{"id":2444,"date":"2017-08-27T19:48:52","date_gmt":"2017-08-27T13:48:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/williamjcobb.com\/blog\/?p=2444"},"modified":"2017-08-27T19:48:52","modified_gmt":"2017-08-27T13:48:52","slug":"review-of-gabriel-tallents-my-absolute-darling-in-the-dallas-morning-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/williamjcobb.com\/blog\/index.php\/2017\/08\/27\/review-of-gabriel-tallents-my-absolute-darling-in-the-dallas-morning-news\/","title":{"rendered":"Review of Gabriel Tallent's "My Absolute Darling" in the Dallas Morning News"},"content":{"rendered":"

So my review of Gabriel Tallent’s debut novel, My Absolute Darling<\/em>, appears in the Dallas Morning News<\/em> today, and can be found here<\/a>. The marketing of this novel seems odd: The combination of its sweet title, the brightly colored branches and needles of the redwoods (it’s set in Northern California) on the book jacket and the glowing blurbs (one of which mentions the book’s “humor”) makes it seem the book is being presented as something of a love story. But the actual plot line is about a beer-guzzling, crazed loner of a father raping and abusing his much-put-upon daughter, a rough-hewn teenage girl. It’s a tough story, and by the end, resembles more horror than coming-of-age\u2014a hybrid of sorts. That’s not unusual (the hybrid nature), and writers\u2014such as Stephen Graham Jones’s in\u00a0All the Beautiful Sinners<\/em> and many others\u2014have done this masterfully, though I think it’s usually acknowledged in the presentation of the book. I was surprised while reading it, noticing that great discrepancy between the book the ad copy presented and what it actually was.
\n\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So my review of Gabriel Tallent’s debut novel, My Absolute Darling, appears in the Dallas Morning News today, and can be found here. The marketing of this novel seems odd: The combination of its sweet title, the brightly colored branches … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,29],"tags":[55,92,178],"class_list":["post-2444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-the-west","tag-book-reviewing","tag-gabriel-tallents-my-absolute-darling","tag-the-west"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t