Backwoods Noir
Jacob McNeely lives a life of self-imposed constraint. He feels cast in a poisoned drama of parental tragedy. His father Charlie runs an meth ring and has the local police on his payroll. His mother is a meth addict.
Jacob believes the script of his life is written and there will be no edits. Drugs and murder are his only future. Working in the garage, a money laundering operation, allows him some breathing room but otherwise he goes where his father says and does as he commands.
The one light in his dismal life is his childhood friend and former girlfriend Maggie. He ended his relationship with her two years earlier to ensure she escaped Cashiers, North Carolina to go to college and leave him behind. They are irrevocably drawn back to each other.
David Joy has written a compelling book with Where All The Light Tends To Go and I was immersed in the story line from the beginning. It’s dark and bleak and powerful.
Finalist 2016 Edgar Award – Best First Novel
~ June Lorraine
7 responses to “David Joy: Where All Light Tends to Go”
I love dark and bleak. And an Edgar nominee? Wow. What’s not to love?
so we’re not talking about crushed rock candy atop a nice bowl of ice cream happiness?? that isn’t crushed rock candy?? why do i suddenly need to move the filing cabinet? how come mommy’s sald facial face doesn’t seem to work and what is she, worried right on time every third day this week without sleep?
Not that frenetic…and no ice
cream involved 🙂
aha dark and brooding as in like a choc bar. each bit with it’s bitters promising health or at least wealth where only at the end of the taste is the sweet. oh please please let there be an mlm involved … oh wait there is the ring…maybe it can go triangle to become a scheme!
Dark, bitter and crunchy!
You do like your crime dark, don’t you? 🙂 It does sound interesting, though.
I do Vicki..it surprises people who know I have such a happy life. The dark side of humankind interests me. Why people make the decisions they do such what clicks in someone’s mind when they decide death instead of divorce for their spouse.
Nice to hear from you!