Something Bad Wrong by Eryk Pruitt

A few weeks ago, I reviewed Pruitt's latest book, Blood Red Summer. The story of a true crime blogger/podcaster (Jess Keeler) in south central Virginia along the VA-NC border. I had read a few of his earlier books and was impressed so I picked up Summer's predecessor, Something Bad Wrong; Pruitt's first book in the Jess Keeler series.  I said in my review that I'd find the first Keeler book for review. Wasn't hard to find. He's a NC native and the local library has a wall of books from NC authors. Piece of cake.

We learn a bit of Keeler's back story that was only alluded to in the 2nd book. What has grabbed Keeler's interest is an unsolved double murder in 1974 since referred to as the Christmas Eve Murders. A young couple left a holiday party for some private time on a local lover's lane. And that was the last they were seen. Most thought they'd run off to elope, but a few weeks later they are found under a pile of leaves, hog-tied to a tree. The two were from Lake Castor but were found in Deeton County, NC. That means competing jurisdictions by cops squaring off measuring dicks. 

Part of the reason Jess is so interested is that her deceased grandfather was the lead detective on the NC side of the crime. She finds some old notebooks of his and she wants to understand what he was going through as he tried to narrow down potential suspects while he battles with the VA cops. 

To help her dig around, she enlists the help of a local TV news anchor whose off-camera behavior got him booted out of TV journalism. Throughout the story, Pruitt takes us through the agendas of all the cops, friends of the deceased couple, suspects, and Jess' family. If that wasn't enough, Pruitt presents perhaps the most heartbreaking descent of Jess' grandfather into Alzheimers that I've ever read. Some might see that as a distraction. Not me. I thought it was both critical and sensitively presented.

I mentioned before that I met Pruitt while he was out humping Blood Red Summer. Thankfully, he said that he plans to keep Jess Keeler front and center in our consciousness. And that's great because he is rapidly maturing as a crime novelist and may soon muscle his way into our power rotation.

If you are looking for new talent in the mystery/thriller genre, look no further. 

And keep your eyes open for ads about a gathering called Noir At The Bar where mystery writers present readings of their work in taverns, mostly up and down the east coast (so far). I think the Noir outings are Pruitt's baby and he's likely to be present. Been to a couple. Worth going.

ECD

Dirtbags by Eryk Pruitt

Lots of those small rural southern towns are charming. As long as there are jobs to keep all those interesting locals employed, around, and available. If the local mill closes, there is little to keep the locals, well, local. 

All Tom London wanted to do was cook. Restaurants were his life. He served the best dinners in Lake Castor, VA. Married with a son. But he had difficulty keeping his hands of the wait staff or some of the entertainment at Club 809, a strip joint (more like a double-wide) just outside the city limits. 

Predictably, Tom gets caught, his wife divorces him and heads home to Texas with their son. She hits on really hard times and ends up a junkie. Tom goes down and takes his son home to Virginia. No sooner does she get her life together she petitions the Texas courts for custody. Tom ain't happy. 

But he's remarried  to the hot but shrill Corrine. Shops, co-owns a clothing store that is going under fast, hates Tom's son (and his dog) but loves the money Tom's restaurant brings in. Tom's current fling is Rhonda Cantrell, his restaurant manager and former stripper at the 809. And she's married to Calvin. 

Calvin is one of those locals (not the charming ones. They've all left) who lays around, does an occasional odd job, and longs for something better. He met Rhonda at the 809 and was OK with her extracurricular activities at the club that brought in cash money. Even after they got married. Calvin has dreams just like everyone else.

He dreams of being a serial killer.

Tom London hires Calvin to go to Texas and kill his ex-wife. Make it look like an overdose. Then there would be no question about him keeping custody of his son. So Calvin and a high school classmate (who but for a blip of fate would've carried out a high school massacre) head off for Dallas.

As you might expect, things don't go according to plan. Yes, the ex is killed, but so is his classmate. To identify the victims as his kills, Calvin carves a '1' into her chest and a '2' into his classmate's chest. And off he goes.

Numbers 3 and 4 happen in New Orleans. The press calls him The Couple Killer. And he likes it; the killing and the notoriety. Works his way back to Lake Castor all the while piling up kills in twos and carving the current numbers into each victim. When he gets home. Corrine has forced Tom to sever all ties with Rhonda. When Rhonda figures out that Calvin is The Couple Killer, she sort of joins in helping him identify targets and pose the victims in such a way that they are quickly found. Calvin's count is now in the teens.

Eryk Pruitt is a Durham, NC screenwriter, author, and filmmaker. One of my favorite authors is JD Rhoades (who lives about 30 miles SW of Raleigh). Saw that JD was going to be participating in a reading at something called "Noir at the Bar" in Durham. I marked my calendar to hopefully meet him and maybe pick up some names of a couple new authors to read. Pruitt was the organizer of this "Noir" gathering of eight authors from NC, VA, KY, and SC. Afterward, I went up to him to thank for organizing the reading and he gave me an autographed copy of Dirtbags.

My previous review on the blog (A Dotted Red Line) described a book with very weak character development (almost absent). Not Pruytt. This is a heavily character-driven story. It's told from three viewpoints: Calvin, Tom, and Rhonda. And while I was getting enthralled with each of these 'dirtbags', I also found a great deal of humor where Pruytt poked fun at the rural life of Lake Castor and some of the colorful locals who remained. In fact, given the right mindset from the start, this might be closer to some of the books by Carl Hiassen in terms of its lighthearted approach - if a serial murderer can be lighthearted. Or it could be viewed to be more like some of those recent serious extended series on TV like The Killing or True Detective or The Following. To me, that's a sign of a pretty talented writer. His website (ErykPruitt.com) is pretty entertaining to boot.

Genre? Of course, it's a mystery, even though you know who the killer is from the start. I thought of it as one of my favorite genres: redneck noir. If Rhoades is the Crown Prince of redneck noir, Pruitt is certainly in his royal court (or trailer park as the case may be).

This might be hard to find outside of Amazon, but if more current day noir mysteries are your bag, you really need to add Pruytt to your shopping list. I'm on the prowl for his second book, #Hashtag. Ignore the latest and greatest NYT bestseller on the racks at the local Piggly Wiggly. Find Pruitt instead. An example of another under the radar author worth trying to find.

ECD