Review by Booklist Review
In "Nowheresville," Kentucky, Emmett Shaw barely ekes out a living, unloading packages at a massive distribution center. Dreams of completing a screenplay are on hold. Emmett's simmering discontent goes into overdrive when his stepbrother Joel moves back home with his wife, Alice. Kentucky is an anthropological exercise for the New York-based Joel, whose one claim to fame is a collection of academic essays about the rural poor. Trapped in a failing marriage, Alice finds solace in Emmett's down-to-earth persona. The scene is set for explosive encounters. Cole (Groundskeeping, 2022) mixes the angst and insecurity of class and poverty to craft a Molotov cocktail he lobs with exacting precision. He juxtaposes breathtaking descriptions of the Appalachian countryside against the ravages of late-stage capitalism that have stripped the state's soul to the bone. "What he longed for, what he found himself dreaming of, in the eddies of time that filled his days, was an ordinary life. Nine-to-five. Meat and potatoes. Wheel of Fortune. Church on Sunday. The quiet, brave persistence of the mainstream, never fighting the current," Cole writes of Joel. It's no surprise--in today's America, an ordinary life feels like the best kind of succor.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Cole (Groundskeeping) spins an evocative tale of ambition, lust, and sibling rivalry in western Kentucky. After toiling as a line cook in New Orleans, 28-year-old Emmett comes home to Paducah, where he takes a job at a massive fulfillment warehouse for an Amazon-like retailer and rents a nearby company condo. Meanwhile, his successful older half brother, Joel, and his wife, Alice, move in with Joel and Emmett's mother. Joel has published a well-received essay collection that mines his experience growing up in the South, and has just accepted a visiting lecture position at a local university. Emmett hopes to flex his own creativity as a screenwriter, despite having no connections or experience. After Alice admits to Emmett that her marriage is crumbling, the two begin an affair, and the plot ramps up further when Emmett's coworker convinces him to steal pharmaceuticals for the illegal drug market. Meanwhile, Joel plugs away at his second book and starts popping antidepressants. Cole has fun with Emmett's search for his screenplay's "hero's journey," and he writes gorgeously descriptive sentences ("the earth was darker than the sky, the pink-rimmed horizon a seam between two worlds"), but the mix of hijinks and high stakes feels tonally imbalanced. Nevertheless, this captures a colorful snapshot of contemporary Southern life. Agent: Peter Straus, RCW Literary. (June)
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
Two half brothers return to Kentucky to confront their roots--and themselves. Emmett, a main character in Cole's engaging sophomore effort, works as an "unloader," transferring packages from air cargo containers to conveyor belts at a massive fulfillment and distribution center. The facility is in a "nowheresville" area of Kentucky, Emmett's home state, to which he has returned after working low-pay, low-status jobs elsewhere in the country, including, most recently, New Orleans. Emmett harbors dreams of becoming a screenwriter, though he has yet to complete a screenplay. His return home coincides with that of his more accomplished elder half brother, Joel, a cultural studies lecturer and writer who has taken a temporary teaching position at a small college nearby. Joel, whom Emmett believes to be their mother's favorite, has moved from New York into the family home in Paducah with his wife, Alice, as their marriage has begun to disintegrate. Despite initial appearances, fulfillment, it seems, may be as elusive to Joel and Alice as it is Emmett. As he did with his debut,Groundskeeping (2022), Cole perfectly captures a particular kind of charming yet frustrating character: a slow-to-launch, aspiring Southern writer who makes ill-considered decisions that throw his life into disarray. Clearly, this is Cole's wheelhouse. He himself was born and raised in rural Kentucky. Here the author takes his main characters in marginally different directions, exploring sibling rivalry and family loyalty, as well as how we are irrevocably connected to and formed by the people and places from whom and which we come. Readers who enjoyed Cole's keenly observed and insightful first novel and were left wanting more of the same--or very similar--will find it in this follow-up effort. Those hoping for something new from this talented author, however, may find fulfillment elusive. If you loved Cole's first Kentucky-set novel about an endearing underachiever, you will enjoy his second. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
