Awards

• Commended for Society of Midland Authors Award (Adult Fiction) 2012

Overview

"From the acclaimed author of ""Knockemstiff""--called ""powerful, remarkable, exceptional"" by the ""Los Angeles Times""--comes a dark and riveting vision of America that delivers literary excitement in the highest degree. In ""The Devil All the Time,"" Donald Ray Pollock has written a novel that marries the twisted intensity of Oliver Stone's ""Natural Born Killers"" with the religious and Gothic over-tones of Flannery O'Connor at her most haunting. Set in rural southern Ohio and West Virginia, ""The Devil All the Time"" follows a cast of compelling and bizarre characters from the end of World War II to the 1960s. There's Willard Russell, tormented veteran of the carnage in the South Pacific, who can't save his beautiful wife, Charlotte, from an agonizing death by cancer no matter how much sacrifi-cial blood he pours on his ""prayer log."" There's Carl and Sandy Henderson, a husband-and-wife team of serial kill-ers, who troll America's highways searching for suitable models to photograph and exterminate. There's the spider-handling preacher Roy and his crippled virtuoso-guitar-playing sidekick, Theodore, running from the law. And caught in the middle of all this is Arvin Eugene Russell, Willard and Charlotte's orphaned son, who grows up to be a good but also violent man in his own right. Donald Ray Pollock braids his plotlines into a taut narrative that will leave readers astonished and deeply moved. With his first novel, he proves himself a master storyteller in the grittiest and most uncompromising American grain."

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9780385535045

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Reviews

The Devil All The Time is one of GQ's Books of the Year: Flannery O'Connor's brutal Wise Blood looks like Sense and Sensibility next to this finely woven, throat-stomping Appalachian crime story. Praise for The Devil All the Time Pollock's first novel, The Devil All the Time, should cement his reputation as a significant voice in American fiction. ...[He] deftly shifts from one perspective to another, without any clunky transitions--the prose just moves without signal or stumble, opening up the story in new ways again and again...where any prime-time television show can incite nail-biting with a lurking killer, Pollock has done much more. He's layered decades of history, shown the inner thoughts of a collage of characters, and we understand how deeply violence and misfortune have settled into the bones of this place. The question is much more than whether someone will die--it is, can the cycle of bloodletting break? This applies both to the people Pollock so skillfully enlivens as it does to the place he's taken as his literary heritage. --Carolyn Kellogg, Los Angeles Times The Devil All the Time... fulfills the promise in [Pollock's] 2008 short-story collection, Knockemstiff, named after his real-life hometown, where life as is tough as its name suggests. His fictional characters find ways to make it tougher. Devil, as violent as the bloodiest parts of the Old Testament...invites comparisons to Flannery O'Connor and Raymond Carver, who mined the grace and guilt in the hopeless lives of lost souls....But it's not so much what happens as how Pollock, with the brutal beauty of spare writing, brings it all together. --Bob Minzesheimer, USA Today If Pollock's powerful collection Knockemstiff was a punch to the jaw, his follow-up, a novel set in the violent soul-numbing towns of southern Ohio and West Virginia, feels closer to a mule's kick, and how he draws these folks and their inevitabl Praise for The Devil All the Time Pollock's first novel, The Devil All the Time, should cement his reputation as a significant voice in American fiction. ...[He] deftly shifts from one perspective to another, without any clunky transitions--the prose just moves without signal or stumble, opening up the story in new ways again and again...where any prime-time television show can incite nail-biting with a lurking killer, Pollock has done much more. He's layered decades of history, shown the inner thoughts of a collage of characters, and we understand how deeply violence and misfortune have settled into the bones of this place. The question is much more than whether someone will die--it is, can the cycle of bloodletting break? This applies both to the people Pollock so skillfully enlivens as it does to the place he's taken as his literary heritage. --Carolyn Kellogg, Los Angeles Times The Devil All the Time... fulfills the promise in [Pollock's] 2008 short- Advance Praise for The Devil All The Time The Devil All the Time... fulfills the promise in [Pollock's] 2008 short-story collection, Knockemstiff, named after his real-life hometown, where life as is tough as its name suggests. His fictional characters find ways to make it tougher. Devil, as violent as the bloodiest parts of the Old Testament...invites comparisons to Flannery O'Connor and Raymond Carver, who mined the grace and guilt in the hopeless lives of lost souls....But it's not so much what happens as how Pollock, with the brutal beauty of spare writing, brings it all together. --Bob Minzesheimer, USA Today If Pollock's powerful collection Knockemstiff was a punch to the jaw, his follow-up, a novel set in the violent soul-numbing towns of southern Ohio and West Virginia, feels closer to a mule's kick, and how he draws these folks and their inevitably hopeless lives without pity is what the kick's all about. Willard Russell is back from ther Advance Praise for The Devil All The Time If Pollock's powerful collection Knockemstiff was a punch to the jaw, his follow-up, a novel set in the violent soul-numbing towns of southern Ohio and West Virginia, feels closer to a mule's kick, and how he draws these folks and their inevitably hopeless lives without pity is what the kick's all about. Willard Russell is back from the war, on a Greyhound bus passing through Meade, Ohio, in 1945 when he falls for a pretty waitress in a coffee ship. Haunted by what he's seen in the Pacific and by the lovely Charlotte, he finds her again, marries her, and has a son, Arvin. But happiness is elusive, and while Willard teaches his only son some serious survival skills ( You just got to pick the right time, he tells him about getting back at bullies. They's a lot of no-good sonofabitches out there ), Charlotte sickens, Willard goes mad--sacrificing animals and worse at his altar in the woods--and Arvin's sent to his grandmother Emma i Praise for The Devil All The Time If Pollock's powerful collection Knockemstiff was a punch to the jaw, his follow-up, a novel set in the violent soul-numbing towns of southern Ohio and West Virginia, feels closer to a mule's kick, and how he draws these folks and their inevitably hopeless lives without pity is what the kick's all about. Willard Russell is back from the war, on a Greyhound bus passing through Meade, Ohio, in 1945 when he falls for a pretty waitress in a coffee ship. Haunted by what he's seen in the Pacific and by the lovely Charlotte, he finds her again, marries her, and has a son, Arvin. But happiness is elusive, and while Willard teaches his only son some serious survival skills ( You just got to pick the right time, he tells him about getting back at bullies. They's a lot of no-good sonofabitches out there ), Charlotte sickens, Willard goes mad--sacrificing animals and worse at his altar in the woods--and Arvin's sent to his grandmother Emma in Coal C Praise for Knockemstiff Pollock brings grace and precision to colloquial language, and the ferocious integrity of his vision is flat-out stunning . . . I keep reaching for some other writer to compare him with--maybe a Raymond Carver with hope and vitality, or a godless Flannery O'Conner--but Pollock is no shadow of anybody else. This is a powerful talent at work. --Katherine Dunn, author of Geek Love This is as raw as American fiction gets. It is an unforgettable experience. -- San Francisco Chronicle Pollock's voice is fresh and full-throated . . . His steely, serrated prose . . . calls to mind Harry Crews. -- New York Times Book Review The next important voice in American fiction. -- Wall Street Journal More engaging than any new fiction in years. --Chuck Palahniuk Knockemstiff is an astonishing debut, reminiscent of when Larry Brown burst on the scene with Facing the Music. Pollock's refusal to sentimen

Praise for Knockemstiff <br> Pollock brings grace and precision to colloquial language, and the ferocious integrity of his vision is flat-out stunning . . . I keep reaching for some other writer to compare him with--maybe a Raymond Carver with hope and vitality, or a godless Flannery O'Conner--but Pollock is no shadow of anybody else. This is a powerful talent at work. <br>--Katherine Dunn, author of Geek Love <br> This is as raw as American fiction gets. It is an unforgettable experience. <br>-- San Francisco Chronicle <br> Pollock's voice is fresh and full-throated . . . His steely, serrated prose . . . calls to mind Harry Crews. <br>-- New York Times Book Review <br> The next important voice in American fiction. <br>-- Wall Street Journal <br> More engaging than any new fiction in years. <br>--Chuck Palahniuk <br> Knockemstiff is an astonishing debut, reminiscent of when Larry Brown burst on the scene with Facing the Music. Pollock's refusal to sentimen

Advance Praise for The Devil All The Time <br> If Pollock's powerful collection Knockemstiff was a punch to the jaw, his follow-up, a novel set in the violent soul-numbing towns of southern Ohio and West Virginia, feels closer to a mule's kick, and how he draws these folks and their inevitably hopeless lives without pity is what the kick's all about. Willard Russell is back from the war, on a Greyhound bus passing through Meade, Ohio, in 1945 when he falls for a pretty waitress in a coffee ship. Haunted by what he's seen in the Pacific and by the lovely Charlotte, he finds her again, marries her, and has a son, Arvin. But happiness is elusive, and while Willard teaches his only son some serious survival skills ( You just got to pick the right time, he tells him about getting back at bullies. They's a lot of no-good sonofabitches out there ), Charlotte sickens, Willard goes mad--sacrificing animals and worse at his altar in the woods--and Arvin's sent to his grandmother Emma i

Praise for The Devil All The Time <br> If Pollock's powerful collection Knockemstiff was a punch to the jaw, his follow-up, a novel set in the violent soul-numbing towns of southern Ohio and West Virginia, feels closer to a mule's kick, and how he draws these folks and their inevitably hopeless lives without pity is what the kick's all about. Willard Russell is back from the war, on a Greyhound bus passing through Meade, Ohio, in 1945 when he falls for a pretty waitress in a coffee ship. Haunted by what he's seen in the Pacific and by the lovely Charlotte, he finds her again, marries her, and has a son, Arvin. But happiness is elusive, and while Willard teaches his only son some serious survival skills ( You just got to pick the right time, he tells him about getting back at bullies. They's a lot of no-good sonofabitches out there ), Charlotte sickens, Willard goes mad--sacrificing animals and worse at his altar in the woods--and Arvin's sent to his grandmother Emma in Coal C

Advance Praise for The Devil All The Time <p> The Devil All the Time... fulfills the promise in [Pollock's] 2008 short-story collection, Knockemstiff, named after his real-life hometown, where life as is tough as its name suggests. His fictional characters find ways to make it tougher. Devil, as violent as the bloodiest parts of the Old Testament...invites comparisons to Flannery O'Connor and Raymond Carver, who mined the grace and guilt in the hopeless lives of lost souls....But it's not so much what happens as how Pollock, with the brutal beauty of spare writing, brings it all together. --Bob Minzesheimer, USA Today <p> If Pollock's powerful collection Knockemstiff was a punch to the jaw, his follow-up, a novel set in the violent soul-numbing towns of southern Ohio and West Virginia, feels closer to a mule's kick, and how he draws these folks and their inevitably hopeless lives without pity is what the kick's all about. Willard Russell is back from thep

Author Information

"DONALD RAY POLLOCK, recipient of the 2009 PEN/Robert Bingham Fellowship, made his literary debut in 2008 with the critically acclaimed short story collection ""Knockemstiff."" He worked as a laborer at the Mead Paper Mill in Chillicothe, Ohio, from 1973 to 2005."

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