From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Lovers of gritty noir will devour this stand-alone from Piccirilli (Shadow Season), a pulse-pounding account of a writer's descent into despair and violence. The unnamed narrator's wife has left him; he feels guilty about their decision to have an abortion; and his once-promising literary career, which netted him several awards, has petered out. As the story opens, he's a homeless drifter, alone except for his dog, Churchill. When three punks attack him on a Denver street, something snaps and he fights back, seriously injuring his assailants. He pawns his few remaining possessions from his late parents and uses the cash to buy a gun, before traveling across the country to seek out his brother in New York. On his tortured odyssey, he revisits parts of his past in an effort to tease out some sort of meaning. Piccirilli makes his fall from grace utterly convincing and his emotional rage all too understandable. (Apr.)
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Review
'EVERY SHALLOW CUT is bloody brilliant. So many emotional wallops in so few pages.' --Sarah Weinman (Los Angeles Times, Barnes & Noble Review)
'EVERY SHALLOW CUT can easily be read in 90 minutes -- and it should be. Doing so makes Piccirilli's matter-of-fact portrait of utter despair more compelling and drives home its austere beauty. Inspired by current economic hardship and possibly by his own worst nightmares, Piccirilli dedicates the book to readers who share such fears. Ninety minutes spent with EVERY SHALLOW CUT will sting for years.' --Thomas Gaughan, Booklist
'I love the writing here. It is stripped down to a kind of Charles Willeford-Charles Williams simplicity that is all the more effective for its bluntness and accessibility. The dialogue is dead-on. . . . Tom Piccirilli has written many fine books and stories but at this point in his career, for me anyway, I would call EVERY SHALLOW CUT his masterpiece.' --Ed Gorman, Spur- and Bram Stoker Award-winning author of The Poker Club
'With an already-impressive body of work behind him, Piccirilli delivers his greatest book yet with Every Shallow Cut. Piccirilli's prose is stripped-down and almost acoustic for this effort. Every word counts . . . and cuts. If this were music, Every Shallow Cut would sit right alongside Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska, Johnny Cash's American Recordings, and Neil Young's Harvest Moon. Highly recommended.' --Brian Keene
'With an already-impressive body of work behind him, Piccirilli delivers his greatest book yet with Every Shallow Cut. Piccirilli's prose is stripped-down and almost acoustic for this effort. Every word counts . . . and cuts. If this were music, Every Shallow Cut would sit right alongside Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska, Johnny Cash's American Recordings, and Neil Young's Harvest Moon. Highly recommended.' ---- Brian Keene
'I love the writing here. It is stripped down to a kind of Charles Willeford-Charles Williams simplicity that is all the more effective for its bluntness and accessibility. The dialogue is dead-on. . . . Tom Piccirilli has written many fine books and stories but at this point in his career, for me anyway, I would call EVERY SHALLOW CUT his masterpiece.' --Ed Gorman, Spur- and Bram Stoker Award-winning author of The Poker Club
