Award-winning author James Wade blends atmospheric prose with soul-stirring themes in Hollow Out the Dark, a gothic adventure set against a Depression-era landscape where a whiskey war threatens to decimate a small Texas town.
Veteran of the Great War, Jesse Cole is grateful for the quiet life he now leads. But when his closest friend runs afoul of local criminals, Frog and Squirrel Fenley, Jesse is forced to spin his moral compass and enter a violent and volatile underworld. There he encounters corrupt lawmen, hired assassins, and a dark family secret that will upend all he once knew.
Complicating matters are Texas Ranger Amon Atkins—who arrives to investigate the Fenleys just as their empire is threatened by a deadly new competition—and the green-eyed, raven-haired Adaline, a love Jesse thought he’d lost forever.
With resources scarce and winter falling hard on the town, a desperate Jesse must choose between the law and the lawless and find a way to survive while still protecting the people he loves.
A heart-pounding tale full of plot-twisting revelations, Hollow Out the Dark brings readers into a whiskey-fueled world where everyone has a secret, and love everlasting balances on the edge of a knife.
Genre: Mystery
Veteran of the Great War, Jesse Cole is grateful for the quiet life he now leads. But when his closest friend runs afoul of local criminals, Frog and Squirrel Fenley, Jesse is forced to spin his moral compass and enter a violent and volatile underworld. There he encounters corrupt lawmen, hired assassins, and a dark family secret that will upend all he once knew.
Complicating matters are Texas Ranger Amon Atkins—who arrives to investigate the Fenleys just as their empire is threatened by a deadly new competition—and the green-eyed, raven-haired Adaline, a love Jesse thought he’d lost forever.
With resources scarce and winter falling hard on the town, a desperate Jesse must choose between the law and the lawless and find a way to survive while still protecting the people he loves.
A heart-pounding tale full of plot-twisting revelations, Hollow Out the Dark brings readers into a whiskey-fueled world where everyone has a secret, and love everlasting balances on the edge of a knife.
Genre: Mystery
Praise for this book
"With addictive prose and a style all his own, James Wade delivers another powerful read. Part Western, part Southern lit, part thriller, part mystery, part character study set in rural East Texas in the 1930s, Hollow Out the Dark is a mesmerizing story, dark, raw, and original." - Johnny D Boggs
"Hollow Out the Dark is a major achievement in Southern noir, a Prohibition-era crime epic that is at heart an affecting exploration of brotherhood in its many forms. With lyrical prose and sly period dialogue, James Wade builds a propulsive narrative that explodes with revelation. A haunting read that lingers in the memory long after the final page." - Scott Von Doviak
"In Hollow Out the Dark, James Wade casts a cold East Texas landscape in all its grim glory, reflecting the hearts of the men who battle for their piece of it. This prohibition-era Western is no simple tale of bootleggers and lawmen but a meditation on morality in which even the good must choose their own corruption. Wade imbues poetry, philosophy, and craftsmanship in his prose. From story, to scene, to sentence, his care is present in each word. A joy to read." - Caroline Frost
"In Hollow Out the Dark, James Wade's latest Southern-gothic feat, Wade stitches a propulsive tale with Biblical thread, fueling it with whiskey, tucking secrets beneath the floorboards, and draping the Depression-era landscape with suspense. Wade builds himself a well-deserved seat, pulling it to the literary table to sit alongside the likes of Ron Rash, Faulkner, and Cormac McCarthy." - Robert Gwaltney
"James Wade's newest novel, Hollow Out the Dark, is a masterpiece of atmospheric crime fiction; a worthy successor to the likes of William Gay and Cormac McCarthy. Set in East Texas, it is an epic, and age-old, story of greed and generational betrayal--where vengeance is swift and forgiveness a long time coming." - Kathleen Kent
"James Wade is a poet of the dark. With gorgeous lyricism, he writes of men and women caught in the bleakest of circumstances and the choices that must be made when desperate times require desperate measures. It's been forever since I read a novel so stunning in its language and so moving in its effect. Read this book and prepare to be amazed." - William Kent Krueger
"A war-for-whiskey Western in a small Texas town with prose that sings like Cormac, Woodrell, and Walter Hill formed a boy band. James Wade has packed a wallop of a gothic gut-punch about discovering where one's moral compass may land while spinning in a Depression-era storm of violence, corruption, and the hardest of times." - Mike McCrary
"If John Steinbeck and Cormac McCarthy have a present-day successor, it must be James Wade. As intoxicating and robust as its subject matter, Hollow Out the Dark is a Prohibition-era tale that poignantly reminds us although times may change, the human spirit remains frighteningly and unflinchingly the same. Wade distills language with the artistry of an expert craftsman and the fearlessness of a bootlegger.At once heartbreaking and hopeful, this book cements Wade's growing stature as a standard-bearer of Southern-gothic literature while proving yet again that he is one of the most distinctive voices of our time." - Rudy Ruiz
"Hollow Out the Dark is a major achievement in Southern noir, a Prohibition-era crime epic that is at heart an affecting exploration of brotherhood in its many forms. With lyrical prose and sly period dialogue, James Wade builds a propulsive narrative that explodes with revelation. A haunting read that lingers in the memory long after the final page." - Scott Von Doviak
"In Hollow Out the Dark, James Wade casts a cold East Texas landscape in all its grim glory, reflecting the hearts of the men who battle for their piece of it. This prohibition-era Western is no simple tale of bootleggers and lawmen but a meditation on morality in which even the good must choose their own corruption. Wade imbues poetry, philosophy, and craftsmanship in his prose. From story, to scene, to sentence, his care is present in each word. A joy to read." - Caroline Frost
"In Hollow Out the Dark, James Wade's latest Southern-gothic feat, Wade stitches a propulsive tale with Biblical thread, fueling it with whiskey, tucking secrets beneath the floorboards, and draping the Depression-era landscape with suspense. Wade builds himself a well-deserved seat, pulling it to the literary table to sit alongside the likes of Ron Rash, Faulkner, and Cormac McCarthy." - Robert Gwaltney
"James Wade's newest novel, Hollow Out the Dark, is a masterpiece of atmospheric crime fiction; a worthy successor to the likes of William Gay and Cormac McCarthy. Set in East Texas, it is an epic, and age-old, story of greed and generational betrayal--where vengeance is swift and forgiveness a long time coming." - Kathleen Kent
"James Wade is a poet of the dark. With gorgeous lyricism, he writes of men and women caught in the bleakest of circumstances and the choices that must be made when desperate times require desperate measures. It's been forever since I read a novel so stunning in its language and so moving in its effect. Read this book and prepare to be amazed." - William Kent Krueger
"A war-for-whiskey Western in a small Texas town with prose that sings like Cormac, Woodrell, and Walter Hill formed a boy band. James Wade has packed a wallop of a gothic gut-punch about discovering where one's moral compass may land while spinning in a Depression-era storm of violence, corruption, and the hardest of times." - Mike McCrary
"If John Steinbeck and Cormac McCarthy have a present-day successor, it must be James Wade. As intoxicating and robust as its subject matter, Hollow Out the Dark is a Prohibition-era tale that poignantly reminds us although times may change, the human spirit remains frighteningly and unflinchingly the same. Wade distills language with the artistry of an expert craftsman and the fearlessness of a bootlegger.At once heartbreaking and hopeful, this book cements Wade's growing stature as a standard-bearer of Southern-gothic literature while proving yet again that he is one of the most distinctive voices of our time." - Rudy Ruiz
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