indie’s Reviews > Whalefall > Status Update

"The cold phantom hand of the Monastery’s danger zone curls around his waist."

"Last night Jay dreamed of his father’s bones, buttery in a nest of purple kelp, bejeweled with red sea slugs like holiday lights. The bones were soft in his hands, a gentle touch he never got from Mitt and therefore never gave back. He slid them against his cheek. He kissed them. He woke up tasting marrow."

"Like the sardine factory ruins on the Row itself, Steinbeck’s novel evokes a simpler, pitiless time. Qualities Mitt Gardiner values. To him, modern Monterey is a boil seeping tourist pus over a coastline that should have been left to the fish-stinking folk who worked it."