So, there's a case to be made that reading a crime novel set in mountain-rural North Carolina the night after reading one set in rural Florida is much of a muchness, but ... as it turns out there are severe differences in extent and kind, here. This is much more noirish than I was expecting, and much more steeped in grief and like generational pain, and the title is one of the most apt I've come across in a while. This has that licking live-wires feeling that I can't resist running through it. There are times when it some of the characters seem to have the right words to appropriately flummox other more thoughtless characters, which does become jarring after the second or third instance, but that's the only nit I can pick. I will be looking for Joy's other novels.
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