The Thicket by Joe R. Lansdale

 

Yeah, Lansdale. This Lansdale writing about historic Texas, sometimes around the 1910s or thereabouts, it's not booming like the 1920s, and electric light and telephones and automobiles are around the edges of the small towns the novel is set in and around. Laden with delicious turns of phrase, well-paced, with characters that feel not just plausible but real. Gritty and violent--sometimes shockingly so--but with some real beauty showing through. I'm always happy to come across something by Lansdale I haven't read, this was really good.