Ohio

June 11, 2018
In Markley’s standout debut novel (following nonfiction works Publish This Book and Tales of Iceland), four former high school classmates return to their Ohio hometown to make amends. Once a bastion of steel-mill industry, New Canaan has been corroded by economic downturn and opiates; it’s pervaded by a sense of disillusionment shared by the four, whose rudderless adult lives pale alongside the blinding lights of their adolescence. Over the course of one night—interlaced with high school flashbacks—the four settle old scores and uncover some of the town’s nefarious secrets. There’s Bill Ashcraft, who drives into town to deliver a package to a familiar recipient; Stacey Moore, a doctoral candidate who’s sucked into the mystery of her former lover’s disappearance; veteran Dan Eaton, who returns from Afghanistan with a prosthetic eyeball and emotional wounds; and Tina Ross, who confronts a violent part of her past. As the night progresses, the long-buried truth behind a horrifying town legend takes shape, offering a window into the raw forces that shape the town and its residents. Markley’s novel is alternately disturbing and gorgeous, providing a broad view of the anxieties of a post-9/11 Middle America and the complexities of the humans who navigate them. Agent: Susan Golomb, Writers House.

June 15, 2018
A group of young men and women aggressively affected by the post-9/11 world reconverge in their Ohio hometown.Markley's (Tales of Iceland, 2013, etc.) flagrantly symphonic debut novel is effectively four linked novellas, with each section circling around a high school friend or acquaintance of Rick, who was killed in action in Iraq. Each person has hit on hard times in their 20s, and on one evening in their hometown of New Canaan, they're laboring to set things right. Bill has an omnivorous drug habit and is hauling a plainly illicit but unidentified (until the climax) package north from New Orleans; Stacey wants to confront the homophobic mother of her high school girlfriend; Dan is an Afghanistan war vet who wants to catch up with an old flame; and Tina has a score to settle with the jock who sexually abused her in high school. Markley is a knockout storyteller, infusing each section with realistic detail, from the drudgery of Walmart work to war to the fleeting ecstasies of drugs to violence, especially self-harm. (Tina's section is especially tough reading on that last front.) High school, Markley writes, provided "stories of dread and wonder you could wrap whole novels around," and he's followed through. There's an unsettling feeling, though, that while he's mastered complex characterization, it's often in service of simplistic broader portraiture about the Rust Belt. New Canaan, "sclerotic in every capacity," is doom-and-gloom to the edge of caricature: Its economy is rotted and shored up on meth and disability checks, its community reduced to pro-Trump resentment and anti-Muslim anger. The culture Markley describes unquestionably exists, and strong novels about America's underclass are lamentably thin on the ground. But this novel is best appreciated as a set of portraits rather than (as the title suggests) a definitive statement about an entire state.This is a big character-driven epic, though it's overinflated in its pronouncements about its setting.

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July 1, 2018
Markley's weighty debut novel is set in small-town Ohio, post 9/11, and catalogs the myriad ways that war and recession have failed a generation who have known little else. In New Canaan, a town suffering after factories shutter, readers follow four stories of twentysomethings who knew each other in high school, and the fallout of long-held secrets. Bill is ferreting an unknown package to help make ends meet; Stacey searches for her long-lost love, who disappeared shortly after her mother found the two of them together and unleashed fury; Dan has returned from Afghanistan missing an eye; and Tina executes a destructive revenge plot. Their intertwining tales share characters and themes, but plot connections are revealed slowly. Markley's writing is beautifully descriptive, firmly planting readers in the setting even as the author jumps in time, often from paragraph to paragraph. After the leisurely paced majority of the book, the final 100 pages feel rushed, and the climax comes from seemingly nowhere, but even this does little to take away from an insightful, tragic story.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)

Starred review from May 1, 2018

Markley's ambitious foray into fiction (following a memoir, Publish This Book) reunites four high school classmates on a fateful summer night in their Ohio hometown, in what reads like a darker-themed epilog to Friday Night Lights. Hollowed out by a generation of war, addiction, and crippling recession, the quintessential Midwestern town of New Canaan serves as a magnet for our protagonists, as they struggle to break free of their shared histories. There's an antiwar provocateur whose activism gave way to drugs and alcohol, driving back into town with a package taped to his truck; a doctoral candidate whose forbidden lover has not been heard from in nearly ten years; a reticent war veteran who chose three tours in Iraq over a future with the love of his life; and the quarterback's ex-girlfriend, whose beauty and popularity mask a shame that she finally resolves to address. Markley's prose sparkles with insight and supports an intricate narrative architecture that recalls Nathan Hill's The Nix and Patrick Somerville's This Bright River. VERDICT This bleak but honest survey of 21st-century America is highly recommended for all literary collections. [See Prepub Alert, 2/11/18.]--Michael Pucci, South Orange P.L., NJ

Copyright 2018 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 1, 2018

In 2013, former classmates return to overburdened small-town New Canaan, OH. Doctoral candidate Stacey girds for conflict with her former lover's mother, quiet veteran Dan dines with his high school sweetheart, activist Bill carries a mysterious package, and Tina's explosive meeting with the former football captain has consequences for them all. Big in-house love.

Copyright 2018 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.