Well

Well marks the astonishing debut of an author with a singular and unflinching voice and vision. Set primarily among the working class of a Seattle suburb called Federal Way, this highly original novel extols the lives of a large cast of characters lost in various modes of darkness and despair. Whether desperately alone or struggling to come together, they grapple with dark compulsions and heartrending afflictions. What binds them is the Well--that dark, barren Wasteland of the heart and mind--as if trapped at the bottom of well, they search for relief, for a vehicle into the light they know is up and outside. They search in sex, drugs, and violence, and in visions of apocalypse and creation, dreams of angels and killers and local sports championships. Compact, finely wrought, and powerfully charged, Well ultimately rises toward the light in a finale that echoes with the exhilarating human capacity for hope. The result is a mesmerizing tour de force that will establish Matthew McIntosh as a bold and progressive new voice of American fiction.

In his debut novel Well, Matthew McIntosh has produced an impressive, unsettling portrait of the inhabitants of Federal Way, Washington, a blue-collar suburb of Seattle. This book is less a novel than a collage of voices (mostly first-person, sometimes disembodied) unified by their disparate attempts to overcome (or at least come to terms with) physical and emotional pain, addiction, loss, dysfunctional and withering relationships, and other common, but intensely personal, problems. Most striking is that these citizens are acutely aware of their flaws, describing their most intimate thoughts and stories with a twinge of sadness, as if confessing--but not making excuses--for their actions. Some are hopeful, most are resigned, and there is a sense of entrapment among the characters, a realization that they may not have the strength, patience or even a clue how to change for the better. They tell us their strange dreams, fantasies, describe fleeting feelings of self-control.

Of the few, more traditional short stories, "Fishboy" is strongest, wherein a high-school student realizes finally that his obsession with a classmate is unhealthy. In "Gunman," McIntosh creates a faux news report of a bus driver's random shooting, containing a succinct elucidation of what drives these folks to speak: "Why do these things happen? What is it that allows them to happen? We wonder if there is a higher order to the universe. We wonder if there is a higher order to our world, at least. We report that our world is falling apart. And we report that we are falling apart." With the proof in the writing, not the ambitiousness or media fanfare, Well is a hauntingly memorable book from a refreshing, new voice. --Michael Ferch