Brutal book, not an easy read. It is full of violence, perverted characters ( and I mean really abnormal like child abusing priests and a Bonnie-and-Clyde-style serial killer couple) with no humor and written in a very sinister language. But believe me, once you start to read and survive to page 10 without putting it away, you´ĺl get sucked into this downward spiral of darkness; this book is fascinating.
The story is manyfold and describes the lives and deaths of several characters in the bible-belt-US between 1945 and 1960. These lives and their either desolate or gruesome inner workings are depicted and meetings between the main characters end mostly fatal.
The main topics of the book are guilt and believe. All the bad guys in the book are guilty of something (mostly of murdering the innocent) and all the good guys are hardcore believers and only toys for the badasses – a bit too much black and white, although there are greyshades and the main character doesn´t fit into this black and white scheme either.
If you get your hands on this book give it a try. It´ll be a short read – either you put it away quickly or you´ll suck it in breathlessly.