I requested this from the library after hearing the good folks at the New York Times Book Review podcast review it on 30 June.
I had, apparently, heard of Tom Drury before, as a few of his other books are on my Goodreads' to-read list. I've never read any of them, but after this I'm definitely planning to.
This book had a sort of... Midwestern Murakami feel to it. So of course I really liked it, because I really like Murakami.
It's the story of Pierre, a small-town loser down on his luck. He gets mixed up with a number of unsavory characters, but it's never totally clear why. He just seems to wander around and bad things happen to him. He doesn't really cause them but doesn't really do much to stop them either.
Unlike Murakami, Drury ties up all the pieces into a nice, neat little bundle. The writing is dialogue-heavy, (which made it a quick read for me), and quite witty. It's magical realism without the reader even noticing the magic until a few pages later. I'm not sure there's a lesson, but it was an interesting ride, and I'll definitely be picking up more Drury this year.
The Details:
The Driftless Area by Tom Drury
Old Street Publishing, 2015 (first published in 2006)
Rating: 4
Have you read the Driftless Area? Let me know what you thought!
