Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin

This book is quite a departure from some of the books I have read lately.  It is set in Mississippi and does the whole "present day story with flashbacks to fill in missing parts" thing that seems to be something that authors like to do.  I am honestly impressed with this kind of story telling for a couple of reasons.  First, I am super linear so when I am telling a story or writing my stories I start at the beginning and end at the end.  No jumping around for me.  Second, some authors seem to have a great way of weaving details in and out of the story to keep the reader engaged and interested.  It drives the story and makes it that much more fun to read, especially if there is a mysterious element to the book, like this one did.

I liked the second half of the book much more than the first half.  I like action and movement and character changes.  I don't need two pages of description of how a cabin looks. I am a lazy reader that way.  Tell me it's a cabin, give me a few details and I will fill in the rest.  I can recognize that kind of writing as impressive, it just isn't my preference.

This story starts out with one of the two men being shot and left for dead.  The man, Larry, has a bad reputation in his small Mississippi town, suspected but never convicted of kidnapping a local girl when he was in high school.  He is 41 now and leads a lonely life.  The other  man, named Silas when he was a boy but is now called "32", is local law enforcement.  Larry is white, Silas is black and the two made unlikely friends for a very short time when they were in high school.

The story unravels as Silas solves Larry's shooting and I will admit to being surprised at the end of the story, although as I look back I probably shouldn't have been too surprised.  Not being a 40 year old man...or a teenage boy...there were times that I wasn't super invested in the characters but I was glad that I didn't abandon the book part way through.  I would have missed out on a pretty good story.