Ex-cop Mona Bright has been living a hard
couple of years on the road, but when her estranged father dies, she
finds she's had a home all along: a little house her deceased mother
once owned in Wink, New Mexico.
And though every map denies Wink exists, Mona finds they're wrong: not only is Wink real, it is the perfect American small town, somehow retaining all the Atomic Age optimism the rest of world has abandoned.
But the closer Mona gets to her mother's past, the more she understands that the people in Wink are very, very different - and what's more, Mona begins to recognize her own bond to this strange place, which feels more like home every day.
Hank says:
"When Mona Bright's estranged father dies, leaving her a house she didn't know her long-dead mother had owned in the small town of Wink, New Mexico, you can pretty much figure it's not going to go smoothly. For one thing, it's not that easy even to find Wink, but when she manages to get there, the arrival of a newcomer in a bright red car distracts attention from a funeral, because--well, there are never, ever newcomers there. For another, the first chapter has shown us a distraught group of criminals escaping (minus one of the contingent) from a house in Wink their boss sent them to on a mission, and it proved to be Just Not a Normal House on the inside.
And though every map denies Wink exists, Mona finds they're wrong: not only is Wink real, it is the perfect American small town, somehow retaining all the Atomic Age optimism the rest of world has abandoned.
But the closer Mona gets to her mother's past, the more she understands that the people in Wink are very, very different - and what's more, Mona begins to recognize her own bond to this strange place, which feels more like home every day.
"When Mona Bright's estranged father dies, leaving her a house she didn't know her long-dead mother had owned in the small town of Wink, New Mexico, you can pretty much figure it's not going to go smoothly. For one thing, it's not that easy even to find Wink, but when she manages to get there, the arrival of a newcomer in a bright red car distracts attention from a funeral, because--well, there are never, ever newcomers there. For another, the first chapter has shown us a distraught group of criminals escaping (minus one of the contingent) from a house in Wink their boss sent them to on a mission, and it proved to be Just Not a Normal House on the inside.
After townspeople grudgingly help her locate her mother's house, she
decides to take up residence, and see what she can find out about the
end of her mother's life. No one is at all forthcoming, but she starts
to fit in a little bit, in spite of people's resistance. With some
effort, the prevailing attitude of Not Talking About That begins to peel
away, and Mona gets an inkling about the strange forces in control of
Wink, and how her mother's history fits in. Bennett steadily builds the
suspense to a satisfying, confrontational climax I don't want to spoil.
However, I think we can all be glad that nonfictional families pretty
much stick to being dysfunctional in a single dimension! During various
parts of the story, I was reminded of things I've liked in books by
Stephen King, Neil Gaiman, and especially Clive Barker, but I did not
find it to be annoyingly derivative."
No comments:
Post a Comment