The Bottoms by Joe R. Lansdale

The Bottoms is an Edgar award-winning novel that is told in first-person by Harry Collins, an old man in a rest home, that reflects on his time as a boy in the 1930s, when he and his younger sister discover the corpse of a prostitute in the forest near their home. This discovery sets off a string of events where Harry’s father Jacob, the local constable, investigates a string of similar murders and the racist underbelly of the community of Marvel Creek, Texas comes to light. This novel is like a cross between Where the Red Fern Grows and To Kill a Mockingbird with a serial killer thrown into the mix.

The story has an interesting mix of nostalgia and horror as Harry reflects on his youth in the rural community, a place that is beautifully simple as well as horrific in equal measure. Lansdale does an excellent balancing act, showing the good from the ones in the community fighting for racial equality and the bad from the ones who are part of the KKK or simply intolerant to the Black community nearby. Turns out, many in the White community are actually biracial, whether they know it or not, and this bit of secrecy lurks underneath their community; it’s like a hidden treasure waiting to be discovered. Even members of the KKK are either unknowingly biracial or in one case, a Jew. It’s a telling reality that the town has a difficult time facing. But, in addition to all of this, there is a serial killer stalking women, and leaving their defiled corpses along the river. Harry’s father Jacob, the noble constable of Marvel Creek, does his best to investigate the murders. When a Black man named Old Mose is hung by the KKK for the murders, Jacob is consumed with grief and alcohol for Mose’s unjustified killing. Only when Harry’s grandmother arrives do the clues left by the killer get a more thorough examination, leading us to the truth.

Harry is a very effective storyteller and his memory of the time is sharp, effusive, and empathetic. If there is a stumbling block at all—and it is a minor quibble to be sure—it is the soliloquy the killer eventually gives for his motives, a page taken straight out of a comic book, like a super villain sermonizing about their thwarted plans to the feeble-minded interlopers. Could this killer’s motivations and reasons have been conveyed in another way? Possibly. Ultimately, it’s a trope of the pulp, murder mystery variety, one that brings the reader out of the literary excellence of the storytelling for a brief moment. Otherwise, this is an excellent novel filled with many treasures worthy of revisiting a second time, if not more.

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel and I highly recommend it. I would give this novel 4 and 1/2 stars.

Buy the paperback on Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/a/152/9780307475268