THE OUTLAW ALBUM

Twelve spare, haunting and brutal slices of country noir from the genre’s most gifted practitioner.

From Woodrell, author of the brilliant Winter’s Bone, which was richly adapted into the Oscar-nominated 2010 film, now comes a collection of short fiction, previously published in outlets ranging from The Missouri Review and Esquire to hard-hitting anthologies like A Hell of a Woman. And boy, does Woodrell have a way with words. The first sentence of the first story captures its essence: “Once Boshell finally killed his neighbor he couldn’t seem to quit killing him.” In a sort of redneck therapy, one of the locals takes a squirrel rifle to his Northerly neighbor, then buries him back in the woods where he can take a hatchet to the man whenever he’s feeling ornery. The Edgar Award–nominated “Uncle” is even worse. When a country girl tires of her uncle’s raping and murdering lost tourists, she takes a pick-axe to him. There is “Twin Forks,” in which a man tries to recapture his youth only to stare murder in the eyes. And “Florianne,” which delves into a man’s paranoia over his daughter’s disappearance. There are war vets in “Night Stand” and “Black Step,” reeling in a world where violence follows them home, and even a brief visit to the old outlaw Jake Roedel in “Woe to Live On.” Woe, indeed. Hard words and harsh trials from a writer who knows all too well the frozen ground he occupies.