testpattern 's review for:

The Bottoms by Joe R. Lansdale

4.0

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This elegant, pitch-black East Texas thriller is probably the best of Lansdale's straight novels that I've read. It suffers from some of Lansdale's usual stylistic ticks, such as overuse of the same homespun turns of phrase, and his once-a-novel cautionary tale about the evils of alcohol abuse, but otherwise the prose glistens. The narrative is set during the Great Depression, and is wonderfully evocative in its description of the period in a location different from the ones we usually see.