Sinopsis

2011 Eric Hoffer Award in the General Fiction
2011 The Thomas & Lillie D. Chaffin Award

“Alex Taylor is a fresh new voice, not just in Kentucky, but in American literature.”'
--Chris Offutt

Like a room soaked in the scent of whiskey, perfume, and sweat, Alex Taylor's America is at once intoxicating, vulnerable, and full of brawn. These stories reveal the hidden dangers in the coyote-infested fields, rusty riverbeds, and abandoned logging trails of Kentucky. There we find tactile, misbegotten characters, desperate for the solace found in love, revenge, or just enough coal to keep an elderly woman's stove burning a few more nights. Echoing Flannery O'Connor and William Faulkner, Taylor manages fervor as well as humor in these dusky, shotgun plots, where in one story, a man spends seven days in a jon boat with his fiddle and a Polaroid camera, determined to enact vengeance on the water-logged body of a used car salesman; and in another, a demolition derby enthusiast nicknamed "Wife" watches his two wild, burning love interests duke it out, only to determine he would rather be left alone entirely. Together, these stories present a resonant debut collection from an unexpected new voice in Southern fiction.

Alex Taylor has worked as a day laborer on tobacco farms, as a car detailer at a used automotive lot, as a sorghum peddler, as a tender of suburban lawns, at various fast food chains, and at a cigarette lighter factory. He holds an MFA from the University of Mississippi and now teaches at Western Kentucky University. He lives in Rosine, Kentucky.

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. This debut collection pulls readers into rural Kentucky and hammers them with the despair and frustration that drive his fierce, battered denizens of the Bluegrass State: coal thieves, demolition derby drivers, punk teens, and tavern-brave hicks, all aiming to break off a tiny slice of the world. In the title story, two men go looking for the drowned body of a man to settle a score with the drowned man's corpse. The Evening Part of Daylight also shatters the sacred when an offended groom punches his bride in the face and then has to deal with the angry masses, while in Winter in the Blood, a pair of cattle killers embody the senselessness of murder. Taylor's command over his characters is as remarkable as his sharp, evocative prose. The bleak Kentucky landscape is drawn in grays and browns with an unforgiving yet loving eye; the descriptions of the countryside alone make Taylor's stories worth digging into, but with his characters and all of their petty grievances and desperate hopes, this first-time author inspires a mix of wonder, love, and pity for his sick, sad characters. (Apr.)
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From Booklist

Taylor blends all the essential ingredients of classic Southern fiction—beer, fishing, guns, cars, and moral and social restlessness—together in his first collection, 11 stories of revenge, violence, impossible love, and true heartache. His hard-drinking, dogged Kentuckians have little and desire less, yet find themselves losing their dignity to those who seem to possess more. Two surly brothers, late for their aunt’s funeral (and without a gift), snag a prize catfish with their bare hands, only to have it stolen by a smug man with a jet ski and a pretty girl. A group of lonesome men, who regularly meet for a cathartic, makeshift demolition derby, lose their bearings when a woman driving her husband’s Mustang interrupts them. And a band of vengeful American colonists on a manhunt are betrayed by a silver-tongued Tory while the outlaw hides in a cave. Taylor’s voice is sure and raw, truly and comically Southern in the best sense of the word, and these spirited tales are a fine addition to the South’s long and celebrated storytelling tradition. --Jonathan Fullmer

Review

“Taylor, who is still in his twenties, writes with wit, zest and skill. . . . Kentucky is lucky to have a writer as weird, unique and gifted as Alex Taylor. In the long queue of very good contemporary Southern writers, here’s a guy who can cut to the front.”
—Pamela Miller, The Minneapolis Star-Tribune

“He depicts seemingly archetypal female roles: recent widows, spurned wives, cynical teenagers—and sets them afire with earnest sexuality, guts, and as much straight-faced momentum as their male counterparts. There’s chilling humor in this collection, purple violence, snow-blighted landscapes, demolition derbies, and at least a dozen forthright and heretofore unused descriptions of the heart.”
— Oxford American

"This is the beautiful paradox of Taylor, a writer whose visions of a hard and ugly truth also tap into the quiet depths of the rural soul, a young man who’s told he frowns too much, yet can’t stop making jokes at his own expense. . . . Taylor might not be Western Kentucky’s best-kept secret for very long.”
—Erin Keane, The Courier-Journal

“Taylor, who is still in his twenties, writes with wit, zest and skill. . . . Kentucky is lucky to have a writer as weird, unique and gifted as Alex Taylor. In the long queue of very good contemporary Southern writers, here’s a guy who can cut to the front.”
?Pamela Miller, The Minneapolis Star-Tribune

“He depicts seemingly archetypal female roles: recent widows, spurned wives, cynical teenagers?and sets them afire with earnest sexuality, guts, and as much straight-faced momentum as their male counterparts. There’s chilling humor in this collection, purple violence, snow-blighted landscapes, demolition derbies, and at least a dozen forthright and heretofore unused descriptions of the heart.”
? Oxford American

"This is the beautiful paradox of Taylor, a writer whose visions of a hard and ugly truth also tap into the quiet depths of the rural soul, a young man who’s told he frowns too much, yet can’t stop making jokes at his own expense. . . . Taylor might not be Western Kentucky’s best-kept secret for very long.”
?Erin Keane, The Courier-Journal

About the Author

Alex Taylor lives in Rosine, Kentucky. He has worked as a day laborer on tobacco farms, as a car detailer at a used automotive lot, as a sorghum peddler, at various fast food chains, and at a cigarette lighter factory. He holds an MFA from The University of Mississippi and now teaches at Western Kentucky University.