The Name of the Nearest River: Stories — Alex Taylor

Short stories set in Kentucky from a prize-winning author who “writes with generosity and understanding of rural and small town life” (Chris Offutt, author of Country Dark).
 
Like a room soaked in the scent of whiskey, perfume, and sweat, the atmosphere of these stories is at once intoxicating, vulnerable, and full of brawn, revealing the hidden dangers in the coyote-infested fields, rusty riverbeds, and abandoned logging trails of Kentucky.
 
In one story, a man spends seven days in a jon boat with his fiddle and a Polaroid camera, determined to enact vengeance on the water-logged body of a used car salesman; in another, a demolition derby enthusiast watches his two wild, burning love interests duke it out, only to determine he would rather be left alone entirely. Together, these stories present a resonant debut collection from an unexpected new voice in Southern fiction, a recipient of the Thomas and Lillie D. Chaffin Award for Appalachian Writing, the Barry Hannah Prize for Fiction, and the Eric Hoffer Award in General Fiction.
 
“This debut collection pulls readers into rural Kentucky and hammers them with the despair and frustration that drive his fierce, battered denizens of the Bluegrass State.” -- Publishers Weekly (starred review)
 
“[Taylor] writes with wit, zest and skill . . . In the long queue of very good contemporary Southern writers, here's a guy who can cut to the front.” -- The Minneapolis Star-Tribune