Synopses & Reviews
In a triumphant return to the characters that launched his career two decades ago, Tom Drury travels back to Grouse County, the setting of his landmark debut,
The End of Vandalism. Drury's depictions of the stark beauty of the Midwest and the futility of American wanderlust have earned him comparisons to Raymond Carver, Sherwood Anderson, and Paul Auster.
When fourteen-year-old Micah Darling travels to Los Angeles to reunite with the mother who deserted him seven years ago, he finds himself out of his league in a land of magical freedom. He does new drugs with new people, falls in love with an enchanting but troubled equestrienne named Charlotte, and gets thrown out of school over the activities of a club called the New Luddites.
Back in the Midwest, an ethereal young woman comes to Stone City on a mission that will unsettle the lives of everyone she meets including Micah's half-sister, Lyris, who still fights fears of abandonment after a childhood in foster care, and his father, Tiny, a petty thief. An investigation into the stranger's identity uncovers a darkly disturbed life, as parallel narratives of the comic and tragic, the mysterious and everyday, unfold in both the country and the city.
Review
"Some writers are good at drawing a literary curtain over reality, and splashing upon the curtain all colors of their fancies. And then there are the writers who raise the veil and lead us to see for the first time. Tom Drury belongs to the latter, and is a rare master at the art of seeing. Reading Pacific makes me once again fall in love with Drury's words, and his perception of a world that is full of dangers and passions and mysteries and graces." Yiyun Li
Review
"A fine percussive beat sweeps the reader along....The always fresh perspective of this one-of-a-kind writer will have you responding like his character who 'laughed with surprise in her heart.'" Kirkus Reviews
Review
"Uncanny dialogue, deadpan humor, a few morbid twists, and a considerable amount of quirk make [Pacific] an engaging read." Publishers Weekly
Review
"As in his previous masterful novels, Drury weaves carefully metered sentences, deeply felt scenes, and struggling characters into an endlessly entertaining tapestry of human comedy and small-town living." Booklist
Review
"One of the great strengths of Drury's fiction is his ability to suggest the deep funny-sadness of life without sinking to ridicule or bathos. He celebrates quirkiness of speech and habit for its ability to particularize the individual beyond stereotype. Unexpected gestures connect characters and reveal wounds of the heart....Drury invests his characters with a warm-blooded immediacy that demands respect....It's rare to read a novel with so little cliché or convoluted prose, in which the dialogue is both believable and exceptional." Shelf Awareness
About the Author
Tom Drury is also the author of The End of Vandalism, Hunts in Dreams, The Driftless Area, and The Black Book. His fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, Harper's Magazine, and The Mississippi Review, and he has been named one of Granta's Best Young American Novelists.”