In Twilight, Fast Falls the Eventide

William Gay's finely wrought novel, Twilight (MacAdam Cage, Softcover, 2007), both enraptures and appalls. A Southern storyteller in the vein of Faulkner and O'Connor, Gay draws us into the dark world of the Tennessee wood where mythology and modernity share equal credence. The story follows a young brother and sister who unearth a gruesome secret; the town's undertaker, Fenton Breece, has undertaken activities both nefarious and necrophiliac on his lifeless clientele. After a blackmail scheme goes terribly wrong, Breece hires a deranged local to hunt down his would-be extortionists and bring them to bloody injustice. Gay's use of language is not only masterful, it is wholly fresh and innovative. Start reading at dawn, finish at Twilight.