Country Dark

Country Dark spans 1954 to 1971, opening with Tucker's return home from the Korean War, where he had special training in killing other men, to rural Kentucky near the Ohio border, where he takes up a job as a driver in a bootlegging operation. Tucker is devoted to his rural home life and to his young wife and children, and once their way of life is threatened, he understands he may have to employ his wartime skills to keep it together. Chris Offutt's new novel is almost impossible not to race through, but it also must be savored for its artful but unpretentious phrasing, and for its many surprises, which we won't talk about here.

Following his razor-sharp and honest memoir, My Father the Pornographer, Chris Offutt demonstrates that he is on a creative roll with his first work of fiction in almost 20 years, and I’m here to tell you that it is worth the wait. Offutt mines his Kentucky roots to tell the tale of Tucker, a young Korean War vet who returns home to the hills and works as a bootlegger until the state comes for his family and he is forced to react with violence. Written in spare yet lyrical prose and filled with unforgettable characters, Country Dark is a taut backwoods noir that brings to mind James Dickey at the height of his powers.