Once You Break a Knuckle: Stories
This powerful collection by the author of Ballistics (2013) is set, as that novel is, in the Kootenay Valley of western Canada, a region that seems oddly akin to the American South, with an assortment of macho (if vulnerable) men, rednecks (“hicks”), pickup trucks, booze, and drugs. Although there is a sameness to the stories—young men working out difficulties with their Great Santini–like fathers and with women, all of whom are described as beautiful—Wilson captures those travails and the British Columbia setting with strength, passion (a not unmixed affection), wit, and compelling imagery. In “Big Bitchin’ Cow,” a young man saves his father from a “mean” bovine; in “The Elasticity of Bone,” another teen arranges a competitive judo match with his unsuspecting dad. Physicality is a strong element in these stories, many related by character and almost all by theme. The book comes with impressive endorsements (Margaret Atwood, Geoff Dyer) and will appeal to readers of Russell Banks and Daniel Woodrell. --Mark Levine