''Philipp Meyer's debut novel, set in Buell, Pennsylvania, the heart of America's withering Rust Belt, could easily be a regular tale of life on the other side of the tracks. When the once-booming steel and coal industries collapsed, "half the people went on welfare and the other half went back to hunter-gathering". Buell has become the kind of place where kids cook up meth in their backyards and Wal-Mart is the only company hiring. Meyer's cast is equally familiar: Isaac England, a bright boy who should have gone to college but stayed to look after his disabled father; his sister, Lee, who has fled town for the Ivy League; his best friend, Billy Poe, the high-school football star who has become a violent, beer-swilling no-hoper; Poe's mother, Grace, who can't keep away from good-for-nothing men; and Bud, a cop with a good heart..''
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