My friend wrote this book. He's the head of the creative writing program at Pennsylvania Governor's School for the Arts, which is where I worked this summer. His name is Dave. Dave and I have consumed beers together, played Balderdash, engaged in competitive billiards (while consuming aforementioned beers). And now I have read his novel. It's a meditation on violence, touching on subjects ranging from Abu Ghraib to Hiroshima, Flannery O'Connor to Pulp Fiction, custom made electric chairs to what exactly a Rusty Trombone is (it involves a toilet seat). All the while, he weaves in stories from his own life: scaring children with his old black neighbor on Halloween, encountering a series of butchered hogs split down the center and displayed on a front lawn, dressing up like Captain Kirk and drunkenly posing for his own Abu Ghraib polaroid. And throughout each story, memory, and historical happening, Dave attempts to figure out why we are the way we are. How America's view of violence has come to be what it is.
I'm very proud to say that my friend has written a thoughtful, humbling, quiet, provoking novel. It's pretty awesome to have talented friends. Thanks Dave! I can't wait to beat you in pool again!
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