THE POISON FLOOD

A reclusive musician and songwriter is forced to reckon with his past in the wake of a local environmental disaster.

Hollis Bragg is a man who prefers to stay out of the public eye. Some of this is due to his discomfort in his own body: “Back forever crooked forward, forcing my stomach into permanent lines, flesh left sagging from being unable to perform even modest exercise.” And some of it has to do with his complex relationship with former band mate Angela—now a successful musician for whom Hollis writes songs in secret. He’s haunted by other memories as well, including some from his childhood in his father’s church, its congregation mostly “strange hill folk whom the starched-shirt preachers in town wouldn’t want to touch long enough to baptize in the creek.” Hollis’ life changes when Russell Watson, a young musician, shows up at his house with a burgeoning appreciation for Hollis’ musical history. Russell is the son of a wealthy business owner; his unstable friend Victor, who accompanies him to Hollis' house, is an activist who hates the pollution Russell’s father’s company is responsible for. A massive chemical spill into a local river further ratchets up the tension. But the disparate threads of this novel never quite connect. Although Hollis himself is vivid and contradictory—at one point, Angela talks about her frustration with his reticence, saying “The only option is to force you to [perform]”—the rest of the characters don’t feel as fleshed out. Russell never really comes into focus while Victor seems more like a plot device than anything else.

When the novel focuses on a musician's creative struggles, it sings, but other elements feel forced.