Review by Booklist Review
Pierre Hunter had a chance to escape his small Iowa hometown, but now he's back, working as a bartender. Reticent and watchful, he lives a spare, wistful life, blundering in and out of trouble. He's happiest while skating across the lake on his way to work, until one fateful day when he falls through the ice. He would have perished if a beautiful woman living all alone in an isolated house on a bluff hadn't appeared and rescued him. After he and Stella become lovers, he hitchhikes to California to visit relatives and incurs the wrath of a dangerous man under peculiar circumstances. In fact, everything is just a bit odd in this moody and mysterious tale. Over the course of four original novels, Drury has forged an entrancing form of midwestern paranormal noir. Deadpan wit, cosmic melancholy, characters both ethereal and down and dirty, predicaments a Beckett character would accept as inevitable, and a porous divide between the living and the dead add up to a delectably unnerving outlaw fairy tale. --Donna Seaman Copyright 2006 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Blas? 24-year-old Pierre Hunter is the unlikely hero of Drury's fourth novel, set in the isolated region of the Midwest that gives the book its title. Newly orphaned and bartending in a small town, Pierre is just coasting through life-until a near-fatal ice-skating accident introduces him to beautiful Stella Rosmarin, a mysterious girl who lives alone in an abandoned house. That too-lucky-to-be-chance rescue is the first of a string of strange incidents that fill Pierre's life as he begins an affair with Stella. When, on a cross-country hitchhiking trek, he unwittingly steals $77,000 from a dangerous character named Shane by landing a chance blow, the novel's tone shifts from absurd to surreal as Shane plots to get the money back. Meanwhile, Stella has been keeping a spooky secret that will be the undoing of everyone's plans. Though the Coen brothers-meet-David Lynch characters can seem stylized and two-dimensional, Drury (Hunts in Dreams) has a knack for entertainingly weird detail that shines throughout. (Aug.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
In this latest from the author of End of Vandalism, 24-year-old Pierre Hunter leads a rather aimless life in the small town of Shale, IA. His parents have died, and he works as a bartender, hanging out with the few high school friends who haven't left town. A chance encounter with a mysterious old man on New Year's Eve sets in motion a series of events involving a bag of money and a young woman with a secret who saves Pierre's life. To reveal more would spoil the reader's discovery that a novel that initially seems to drift as aimlessly as Pierre is actually carefully crafted and plotted. Add to this Pierre's pragmatic view of life and the dryly hilarious dialog, and you have a highly enjoyable but hard-to-classify novel. Drury's evocative depiction of small-town life and an unpredictable plot with a touch of the supernatural will appeal to the same readers who enjoy independent films. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 4/15/06.]-Christine DeZelar-Tiedman, Univ. of Minnesota Libs., Minneapolis (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A likable loser has his small-town life upended by vicious lowlifes and Twilight Zone weirdness in this sparkling fourth novel from Drury (Hunts in Dreams, 2000, etc.). We first meet high-school junior Pierre Hunter while he's visiting his girlfriend in the hospital. Soon afterward, she dumps him. He's in college when his parents (elderly, eccentric, cherished) die within weeks of each other. Pierre does not retreat into self-pity, but it takes him five years to graduate. He finds work as a bartender at a supper club in Shale, Iowa, his hometown. Not everything that happens to Pierre is bad. Skating on a lake, he falls through the ice but is rescued by a beautiful young woman called Stella, who revives him in her little house on a bluff, where she lives alone. It's like a fairy tale, thinks Pierre, not knowing that Stella and an old man, a kind of paranormal fixer, are using Pierre for their own ends. Stella is drawn to Pierre regardless, and they make love with abandon before he hitchhikes to California to vacation with his cousin's family. Returning home, he gets a ride from Shane Hall, a career criminal who once burned down a house with a person inside. Luckily for Pierre, Shane is as much of a bungler as he is; his attempt to steal Pierre's backpack ends with Shane unconscious and Pierre richer by thousands of dollars (he found the stash under the hood). He'll send the money to a lost soul he met on the way out, but by now Shane and his partners are tracking him down. Drury ties up all the threads (Shane, the fire, Stella) with consummate skill; the climax comes the day Shale is celebrating "Bank Robbery Days." The bittersweet ending is a perfect mix of light and dark. Drury is a master at showing extraordinary things happening to ordinary people--and it's always a fun ride. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
