed them. I cannot wait to read more Colin Barrett.
I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.
