Knockemstiff [Paperback]

Donald Ray Pollock (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 10, 2009

In this unforgettable work of fiction, Donald Ray Pollock peers into the soul of a tough Midwestern American town to reveal the sad, stunted but resilient lives of its residents. Knockemstiff is a genuine entry into the literature of place.Spanning a period from the mid-sixties to the late nineties, the linked stories that comprise Knockemstiff feature a cast of recurring characters who are irresistibly, undeniably real. A father pumps his son full of steroids so he can vicariously relive his days as a perpetual runner-up body builder. A psychotic rural recluse comes upon two siblings committing incest and feels compelled to take action. Donald Ray Pollock presents his characters and the sordid goings-on with a stern intelligence, a bracing absence of value judgments, and a refreshingly dark sense of bottom-dog humor.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Amazon Significant Seven, March 2008: A quick Internet search for "Knockemstiff, Ohio" reveals a lazy nexus of shabby houses and dirt roads in southern Ohio, lacking a post office and grocery store, but rich in legends of epic fistfights and swamp-dwelling ghosts. Donald Ray Pollock, a native of this "ghost town," populates his own Knockemstiff with living revenants: huffers, murderers, sex fiends, and their hapless (though not innocent) victims, all tethered to the woebegone "holler" by their own self-inflicted shortcomings and depravities. Pollock pulls no punches--his prose is blunt and visceral, as well as stylish and skilled--and reading these mini grand guignols can be like crunching on a mouthful of your own broken teeth. He resists casting judgment (or sympathy) on his doomed reprobates; predator or prey (or sometimes both), Pollock contemplates his characters with all the warmth of a "frozen bleach bottle." It's an astonishing debut. --Jon Foro

--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly

A native of Knockemstiff, Ohio, Pollock delivers poignant and raunchy accounts of his hometown's sad and stagnant residents in his debut story collection that may remind readers of its thematic grand-daddy, Winesburg, Ohio. The works span 50 years of violence, failure, lust and depravity, featuring characters like Jake, an abandoned hermit who dodges the draft during WWII, lives in a bus and discovers two young siblings committing incest on the bank of a creek, and Bobby, a recovering alcoholic who must face the imminent death of his abusive father. The language and imagery of the novel are shockingly direct in detailing the pitiful lives of drug abusers, perverts and a forgotten population that just isn't much welcome nowhere in the world. Many of the characters appear in more than one story, providing a gritty depth to the whole, but the character that stands out the most is the town, as dismal and hopeless as the locals. Pollock is intimate with the grimy aspects of a small town (especially one named after a fistfight) full of poor, uneducated people without futures or knowledge of any other way to live. The most startling thing about these stories is they have an aura of truth. (Mar.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Anchor; Reprint edition (March 10, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 076792830X
• ISBN-13: 978-0767928304
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.7 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (97 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #83,899 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Donald Ray Pollock grew up in Knockemstiff, Ohio, and quit high school at seventeeen to work in a meatpacking plant. He then spent thirty-two years employed as a laborer at the Mead Paper Corporation in Chillicothe, Ohio, before enrolling in the MFA program at Ohio State University. His first book, a collection of stories called Knockemstiff, won the 2009 PEN/Robert Bingham Fellowship. His novel, The Devil All The Time, is forthcoming from Doubleday in July, 2011. Though pretty much a Luddite when it comes to most computer stuff, he is now on Facebook (facebook.com/DonaldRayPollock) and also has a website at www.donaldraypollock.com.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

191 of 202 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Bruised, Vulnerable, Ill-Starred Inhabitants of Knockemstiff, Ohio, April 10, 2008

By 

Grady Harp (Los Angeles, CA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Knockemstiff (Hardcover)

Donald Ray Pollock is talented. His style of writing is one that feels like spontaneous impressions of a tribal people from which he takes the reader by the collar and spins wild tales, all the while making us believe each of his weirdly comic/tragic characters actually exists. Pollock's vantage is not unlike the gopher who happens to burrow up into a strange neighborhood, glances about is total disbelief, then scurries back down in wonder about the current state of the world: the mound he leaves behind is this highly entertaining book.

Though Knockemstiff is an actual place in the remnants of a once settled and civilized Ohio, Pollock uses the place as the matrix from which he devises some of the strangest stories in literature. Though the book is a collection of short stories, Pollock ties some of the characters together in different stories giving the reader the idea that the number of creatures who populate this degenerate town are so few that they must serve as actors more than once. These people are often disabled by drugs, alcohol, physical abnormalities, mental derangements, or the products of barely together couplings that mutually drive partners into bizarre behaviors.

Pollock can create suggestive sexual scenes only to remind the reader with the use of brittle descriptions that the surroundings are peppered with detritus, enough to keep the lights on. Each of the aimlessly unhappy folks we encounter retains an edge of humor (despite some impressively dour physical attributes) and that is in the end what keeps the reader engaged. To retain interest in these folks through eighteen varied (but not dissimilar) stories Pollock is forced to occasionally rely on fantasy episodes out of town, but he deftly keeps his characters in the dirt/mud/snow of Knockemstiff in a manner that keeps the thwarted dreams grounded.

Pollock uses a language that is rich and colorful, and even while his characters seem to be disengaged from a happy life, he manages to take some flights into the beauty of nature - yes, even in Knockemstiff, Ohio the land can be beautiful. The stories he has written can be read quickly, but the metaphors each carry need some time to absorb. There is a little of each of us somewhere in Knockemstiff, whether we admit it or not. For a first novel, this is a winner! Donald Ray Pollock IS talented. Grady Harp, April 08

25 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Donald Ray Pollock, my hero, March 26, 2008

By 

Bill Mitchell "RagingBill" (Baltimore, MD USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Knockemstiff (Kindle Edition)

Donald Ray Pollock's my hero. He's taken a leap into space and he's not coming back. I'm only half way through this book, but it's already been worth the money. More than worth it. I'm taking my time with it.

This man who stopped at age 45 to write his book; he felt it was now or never. He didn't want to go to his grave without trying. Now he has carved out a career -- away from driving trucks or working at a meat packing plant. That's guts, and he's good.


I don't know where he gets his stories, how he writes so well, or how he sleeps at night. But he's driving at 120 miles per hour to a place that's impossible to describe. Just amazing.

Bill

16 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Captivating despite (or because of) the wretchedness, March 20, 2008

By 

J. Schowengerdt "Gertie" (madison, wi) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Knockemstiff (Hardcover)

These stories are intense, quirky, a little down-dirty, and fascinating.

If someone had described this book to me before I'd read it, I might have thought "not my thing". The characters are not especially likable, the stories are not particularly uplifting. Then again, that's part of the point. Even though part of me kept thinking "can't one of these folks get their bleep together and live a happy life?", the rest of me was busy wallowing in their misery.

Aside from the content of the stories, the writing style is interesting. Some of the descriptions made me chuckle, and a few of them brought on the thought "yeah, that's it exactly!".

There are a couple of Pollock's stories to be found online if you want to get a taste before committing to the book- but it's hardly necessary. You probably won't be able to turn away.