A FINE DARK LINE
Joe R. Lansdale
Mysterious Press
Suspense
ISBN: 0892967293

The arrival of A FINE DARK LINE prompts a legitimate question regarding its author, Joe R. Lansdale: is there anything this guy can't do well? My first encounter with him was THE DRIVE IN, a science fiction horror novel. This was followed by THE MAGIC WAGON --- a gothic western if you will --- and COLD IN JULY, a mystery. Then came the Batman-based CAPTURED BY THE ENGINES, TARZAN'S LOST ADVENTURE, the Jonah Hex comic book story arcs, and on and on and on...and they are all great. So with A FINE DARK LINE, we have a coming of age novel set in rural Texas in the 1950s, a time both better and worse than our own and inexorably linked to it. And, like all his other works that have preceded it, A FINE DARK LINE is his finest work to date.

A FINE DARK LINE is told through the eyes of Stanley Mitchell, a thirteen year-old boy standing on the summer cusp of adolescence, the younger of two children in a family that isn't poverty-stricken but not exactly next door neighbors to Scrooge McDuck, either. No, the Mitchells are the owners and proprietors of the only drive-in theater in Dewmont, Texas. Stanley's youth and innocence are consumed in a slow-burning maelstrom sparked by his discovery of a tin box containing a collection of troubled love letters that ultimately lead him to a burned out house, the mysterious deaths of two young women and secrets that the powers that be in Dewmont would prefer to stay buried. Stanley's unlikely ally is Buster Smith, the projectionist at the theater, an elderly black man whose attempts to drown his demons in alcohol are doomed to failure but who has a depth that only Stanley is aware of. In attempting to solve the mysteries of the deaths of the two women, Stanley exposes not only himself, but also his family and friends, to danger. A FINE DARK LINE, however, is more than a mystery story. It is, ultimately, the tale of a time not so long gone but vanished completely nonetheless. Lansdale uses the mystery as a vehicle to explore the cultural landscape, race relations and sexual mores of the 1950s. What is most remarkable here is that Lansdale is able to capture so perfectly the voice of a 13 year-old boy in that era. I suspect that, to at least some extent, it is his own, some 50 years removed. If so, it resonates within him pitch-perfectly and his translation is unerring.

With A FINE DARK LINE, Lansdale continues to expand the breadth and scope of his literary vision. One could easily come to the conclusion that his talent and landscape know no boundaries. He is a writer who has exceeded the promise of his earliest work and the expectations of his readers --- and will undoubtedly continue to do so.

   --- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub

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