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The first four chapters of Smonk surely rank among the most grotesque, savage and compelling fiction ever written.  Using Alabama in the early 1900s as his setting, Tom Franklin has created two despicably fascinating characters, E.O. Smonk and Evavangeline, for whom violent and creative self-preservation are as natural as breathing.  These two travel along separate paths of destruction, sharing some bit players in their storylines, but otherwise remaining oblivious of each other’s existence as they move toward the day of reckoning.

Whether they are evil incarnate, as some folks believe, or avenging angels, Franklin does not make clear, because he populates the countryside with enough human and animal detritus to place their actions in proper context.  As bad as they may be, Smonk and Evavangeline are simply the best at playing a game in which survival is the only rule.

Franklin sets a frantic pace in the beginning, as the bodies and the indignities against humanity pile up like the carcasses of rabid dogs that litter the land.  Smonk simultaneously repulses and demands rapt attention, appealing not to the prurient interests of pulp fiction but to the stunned disbelief that things cannot get any worse.  Or can they? (more…)