The Driftless Area

by Tom Drury

The new novel from the award-winning author of The End of Vandalism is a wry and sophisticated heist drama. Set in the rugged region of the Midwest that gives the novel its title, The Driftless Area is the story of Pierre Hunter, a young bartender with unfailing optimism, a fondness for coin tricks, and an uncanny capacity for finding trouble. When he falls in love, with the mysterious and isolated Stella Rosmarin, Pierre becomes the central player in a revenge drama he must unravel and bring to its shocking conclusion. Along the way he will liberate 77 thousand dollars from a murderous thief, summon the resources that have eluded him all his life, and come to question the very meaning of chance and mortality. For nothing is as it seems in The Driftless Area. Identities shift, violent secrets lie in wait, the future can cause the past, and love becomes a mission that can take you beyond this world.

In its tender, cool irony, The Driftless Area recalls the best of neonoir, and its cast of bonafide small-town eccentrics adrift in the American Midwest make for a clever and deeply pleasurable read from one of our most beloved authors.

Genres: Fiction, Mystery, Crime, Novels, Contemporary, Literary Fiction, The United States Of America

224 pages, Hardcover

First published June 29, 2006

About the author

Tom Drury was born in 1956. The recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, Drury has published short fiction and essays in The New Yorker, A Public Space, Ploughshares, Granta, The Mississippi Review, The New York Times Magazine, and Tricycle: The Buddhist Review. His novels have been translated into German, Spanish, and French. "Path Lights," a story Drury published in The New Yorker, was made into a short film starring John Hawkes and Robin Weigert and directed by Zachary Sluser. The film debuted on David Lynch Foundation Television and played in film festivals around the world. In addition to Iowa, Drury has lived in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Florida, and California. He currently lives in Brooklyn and is published by Grove Press.

Reviews

[piperitapitta · Rating 2 out of 5]

The Driftless Area



Peccato, ma questo nuovo romanzo di Drury (di cui avevo letto La fine dei vandalismi, primo capitolo della trilogia di Grouse County) sembra un Haruf senza la grazia di Haruf, un Power senza la profondità di Power: un po’ come mangiare il tacchino freddo quando invece sogni quello ripieno del Thanksgiving con la salsa di mirtilli.

“Tom Drury è come una bottiglia di ottimo champagne”, scrive Jonathan Franzen, e a me, che ho iniziato a dubitare delle sue doti letterarie, ora viene da pensare che sullo champagne ha senz’altro parecchio da imparare. Oppure che non ha letto questo, di cui il titolo - in originale (The Driftless Area) e in traduzione (il cui motivo spiega nella postfazione) è senza dubbio la parte migliore.

[RIchard · Rating 5 out of 5]

After nearly unanimous critical praise for his first two novels, The End of Vandalism and Hunts in Dreams, the critical response to this one was decidedly mixed. But for my money, this is the best of the three books. I sometimes suspect that Americans, being a famously "pragmatic" lot (not really, but they think they are), get antsy when ghosts appear in "serious" literature. Anything that seems to smell even faintly of magic realism, or surrealism, gets many of us all hot and bothered. We have more of a tendency to accept it on television (god help us), and even sometimes in film (hence the popularity of Lynch's Mulholland Drive, probably my least favorite film of his (I still love it more than most other films released, but...)), but when it happens in a novel by a writer who's not known as a "genre" writer (whatever that is), people are very disturbed.

On a sentence by sentence level, Drury, to me, approaches the delirious and seriously twisted heights of a Denis Johnson, or even Faulkner at his most beautiful and strange (Absalom! Absalom!, for instance)...

At any rate, this book is beautiful and strange...it's a relatively quick reading experience, and Drury manages to make everything seem very simple (he doesn't, for instance, write page-length sentences like Faulkner often does...yet somehow he seems to be able to conjure the same ghostly atmosphere that Faulkner can with his word-witchery) even when things are at their most bizarre. There is an offhanded casualness to the way he suddenly drops the strangest, most beautiful images.

I'm in the midst of re-reading The End of Vandalism in preparation for the new novel--apparently a kind of "sequel"--called Pacific. (It's also a kind of "sequel" to Hunts in Dreams, which itself is a sort of "sequel" to End of Vandalism. Confused? Don't be...you don't have to read these books in order...that's the kind of relationship they have to each other.) I'm enjoying Vandalism tremendously, and find that it's like re-reading someone like Faulkner, or Delillo, Dostoevsky, or Melville...I keep noticing things I didn't notice on earlier reads...and everything feels fresh even though I "know" "what happens"...What a wonderful writer Drury is...and I'm amazed, but I recently read somewhere that he now lives in New York City...I hope he will do some readings upon the release of the new one.

[Come Musica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Il romanzo è ambientato nella Driftless Area, la cui traduzione letterale potrebbe essere "La zona con pochissimi resti della glaciazione", un luogo avvolto dal mistero in cui si incontrano due mondi, quello presente e quello "al di là".

Pierre è un giovane che viene salvato da Stella e si innamora di lei.
Ma dai racconti di Stella emergono delle incongruenze, quando Pierre incontra alcuni suoi famigliari. Chi è Stella? È lei pur non essendo lei: "Al college Pierre aveva imparato una cosa che non aveva più dimenticato: tutto ciò che accade crea le condizioni per il suo declino."

La vita di Pierre si ingarbuglia ulteriormente quando viene in possesso del bottino di una rapina: i ladri faranno di tutto per ritornare in possesso della somma.
E la storia si svolgerà fino all'epilogo della stessa, come il movimento di una foglia, che va un po' su e un po' giù, sospinta dal vento, senza alcun vincolo che la lega ancora all'albero.

“Ma la vita è divertente" dice Pierre. “Non credi? Cioè non come al Luna Park, ma tu scrivi poesie, le foglie si muovono, ogni tanto si scopa… non è bello?"
“Le foglie si muovono?".
“Sì, hai capito cosa intendo".
“Oh, che gioia! Le foglie si muovono".
“Giuro che lo penso veramente”.
“Lo so”.


“Pierre diceva di trovare divertente il movimento delle foglie. Forse intendeva dire che questo pianeta e questa vita che c’è stata data sono un’opportunità che non comprendiamo. E perciò ne facciamo un cattivo uso, giorno dopo giorno. Se osserviamo gli spazi siderali cosa vediamo? Nulla. Né foglie né vita, chissà per quali sterminate distese. E noi siamo qui. Stiamo facendo tutto il possibile gli uni per gli altri e ciascuno per sé? O possiamo invece essere migliori di quel che siamo stati finora?"

[Spiros · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Do you believe in fate?" is the question posed by Pierre Hunter, the hapless hero of The Driftless Area, Tom Drury's lapidary fairy tale set in an anomalous region of northern Iowa. It is, of course the wrong question, but Pierre can be forgiven; he has just fallen through river ice, and had his life saved by a beautiful woman with whom he has predictably fallen in love. The correct question, as it turns out, is "has the future already happened?" and, as a corollary, "does the little old drifter who wanders through the story merely know the future, or can he manipulate it?" These are the questions that stay with you, long after you have (all too quickly) finished the book.

Drury's humor is insidious and deadpan; it is subterranean, based on the quotidian interactions of the characters he has created. Two perfectly straightforward sentences will be followed by a third, which will stand the passage on its head and make you laugh out loud. It is truly wonderful.

I don't usually look at what other readers have written about a book before I read it, but I was waiting a long time for this book; I peeked. I must say that I don't understand the criticism of interjecting a metaphysical element into a realistic novel, any more than I am phased by Cervantes using the second part of Don Quixote to respond to criticisms of the first part, or Lawrence Sterne insinuating himself (in the persona of Pastor Yorick) into Tristram Shandy, or David Mitchell leaving the ninth and final chapter of Number9Dream completely blank. The novel is a world created entirely by its author; if it is well written, you should allow yourself to be at home in that world.

[Oscar · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hasta esta novela, Tom Drury nunca había sido traducido al castellano, y, por los menos para mí, era un completo desconocido. Un escritor seleccionado por Granta entre los mejores novelistas americanos jóvenes junto a Jeffrey Eugenides y Jonathan Franzen, es incomprensible que haya pasado tan desapercibido.

Cuando la crítica habla de 'La región inmóvil' comparándola con los hermanos Grimm y los hermanos Coen, no andan muy desencaminados, aunque yo diría que tiene más de estos últimos. De la historia, narrada de forma coral, mejor no contar demasiado, porque, aun no tratándose de una trama con enigma, sí contiene cierto misterio que se trata muy sutil y elegantemente. La primera parte de la novela nos presenta a un Pierre Hunter adolescente, a sus padres y a alguno de sus amigos, novia incluida. Pero contado de una manera poco recargada y muy sobria, sin rodeos, dándonos a conocer esa región inmóvil del título, un pueblo del Medio Oeste americano, frío y con personajes muy particulares. Después, en la segunda parte de la novela, la historia da un giro totalmente inesperado, estilo hermanos Coen, que conduce a un final controvertido.

La lectura de 'La región inmóvil' me ha recordado bastante a la película Winter's Bone, donde una chica vive en un pueblo similar al del libro, donde lo mejor son la protagonista, los secundarios y ese ambiente crudo. De la novela me quedo con la relación que mantiene Pierre con Stella, con las curiosas y estrambóticas conversaciones de algunos personajes, y sobre todo me quedo con la sensación de haber descubierto a un gran narrador, Tom Drury.

[Shanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm stunned by this book. I went along for the ride in Drury's masterpiece, and I experienced reading like I never had before. The writing "drifts" seamlessly from one topic to another and I felt as though I was skating through the story. At times Drury's writing seems simplistic in the way that a Picasso painting seems basic to a neophyte, but the deeper I fell into the story, the more I realized that each word was so carefully prepared and each sentence so carefully crafted that the story's ease was the result of Drury's tedious attention to detail. It is a must read, and I guarantee that once you read it, you will want to reread it in order to see all that you missed the first time.

[Pete · Rating 4 out of 5]

i have no idea why this book has the cover that it has. this is an understated, weird midwestern-gothic novel about coincidence, throwing rocks at moving vehicles, mailing money to strangers, reenactments of bank robberies. i guess it's sort of hard to distill that into a cover image but still, pretty girl with freckles in a field of dirt is definitely not the correct vibe.

i like tom drury *a lot* -- "end of vandalism" was a revelation, albeit a quiet / subtle / downbeat one. this is shorter and throttles back the deadpan humor a bit in favor of a stranger story and crystalline-mundane dialogue. the climactic scene that shifts from the "bank robbery days" play to the orchard is glorious, even if the plotting required to set it up is a little clunky. if i had to boil this down i'd say it's fargo but with ghosts instead of cops. which i think is a pretty good idea.

this set me to:
-looking at "Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio" (source of epigraph)
-wondering whether it has anything to do with Melville's Pierre (there are some structural/conceptual similarities)

choice nugs:
"There a pack of tricolor beagles strained at their leashes and bayed at the old man, Tim Geer, who sat eating a grilled cheese sandwich in the back of one of three police cruisers now in the lot. The dogs did not seem to realize their job was done or maybe they only wanted the sandwich."

"Roland's graduation picture hung on the wall. He looked wary in the photograph, as if listening to a complicated offer that might be a ripoff."

"She'd had some hard times. Something begins to fade from the eyes after too much of anything. She had thick dry reddish hair and white scars on either side of her face as if she had been attacked by a bear.

In fact, she said, she'd done this with her own fingernails one time after going too many days on speed. Pierre did not know what to say to that, but she smiled and nodded, as if the pain had faded, leaving only a sort of impersonal amazement."

[Edan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Driftless Area has the same austere and precise prose as Drury's other books, and that same strange tone: whimsicality mixed with realism, lightness and darkness intertwined. In this novel, however, Drury tries something new plot-wise, adding supernatural elements and what the summary on the back cover calls "neo-noir". I wouldn't go that far, but there is a sinister storyline here that occasionally feels at odds with Drury's trademark silliness and anti-plot scenes in which people talk about nothing in particular. The end was well-handled and risky, though, and I appreciated the ideas of fate and destiny therein--it got me thinking about Drury as author, setting up all these plot dominoes, which in turn creates the thematic subject of the book. Did these ideas of fate interest Drury because he was trying so hard to write a book that he wouldn't normally write? That is, a book with a strong sense of cause and effect, with an overarching conflict and inevitable conclusion?

Here's a typically wonderful Tom Drury exchange from The Driftless Area:


"It's just that I thought life was going to be fun. That was really the impression I had."
"It is fun," said Pierre. "I mean it's not Adventureland. But you write your poems, the leaves move, you get laid sometimes. Isn't that fun?"
"The leaves move?"
"You know what I mean."
"Oh, joy, the leaves are moving."
"Honest to Christ, I believe that."
"I know you do."
Then Pierre heard a muffled sound and Carrie took a silver cell phone from her purse and checked the number on the screen and shut off the phone.
"Let me see that," said Pierre.
She handed it to him.
"Very modern," he said.

[JMM · Rating 2 out of 5]

The Driftless Area is a cross-genre story of a young man who becomes involved with a supernatural woman and a crime. While I admired certain elements, this was not the book for me. The writing is so spare that it gave me nothing to hold on to. “Where was I?” I’d think on picking it up, “who was that person again?” Clearly, the guy can write – there were moments of brilliance. But mostly I was nagged throughout by the notion that the author only moved the plot forward with a movie offer in mind. (The reading guide in the back reinforced this notion, with its first discussion question referring to a similarity to a Coen brothers movie.) Author Drury gets amazing praise but this book just held little appeal for me.

[Anna Van Someren · Rating 5 out of 5]

Maybe it's because I'm from Iowa and it's comforting to hear that straight, plain way of talking again: "Tell you what we're going to do", and calling storm windows storms and saying billfold instead of wallet. It all reminds me of my dad, gravel roads, men saying goodbye to each other like "Well." "Okay then."

but also
-a perfectly subdued, dour humor
-a story bent on impending violence, steadily marching toward it, no way around it
-philosophical ponderings on the passage of time, and on fate,
-slippage into the supernatural,
-a minor character who writes satisfyingly bad poems,
- a beautiful love story
and more.

[John · Rating 2 out of 5]

this is a classic case of a dust jacket hypejob. i picked this book up off the shelf, read the jacket, and wanted to read it. it said modern pulp. it said midwest noir. it was pappy crap. i'm happy it was short. when i was done i reread the jacket - lies. you can't win them all.

[gremlin snacks · Rating 1 out of 5]

After I was completely fed up, I started skimming. I finished it, but I wish I had never even picked it up. Honestly, I don't even know wtf the story was supposed to be about. The description was very misleading.

[Nicole Fabian · Rating 5 out of 5]

my favorite author of the moment - this and his other books are philosophical, introspective, witty, and real. the reader can identify with things that each character says or does, so there's no black-and-white "bad guy" or "good guy." love this author!

[Leah · Rating 3 out of 5]

did i miss something important, or do people just like it for the visible nipples on the front cover?

[Sakura87 · Rating 2 out of 5]

Non ho più l'età né la pazienza per libri con dialoghi così pallosamente nonsense spacciati per profondi, e Tom Drury non è Cormac McCarthy.

[Colleen · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 Stars

This was the second book in a row I read that was short with a lot of good ideas that were not developed enough. I first saw the trailer for the movie adaptation and was immediately intrigued. But the things that intrigued me from the trailer and then from the book description were never fully manifested in the story itself. Never having read anything else by this author, it is hard to say if this is just his style or if he was experimenting. It left me wanting more and not in an entirely good way either.

I am not sure what to classify this book as. The publisher clearly did not either "a wry and sophisticated heist drama" and "Neo-Noir." Having finished reading it, I do not think any of those descriptors fit the story. The dialogue was not witty and the sentence structure seemed overly simple. There was nothing Noir about it. And it is hard to call either the writing or the plot sophisticated when both felt so underdeveloped. Not that there was anything bad about the book. I did enjoy parts of it. And with barely over two-hundred pages and large font, it would be easy enough to read in a day. However, the story never reached anywhere near the promised heights.

The paranormal parts of the story should have been given a much bigger part. There was an intriguing underlying plot of otherworldly maneuvering, but while this storyline drove the rest of the tale, it is merely the box within which the rest of the story is packaged. Large bits of it were just slow ruminations about mundane everyday life in an unnamed Midwestern town.

The characters did no have satisfactory depth particularly the main character, Pierre. I never truly understood his motivation. Particularly when he gives $77,000 away to a drug addict he only met once and spent a couple of hours with. Who does that? Even the most generous of people would be unlikely to do such a thing. It felt as if Pierre was the ghost; he has such an insubstantial air and just floats through life with no direction and no real connection to anything or anyone. As always, it was hard to be invested in a story when the characters are not compelling. Which also mad it harder to care about the plot since it centered on revenge.

The story also skips periods of time with no real delineation. It was hard to tell when anything was happening. The ending was weird and unsatisfactory. Having a play that mirrored / foreshadowed the ending was too gimmicky. And I was not sure what to make of the very last page where an unnamed man stumbles upon an unnamed women in a certain orchard. Was that supposed to be Pierre finding his way back Stella? Was it all a dream? I have no idea what to make of the ending.

The Driftless Area may have a paranormal "noir" mystery to it, but it largely concerns everyday life in a Podunkly average town. And that is kind of how I feel about this book overall. If you drove throw the town in this story, you might think it was an alright place, but you would forget it as soon as you left. There just was not anything striking enough to make a lasting memory.

RATING FACTORS:
Ease of Reading: 3 Stars
Writing Style: 3 Stars
Characters and Character Development: 2 Stars
Plot Structure and Development: 2 Stars
Level of Captivation: 3 Stars
Originality: 3 Stars

[Alexander Elmore · Rating 3 out of 5]

Though slow to start, I did enjoy The Driftless Area a considerable amount. I don't mind slow openings, and this one was not bad. For about the first 5 chapters (there are only 10, so roughly half the book) there is no mystery or noir of any real sort. There is however alcoholism, romance/sex, and a brief near-death experience. Once the plot started rolling, however, it went. Drury's novel did keep me entertained the whole read and had an interesting plot/characters; however, my biggest problem with the novel was a supernatural twist thrown in around the end of chapter 7. True, it did tie into the novel (I won't say what, who or how for a spoiler free review), but it still felt totally out of left field and a bit unnecessary. Once you look past this though, it was a nice, short and fun read.

Also a side note: Drury's "sex scene" (if you will) was exceedingly well written, in my opinion. It was not graphic in any sense. The actual act of sex is not described, but the description of the scene and the two lonely people looking for someone to understand them and love them was absolutely phenomenal. I felt the character's connection to each other and what their actions meant on a deeper, spiritual level, not just physical.

[Sean Beaudoin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I bet it would take about four seconds of Googling "Tom Drury" before you came up with the phrase "he's a writer's writer." That's because his brand of deceptively simple and elegant prose is sometimes dismissed as being sort of lightweight or not literary enough, but it's obvious to anyone who has tried to write decent fiction (and mostly failed) exactly how difficult it is to achieve this level of clarity, even for a fable or sly ghost story, whichever this may be. Either way, it's really refreshing to read a novel whose entire purpose is to tell an un-ornamented story, but is written by an author capable of delivering an epic's-level of detail in such a stripped-birch fashion. Apparently it's time to buy some of his other books.

[Bethany · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've been randomly selecting books to read in the library quite frequently these days. The Driftless Area was one such book. I picked it up in the library this afternoon and read it in one sitting. (I read it at the library, actually. In the corner by the paperback romances, which I certainly didn't do on purpose, let me tell you.)

Anyhow, yes! This was an odd little book, but strangely satisfying. And with a plot twist or two that I didn't see coming.

Chalk another point up for random library books!

[Patrick Brown · Rating 4 out of 5]

Go read Edan's review of it. She said it all.

[Vivienne Strauss · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this. The blend of philosophy, surrealism and realism was just perfect. Felt kind of like Blue Velvet meets Repo Man.

[Justine · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't really know. This was kind of confusing.

[Anthony Colozza · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a very interesting and likable book. The writing style is unique and the story is somewhat of a dark comedy along the lines of Fargo. If you like those types of stories you will love this book. The writing and dialog in the book are calm and relatable. The characters are very likable even the villains. This was an enjoyable book that will hold your attention and draw you in. At times it is slow paced but never boring.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was so weird, a lot happened but it was all written in such a nonchalant manner that I found myself rereading paragraphs just to make sure it really had happened. I loved the story even if it took a bit of a dumb supernatural turn and some of the characters were kind of bare with no real progression.

[Aaron Lindsey · Rating 5 out of 5]

So good! The best book I've read this year.
The writing grabbed me on page one, and held on tight. The story was good. It is one of those fun tales where the characters are interesting enough without much action, but then BAM! This sweet, fun story turns into a thriller with one super exciting incident I did NOT see coming. From there, it was surprise after surprise until the shocking ending.
This is my first Tom Drury book, but I'm planning to read the rest ASAP.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

Drury is an interesting author. He delivers an offbeat tale here, that he somehow pulls off.

[Knut André Dale · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eerily beautiful. Drury is a hidden American treasure.

[Rubie K. · Rating 5 out of 5]

this was so simple & beautiful & i am going to be thinking about it for a long time

[Lokimcgraw · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is amazing. I wanted to crawl into this world and live there and engage with these characters myself. I can think of no higher compliment. Five stars only because this app won’t let me give it six.

[John Owen · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are a lot of things going on in the book that just feel a little strange but later in the book, they go full force. It takes some adjustment to accept it.