Free Danner — Loretta Giacoletto

This coming-of-age novel for adults over 18 is on the edgy side, as in dark humor with off-beat characters, some not-so-likable, others downright despicable. As for Danner, he's the ultimate bad boy readers will either love or hate or love to hate. Free Danner really is free, after spending ten years in Juvy for what the judge called an unspeakable act and Danner considered one of mercy. Now he's determined to find the dad who doesn't know he exists. One thing's for sure: this is not The Maury Povich Show; it's Danner's. And he figures everybody's out to screw him, especially the big shot who hired him as a hit-man-in-training. So what's a guy to do? The right thing, but Danner has always had a problem distinguishing right from wrong. Free Danner is eleven when his party-girl mom sends him to live with her parents on their Southern Illinois farm. The generation gap proves harder on the rebellious city boy than his grandparents and soon results in a tragedy so horrific no one could've predicted it. Fast forward to Danner at twenty-two, by-passing those years he spent in the juvenile system and then some. He locates his mom Lark in St. Louis and demands she name the clueless dad. Lark's not sure but with Danner's not-so-gentle persuasion, she comes up with three possibilities. Danner's search for his dad and a better life takes him on a crisscross journey to Las Vegas, Southern California, and the Florida Panhandle. Most of the off-beat characters he encounters along the way either wind up dead or wanting Danner out of their lives. But these people don't know the real Danner or what being free means to him.