Blood & Whiskey #4
Megan Abbott, Ace Atkins, Jonathan Santlofer, spicy tequila, Van Halen & more...
Dear friends and readers…
Before I get to the blood and mayhem, a few quick words about… Canada.
I’m writing this from outside Victoria, BC, where my wife and I have traveled to reconnect — finally! — with our younger son, Leo, who we hadn’t see for eighteen Covid-deranged, border-blocked months. Leo’s been going to school up here, and we reunited in a three-way clinch hug outside Dumpling Drop (his employer) in Chinatown, and for the next hour we couldn’t stop hugging and kissing and occasionally weeping. (Sample photos, from a graffiti’ed back alley, below and on my Instagram.) I’m now sipping a Vancouver Island Pilsner and feely giddy that such a weight has been lifted and, even though I spent the past year pissed at Trudeau, I’m now feeling grateful and wanted to say a few nice things about Canada: Neil Young, Schitt’s Creek, Whistler Mountain, the beaches around Tofino, Louise Penny, and the great novel (Caught) I’d read years ago by Newfoundland author Lisa Moore.
Okay, on to this month’s books…
I’ve read most of Megan Abbott’s eleven books and can safely say that her latest, The Turnout, creeped me out the most. It’s Nutcracker season (“a necessary evil”) and the ballet-instructor trio of Dara and Marie Durant and Dara’s ex-dancer husband, Charlie — “It was the three of them. Always the three of them. Until it wasn’t.” — are prepping their young dancers for the big annual performance when a fire forces them to hire a crew to repair their school. The contractor arrives, bulky and crass, with two phones and a “throbbing beeper” — “like a caveman and his club.” And that’s when the seemingly tight-knit trio starts to crumble. With lots of tense, tight-spaced scenes, stolen glances, buried family secrets, bruises, and ballet scenes that feel more like torture than dance, the story simmers and seethes, unfolding slowly and unpredictably. It was a rare and memorable reading experience, and I asked Megan to tell us more…
Mood: A hothouse, intense, bodily, bruising, enclosing.
Origins: One was my own early experiences with ballet, taking classes at a strip mall studio led by two long-legged sisters. We were all obsessed with them, speculating about their lives. Another was the weirdness of The Nutcracker itself. I went back and read the source material: E.T.A. Hoffmann’s brilliant and disturbing story, “The Nutcracker and the Mouse-King.” Like most fairy tales, it’s much darker and stranger than we remember. It’s been sanitized and transformed into a holiday ritual, but I think that darkness lingers at its edges in fascinating ways. And lastly, I was interested in exploring the way women judge other women for their romantic or sexual choices. A few years ago, when that “Dirty John” podcast became such a viral phenomenon, I was fascinated by some of the responses. It’s a true story about a serial predator and con artist who fleeced and abused women, but I was struck by the harsh treatment the women victimized by “John” received on social media, especially by other women. It felt in some way like a way of insisting “That could never be me.” So all that found its way into the novel, between the sisters at the center.
Secret weapon: At a certain point, very early on for me, Dara’s voice became so vivid, real and alive for me. She’s a tough customer, cool and precise and self-protective. It felt like putting on armor when I wrote her. And then there was so much pleasure in dismantling that armor.
Favorite line: “The true terrorism of girls is the accuracy of their aim.” My editor Sally Kim pointed that one out to me early on, how it stuck with her. That’s all you want as a writer—to have lines or passages linger with the reader.
Risk: Getting ballet wrong! There’s inevitably going to be mistakes, but I wanted to get it right enough that it didn’t distract balletomane readers. I researched heavily before I began and when I was finished I had a former ballet dancer and teacher review the manuscript for errors. She was incredible, with all the precision of a dancer.
Fuel: For me, movies are always going to foremost. I was watching a lot of melodrama and Tennessee Williams to live in that heightened tone I wanted. And going to see The Nutcracker at the New York City Ballet, which is true enchantment. And, of course, when blocked, a well-deployed gimlet is the ultimate key to the unconscious. I’m also partial to a French 75: gin, champagne, a twist of lemon—what else is there?
The Heathens, by Ace Atkins
Though I’d been hearing about this series for years, this was my first go-round with former U.S. Army Ranger Quinn Colson, now sheriff of Tibbehah County, Mississippi, who is on the trail of a firecracker of a tattooed teen, T.J. Byrd — “ninety-nine pounds of pure redneck muscle and attitude.” T.J. appears to have murdered her no-good mother, Gina, and is on the run with her little brother, her boyfriend, and her best friend. This unlikely crew befriends a rich girl rehab escapee who helps T.J. become a social media darling. Also on T.J.’s trail are the memorably disgusting and soullessly violent father-son roofer team of Dusty and Flem Nix, heartless bastard hired guns. I loved the pace of this book, steady and deep, and it was a treat to read an author in such control of his characters and their surroundings. I’m a suspicious reader, radar up, ready to pounce on a false note. There were none here, no caricatures or shortcuts, just real people suffering their small sorrows. Even the bad guys/gals are just trying to make sense of the hand they’ve been dealt. I loved one scene with three bad dudes driving through the countryside in an Eldorado, Brenda Lee on the radio (“Break it to me Gently”), one creep with liver & onion breath and another nursing a sick feeling that “something real bad was coming.” Sheriff Quinn is the moral anchor of the story, but the real star for me was T.J. Byrd, tough and mean, who listens to her dead father’s favorite bands — Van Halen, AC/DC, Poison, Ratt, Def Leppard, Motley Crue, GNR (see the playlist below) — but doesn’t ask for anyone’s sympathy. “My life’s been a mess since I was born,” she tells Colson. “Don’t shed a tear for me, Sheriff.” (I nearly shed a tear, though, during a scene in which many bottles of Pappy Van Winkle got smashed.)
Consider me hooked on Quinn Colson; I’ll be working my way through the earlier books. I also recently read one of Atkins’s first books, Wicked City, based on the true story of Phenix City, a notorious 1940s-50s Alabama hub of gangsterism, gambling, prostitution, and many dastardly deeds. And here’s a fun Zoom conversation between Ace and SA Cosby (author of Razorblade Tears, which I reviewed last month).
The Last Mona Lisa, by Jonathan Santlofer
Based on the true story of the iconic painting’s theft in 1911, Santlofer’s excellent new novel plays with art historians’ speculations that the Mona Lisa hanging in the Louvre might actually be a forgery. The story revolves around Luke Perrone, an alcoholic (now sober) art professor from New Jersey who for much of his life has been obsessed with the fact that his great-grandfather was behind the 1911 theft. An art replicator himself, Santlofer brings vivid life to the details of copying (or forging) paintings, and he’s got a clear mastery of art and art history. (“This feels like the thriller Santlofer was born to write,” Lee Child has said.) He bounces us from the present back to 1911, from Florence to Paris to New York, introducing a colorful cast of characters, from a rogue Interpol analyst to a snooty Picasso, from a bad-guy brute to a scarier bad guy in a suit. Santlofer is a sharp, smart writer, funny and great with dialogue, and this is a fun and twisty read. Looming over it is the genius of DaVinci himself, whose work (as Santlofer shows us) retains the power to drive people to steal, cheat and even kill.
Others I’d previously mentioned and recently finished (but sadly don’t have time to fully review — though I dug them all):
The Great Mistake, by Jonathan Lee
The Thousand Crimes of Ming Tsu, by Tom Lin
The House on Vesper Sands, by Paraic O’Donnell
See below* for info on buying books mentioned in Blood & Whiskey.
What’s my wife reading? Lisa Unger’s forthcoming Last Girl Ghosted (coming in October — I’ll review it then); and The Beautiful Mystery, another Inspector Gamache tale by Louise Penny. And we were both awed by the amazing Jennifer Senior story in The Atlantic about the family of a 9/11 World Trade Center victim, twenty years later.
And let me add here a bonus shoutout to my mother-in-law, who’s been visiting us this summer. In a two-week span she read the Abbott, the Santlofer, the new Laura Lippman, and more, while completing the daily NYT crossword. Any time I worry about getting older, I’m comforted by the thought: Oh, but more time to read…
Watching: We started Gomorrah (nah), then tried Jett (not bad, and Carla Gugino is great, but not addictive enough). My kid showed us the trailer to the forthcoming Sopranos prequel, The Many Saints of Newark (coming in October), which looks good. Next up: Ted Lasso (season 2), and Borgen (Danish). Got any recommendations?
Cocktail and Playlist of the Month…
Despite the title of this newsletter, a few readers have asked for non-whiskey drinks. I’m all for it! I’m a fan of Megan’s French 75 suggestion above. And this month’s cocktail — tequila + mezcal — comes compliments of Ace Atkins, as do the playlists that follow. Says Ace: “It might be too spicy for some tastes. But this is how I see it.”
The Heathen
Muddle a few slices of fresh jalapeno with a quarter teaspoon of sugar and a shot of fresh lime juice.
Add 1 shot of mezcal and 1 shot of tequila.
Finish off with some grapefruit infused soda and a slice of lime.
If you like, dust the rim with equal mix of sea salt and chili powder.
-We used La Croix for the soda, and it was delicious...
Playlist…
Also from Ace, here’s a Quinn Colson collection of classic country toons — 6+ hours of favorites from the sheriff of Tibbehah County, including Tanya Tucker, Waylon Jennings, Charlie Pride, Elvis, Johnny Cash and more.
And if you’ve read The Heathens, you’ll appreciate the rockin’ musical tastes of T.J. Byrd, who has her own mixtape (GNR, Bon Jovi, Def Leppard, Poison, etc): HERE.
Giveaway…
Last month’s winner: Kris Antonelli (former Baltimore Sun co-reporter/pal). Congrats!
Next giveaway: I’ll send 2 or 3 of the books pictured below to one winner (picked from a hat). To enter, just share/post this newsletter on one of the socials.
Thanks for reading! If you have any feedback or suggestions, I’m all ears — comment below, or shoot me an email. And if you like this kind of thing? Tell a friend, your mother-in-law, your yoga instructor, your barrista, your contractor, your boss, your kid.
Till next month….
-Neal
You can find me on Instagram; occasionally Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Goodreads
And it's a battered old suitcase
To a hotel someplace
And a wound that will never heal
No prima donna, the perfume is on
An old shirt that is stained with blood and whiskey…
-Tom Waits, “Tom Traubert’s Blues”
*Books mentioned in Blood & Whiskey can be found on my online list at Bookshop.org (which supports independent bookstores by sharing a cut of each sale), or at Amazon.com. As always, I encourage you to shop local. You can find a store near you with Bookshop’s store locator tool (HERE), or the store finder at IndieBound (HERE).
p.s. — I’m a couple days late in sending Blood & Whiskey this month, because this just happened (a year and a half since the last time):
