Read Life in the Land of the Living Storyline:
In Daniel Vilmure’s riveting, powerfully tender first novel, two nameless boys take off on a rampage through a seedy Florida port town on a hot, roiling August night, courting disaster with all the reckless abandon of boys until disaster turns and runs them down. They are brothers, out of a background just better than redneck, with a hard-drinking father and a faithless, despairing mother who has moved out. The older brother is a drunk like his daddy, illiterate and, he suspects, illegitimate. One moment he is hair-triggered, ready to snap. The next moment, he’s James Dean—cool, dancing on a high wire between grace and damnation. His kid brother—the little smart ass, the one with sense—goes along to save him but is no match for such hell-bent momentum. They race through the night, the older boy pushing the kid away, yet implicating him. They move helter-skelter through the town, fleeing a brawl at the bait and tackle shop, lifting their supper and a bottle of Gatorade from the all-night Stop ’n’ Go, sneaking into the Double D drive-in where they witness a killing (the first death in a night rife with mayhem), dodging sanctuary when it is offered, pitching themselves headlong —almost lovingly—into harm’s way, until they are moving too fast to be saved.Pages of Life in the Land of the Living :
