Last One Out Shut Off the Lights

May 11, 2020
Soileau’s vivid debut collection delves into snapshots of rough-hewn Louisianan lives, where harsh realities and callous personalities rule the day. In “The Whiskey Business” a high school girl is raped by a boy whose family wields their power to keep him from being prosecuted, and in “So This Is Permanence,” a teenage mother hides her baby in a closet to sneak off with friends, riding in the bed of a pickup across swamps and canals; after this taste of freedom, “dumpsters and rivers started to look like good options.” Other stories, such as “Cut Off, Louisiana: A Ghost Story” and “The Boucherie,” highlight economic desperation in the wake of natural disasters, while “Mr A” tells of a children’s theater director who takes advantage of a road trip to seduce a boy in the troupe. Many stories stand out with exceptional, sometimes poetic phrasing, such as “When Pluto Lost His Planetary Status” (“I have felt love just as profound and worshipful and inimitable and hopelessly banal”). Filled with dense disquietude, these tales portray lives that are wrung dry by relentless conflicts and challenges. The characters are markedly distinct among the stories, though they share in having little or no chance of joy, hope, or redemption. Soileau shines a memorable light on a lesser-seen slice of Louisiana.

Starred review from June 1, 2020
The characters in these short stories come from Sulphur, a southwest Louisiana town named after the stink it produced. Beaten down by hurricanes and unemployment, still haunted by the oil bust of the 1980s, and decimated environmentally, its residents speak Cajun-accented French and die slowly after lifetimes spent working at chemical plants and oil refineries. Some long to escape, while others can't even imagine a way out. One young woman finds solace in a video game in which she can be a queen instead of a payday-loan clerk who was held back twice in middle school, having sopped up the bleak conviction that all roads lead to Kmart or the plant, so why bother. Even those who succeed in getting out often find Sulphur difficult to leave behind; an academically gifted teen attends a magnet high school across the state but can't escape the legacy of her abusive brother. Southwest Louisiana native Soileau portrays the beauty of her home state as well as the poverty, and her empathy and love for its people are evident. A stunning debut from a writer to watch.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)