From Publishers Weekly
McCammon has followed the popular and critical success of Boy's Life with a book that is much darker, but written with the same headlong narrative grip. Dan Lambert is a bitter Vietnam vet in Louisiana at the end of his rope: Agent Orange has condemned him to a slow death, he has split from his wife and now the bank wants to repossess his truck, his only hope of getting work. In a moment of blind madness he kills a bank loan officer and runs, followed by two of the unlikeliest bounty hunters you'll ever meet: Flint, who carries the half-formed head and arm of an unseparated twin brother in his side, and Pelvis, who makes a living impersonating guess who , but has a distinctly better self. As he runs, Lambert picks up another misfit, Arden, an otherwise lovely girl with a horribly disfiguring birthmark, who is seeking a legendary faith healer in the Gulf swamplands where Lambert tries to hide. Most of the book recalls an action-packed popular movie, with car chases, some evil dope runners, murderous alligators and an explosive climax involving a Vietnam-era patrol boat. It's a strong adventure yarn, but McCammon seems to want to bathe it in some sort of cosmic significance, and the attempt to give Flint legendary stature, as well as a mistily mystical windup at a wilderness hospital run by nuns (where Arden can be "cured") take some swallowing. Literary Guild alternate.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
Author McCammon ( Boy's Life , LJ 7/91) has made a name for himself with well-crafted horror thrillers but recently has explored other areas of fiction. Gone South contains danger and suspense, but it is primarily the story of a quest. Dan, dogged by depression and Agent Orange-induced leukemia, has accidentally killed a man. On the run, he meets Arden, a disfigured woman abandoned at a truck stop. He reluctantly agrees to help her on her journey to the Louisiana swamps where, she believes, the legendary Bright Girl will heal her. Meanwhile, an unlikely pair of bounty hunters is on Dan's trail: Flint began life as a carnival freak, with his Siamese twin's tiny arm and half-formed face protruding from his chest; he is saddled with training Cecil, a self-deprecating and pathetically friendly Elvis impersonator. These four misfits collide and, finally, arrive where the Bright Girl may actually live. What happens then has the satisfaction of a fairy-tale quest fulfilled. Their wishes come true, although not in ways they would have guessed. The four characters are wonderful. Their problems, while unusual, seem very real. And the scenes between irritated, icy Flint and soft-spoken, naive Cecil lend at times a slapstick quality to the novel. Highly recommended. Literary Guild alternate; previewed in Prepub Alert LJ 6/15/92.
- A.M.B. Amantia, Population Crisis Committee Lib., Washington, D.C.Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
