Goodnight, Texas

July 17, 2006
Goodnight by the Sea, Tex. (not to be confused with Goodnight in the Plains, 600 miles away), is a dying gulf coast town where global warming and international trade have made the once-reliable vocation of shrimping unprofitable. Alligators run amok while the West Nile virus picks off the elderly. When Russian restaurant owner Gusef learns a gigantic and thought-to-be-extinct zebra fish has beached itself nearby (replete with a dead horse in its belly), he dispatches his good-natured juvenile delinquent fry cook Falk to photograph it. As Gusef concocts schemes to capitalize on the dead fish, a hurricane brews in the gulf, portending possible doom for the town. The characters aren't particularly unique, but Cobb manages to breathe tragicomic life into them: Una, Falk's co-worker who wants more than Goodnight has to offer; Falk's adolescent cousin Leesha, who falls for Una's ex-boyfriend, Gabriel, the drunken bad boy turned driver's-ed instructor who in turn has it in for Falk. Though Cobb (The Fire Eaters
) sometimes strives too hard for colloquial legitimacy ("nowadays you'd be lucky to catch a gafftop catfish a pound"), he expertly exploits the claustrophobic and incestuous atmosphere of smalltown Texas.

Starred review from September 1, 2006
A prehistorically colossal zebra fish with a half-swallowed dead pony protruding from its mouth washes up on the shores of Goodnight, TX. To the wise and wizened locals, this offering from the sea is a bad sign. And, in fact, bad things have already started happening. The fishermen of Goodnight have lost their jobs owing to overfishing, the weather has turned unseasonably warm, and there is an abundance of disease-carrying mosquitoes. The lives of the townsfolk don't offer much more reason to hope. Falk, the orphaned teenager who works as a cook at the Black Tooth Café , nurtures an impossible love for the beautiful waitress, Una, who lives in a trailer with her overbearing mother and dreams of leaving Goodnight. Gabriel, her violent boyfriend, loses his shrimping job and becomes a predatory school bus driver, while Gusef, the Russian owner of the café , dispenses foreboding advice and faces the possible loss of his business. Cobb ("The Fire Eaters") deals with the underlying issues of the destructiveness of nature and the ultimate redemption of humankind. Superbly written, dark and amusing, Cobb's portrait of this small town on the edge of disaster will stay with one long after the last page is turned. Highly recommended." - Joy Humphrey, Pepperdine Law Lib., Malibu, CA"

Copyright 2006 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 15, 2006
Almost as if out of a dream, an enormous, zebra-striped fish the size of a Volkswagen washes up on the shore of the little fishing town of Goodnight, Texas. Even stranger still, there is a small horse stuck in its giant maw. The locals are intrigued, especially Falk, a teenage expellee who wears his heart decidedly on his shirtsleeve, and Gusef, who wants to stuff and mount the giant fish above his little gumbo-serving cafe. Una, a waitress at the cafe, has had it up to (her very diminutive) here with her alcoholic, quick-to-rage boyfriend, Gabriel, and falls immediately into the willing arms of Falk. As the giant fish finally makes its way onto the top of the cafe, a devastating hurricane threatens the already down-and-out inhabitants of the little town. Cobb, who focuses more on atmospherics than plotting, lets the relationships between his characters swirl and ebb without attempting to assert too much, but in so doing leaves much unresolved. Vivid yet gracefully understated at times, he paints in broad swatches that look great from afar but up close reveal some distinct, though promising, flaws.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2006, American Library Association.)