In this entertaining new novel, a ragtag group of misfits is on the lam after a fire breaks out on the meth-making commune in Oklahoma they used to call home.
There’s Ernie, who looks like a “hustler-Jesus from outer space”; Staci, bleached blond and burned out; Ray, Staci’s partner, roughed up from hard living and riding; and Coral, a 17-year-old Deaf girl whose half sister unceremoniously dumped her at the compound in a dented minivan. The four eventually find their way to Texas, where they settle down in a run-down house. As the group slowly grows into an eccentric sort of family, they must confront their pasts and the early traumas that first pushed them to the margins. Meanwhile, the threat of their debts and fears that the police will track them down loom large. Ernie finds himself more and more strongly drawn to Coral while she remains as elusive as ever. Ray and Staci find themselves alternately drawn toward and away from each other, each unsure where the other will land. One day, on the hunt to find a pet for Coral, Ray and Ernie encounter an animal that might even be better…and bigger. The introduction of the animal into the household intensifies the group’s already fraught relationships—or perhaps merely further reveals their own animal natures. The novel, especially the middle third, showcases Libaire’s capacity for truly stunning lyricism, but its inconsistency in narrative tension eventually compromises the strength of her writing—especially in the rushed, anodyne ending. Perhaps most disconcertingly, Coral’s character development stalls midway through the book, rendering her youth and disability merely ciphers that the more fully formed characters use to project and work through their inner turmoil.
An engaging read that has its moments but fizzles out before living up to its potential.