DANCING WITH ELVIS

Every night after saying her prayers, with posters of Jesus and Elvis looking down on her, 14-year-old Frankilee Baxter thinks about murdering Angel Musseldorf. In a great act of Presbyterian charity, Frankilee and her mother have taken Angel away from abusive parents to become part of their family. Their housekeeper, however, says, “there something about that girl that just do not ring true.” Sure enough, Angel is no angel; she’s more an over-sexed, racist, lying, manipulative slut and “dumb as a box of Kleenex,” at least as Frankilee puts it. Clover, Texas, in 1956, is a busy place. Armed desperadoes, kidnapping, extortion, fires, shootings, beatings and cross burnings keep the episodic plot moving, though there’s enough here for more than one novel. Voice and characterization are superb, with many scenes that beg to be read aloud, though Frankilee’s “potty mouth” could be a problem. A fine first novel and an author to watch. (Fiction. 12+)