The Killing Hills

A beautifully-written short novel set in Eastern Kentucky, in hollers near Morehead. A woman is found dead in the woods; who's responsible? The local sheriff gets help from her brother, who is home from the wars to see his pregnant wife. He's a skilled military police investigator, and he knows the area. A local politician (crooked, of course) brings aboard an FBI agent from Lexington to mess up the investigation, and an innocent young man is arrested - but the brother and sister are able to bring the case to a resolution of sorts.

A few things that didn't work for me - the FBI involvement seemed implausible and a little slapstick-y. The pregnant wife who had an affair was a bit of a cipher and not always well-integrated into the story. show more The hero is a bit too good at his job. And it was short! I suddenly realized it was nearly over, and that was a disappointment.

What was really great about the book, though, was the loving and authentic picture of a place where family relationships mean everything, where you know who you're dealing with based on who their kin are. (The one sad character, the Dopted Boy, was an outcast because he wasn't blood-related to anyone in the area, being adopted.) The sense of place extends to the natural world, beautifully described. The town of Morehead, too, is depicted in a way that shows the old town and the old ways dying off and being squeezed out and replaced by a university and a medical center. I hadn't read anything by this author before, but I will definitely read his work again. show less

I'll confess that I was drawn to this book by its cover, especially the way that the old pickup stands out like blood in snow. It offered something different and far outside my personal experience.

As soon as I started the book, I knew I'd made the right choice. I slid straight into the narrative, watching an old man walking a hill in the Kentucky Appalachians in the early morning, searching for ginseng and discovering a body. The text was crisp and low key but I was already intrigued. Why was an eighty-one-year-old man both the oldest man in his community and the only old man he knew? What did that say about mortality rates in his community? Why would a man searching for wild ginseng habitually carry a revolver? And what kind of man show more has, as his first concern after finding a body, the transplantation of a young ginseng plant to keep it from being trampled by the police that he would soon have to call?

I was barely one page in and already I knew I was somewhere quite different from my normal Brit or US big-city crime fiction environments. show less

Very well-written, in my opinion, & very much captures the environment & personalities of southern hill people. (This is Kentucky; I have relatives from the hills of North Carolina. There were pieces/phrases/moments that just felt so familiar -- a vestigial stirring from extended family & past generations.) I think it is a fair portrayal of the pros & cons of the people & the place.

I would be curious about the audiobook because even the cadence of the writing made me imagine people speaking slowly (in the stereotypical southern manner). I don't know if I could just hear the wording in my head because of the way he phrased things or what.

I really liked this book. Recommended if you're looking for modern noir.

After a long absence, hard-boiled combat veteran Mick Hardin has taken leave from the army to return to his eastern-Kentucky home and visit with his pregnant wife. Since they’re not getting along, Mick is holed up in his grandfather’s cabin deep in the woods, where he’s taking some time to consider his own future and that of his troubled marriage. Mick, who is now an agent for the army’s Criminal Investigation Division (CID), does not know how to deal with the fact that the baby might not be his and is drinking himself stupid every night. When a woman’s body is discovered in a remote “holler,” Mick’s sister Linda, the town’s new sheriff, who’s facing political pressure to hand the case over to the FBI, asks him to show more conduct an impromptu investigation. She’s worried that the victim’s family will not share what they know with the police and instead find an opportunity to dispense their own form of justice. Mick is familiar with the territory and the people—a proud lot steeped in a tradition of self-sufficiency and deep mistrust of authority. He speaks their language and knows ways to get them to lower their guard and give up their secrets, and his efforts quickly uncover some unsettling local truths. But The Killing Hills is more than a simple whodunit. About midway through, the primary focus of Offutt’s gripping novel shifts ever so slightly to Mick’s domestic and professional tribulations. It turns out that Mick’s been avoiding calls from his CO: he’s allowed his leave to expire and is now considered AWOL and subject to arrest. Chris Offutt does not waste words: his prose is succinct and to the point. His descriptions effectively set the scene, his dialogue is crisp and curt and often very funny. There is a mystery at its core, but this tautly written story of revenge and betrayal is also richly imagined and deeply human. show less

The booksellers at my favorite indie bookstore are responsible for making me notice Chris Offutt's The Killing Hills, and I'm glad I paid attention. Offutt's book made such an impression on me that I can't wait to read more of Mick Hardin's adventures.

The setting in the Appalachian mountains of eastern Kentucky is pitch-perfect with its deep woods, steep-sided trails, and plenty of places to hide. The residents of those hills and hollers are also vividly drawn, with their clannish affiliations and long memories. They find any way they can to survive, and the choices can be on the wrong side of the law. Life is hard there. So much so that it's the only area in the United States in which the life span is shorter than it was twenty years show more ago.

The colloquial dialogue with its oftentimes humorous turns of phrase made me feel right at home, although if you're like my friend in Minnesota you may not cotton to the southernness of the language (she says with tongue in cheek). Don't worry, though. Offutt doesn't layer on that southern talk with a trowel, so you shouldn't be a bit confused.

Mick is definitely the star of the show, and I loved following him around as he investigated the murder. His knowledge of the people and the area are so profound that, once he knew the identity of the dead woman, he knew which people to question and which ones to watch. His success in dealing with these clannish people is due in equal parts to skill, familiarity, and magic. Watching him avoid danger in the woods by using simple tricks like knowing which bird calls means all's well is a joy and put me right beside him on the page.

Setting, dialogue, characters, mystery... the icing on the cake was the compassionate, intelligent way everything was wrapped up, from the solution to the murder to the strain between Hardin and his wife. I definitely need to read more of Chris Offutt's writing. show less

The Killing Hills is my first Chris Offutt novel, but definitely not my last. What a genuine student of Southern Gothic he is, bringing the hills of Kentucky alive, with all the things that are endearing, like strong family ties, and scary, like clan revenge. Mick Hardin, our protagonist, has a love/hate relationship with his hometown and by the end of the novel, so did I.

I have been reading a lot of heavy material lately--The Henrys, James and Fielding--and this novel was like a breath of fresh air. It was fast-paced, intriguing, and unpredictable. As exciting as the story was, it was the character development that won me and kept me in for the ride. I closed the book wanting more of Mick Hardin.

I have had Chris Offutt on my TBR for show more years, one of those authors I could just never seem to make time for. That won’t be a problem in the future, because I am excited for the next installment in this trilogy, which is due out at the beginning of 2022, and it will be on my wishlist. show less

After reading a full slate of Appalachian books chock full of dour, joyless characters, I found Chris Offutt's writing delightful. The characters weren't necessarily less dour or joyless than characters in other books, but Offutt seems to recall that, once in a while, we all need to laugh.