Synopsis
Harold Miles' picaresque new novel, Bad Ol' Boy, records the fantastic saga of Will Cotton's many outlandish adventures-how Will gambles, connives, plunders, philanders, drinks, embezzles, and murders...how everywhere he creates spectacularly varied carnage as he pursues his wily and bizarre life of crime...how he's always matching wits with, and keeping just barely a step ahead of, the clever and relentless Pinkerton detectives.
When you first encounter the raffish Will, he's burnt out, dying, and terrified of the Southern Baptist hellfire and torment all the spectacular misdeeds of his wicked life have so richly earned him. Will believes that full confession alone can bring about his salvation, and only his young nephew, Gene, the sole relative not eagerly hoping to see Will die, is willing to hear the old reprobate out.
Will's tales carry you roaring away on a wild journey of crime, escapades grittily traversing much of the early 20th century South and mid-America. It's an uproarious but murderous spree and manhunt-often careening along on a grand Harley-Davidson-that ranges from rural Georgia to Lexington, from Chicago to St. Louis, from Baton Rouge to Dallas, from Corpus Christi to El Paso, from Brownsville to New Orleans to Atlanta.
Along the way you'll meet such remarkable characters as:
• Gene's hardbitten harridan-tongued Ma, who fears he's headed down the same rough road as Uncle Will
• Preacher Nelson, the wealthiest man in Plowshare, Kentucky, whose bank Will plunders
• Josie Nelson, the preacher's daughter, a poet whose beauty, it was said, would make a freight train take a dirt road, and whom Will promises to marry, but instead cruelly destroys
• G. B. Balls, the great Pinkerton detective, who brilliantly tracks Will down, but ultimately loses their murderous game
• Kathy Taylor, Will's second wife and innocent companion in flight, increasingly horrified by her realization of the depth of his unbridled criminality
• Ol' Ebo, the inner devil Will's so long embraced, now wrestling for his immortal soul
• Fanny Hawk-either a fancy lady or carnival whore, depending on who's speaking of her-Will's great love, clever counterpart, and most important wife
Bad Ol' Boy will take you along on a wanton, hilarious romp with an original American rapscallion and general scapegrace. Will Cotton is droll and lethal, murderous and penitent, archetypal but all-too-real-you won't forget him soon!
Reviews
Miles's latest installment (after The Devil and Uncle Will ) of the life and times of Will Johnson, aka Will Cotton and Jesse Robinson, takes place on the rogue's deathbed as he regales his nephew Gene, the one relative not looking forward to his death, with stories of his past, of his recurring nightmares and of the treasure he has hidden in his old home just down the road. Gene, naive and well-intentioned, listens to his uncle's tales of murder and derring-do while also trying to retrieve the old man's loot without tipping off the rest of the family. Gene's story is quickly subsumed by Will's tall tales, whose telling is inspired, perhaps misguidedly, by Will's belief that confession will save his soul. The stories he tells are certainly damning: how he robbed a preacher's bank and, while in the preacher's home, seduced his daughter and then accused the preacher himself of sleeping with her; how he murdered the great detective, G. B. Balls; how he misled a sweet young girl into marrying him; and how, after leaving that wife, he tangled with Fanny Hawk, a part-Native American carnival whore in whom he finally met his match. Miles presents Will as much more of a lovable rapscallion than even the most charitable reader may wish to concede; Will's evil deeds, though entertaining, cause terrible harm to innocent people. Still, the novel captures the spirit of frontier adventure fiction in a contemporary setting and should intrigue fans of the American picaresque.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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