Abattoir Jack by Christopher Neilan.

 

At the age of 22, Jack is going nowhere.  Stuck in a New Mexico backwater, slicing dead cattle for a living, he is ready to seize any opportunity to make something of his life.  So when his workmate Ed tells him about the $25,000 stashed in a bus station locker in San Francisco, and when he meets and falls for the beautiful De S’anna, a sweet Italian supernova of sweat and lips and purple-black hair, the two events propel him into a journey of love, drugs, madness and determination as he tries to make real those two seductive mirages, the accidental fortune and the perfect love.

 

Christopher Neilan’s debut novel is a coruscating tale told in vibrant, visceral prose.  Funny, sexy, poetic, thrilling and endlessly inventive, Abattoir Jack is a very impressive achievement.