A review by andrew61
Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin

3.0

An enjoyable crime novel set in m, i,crooked letter, crooked letter, i, crooked letter, crooked letter...., sorry Mississippi, that being the way children are taught to spell their home state in schools apparently and thus the title. It is a story of families, race, and betrayals with a lot of local dialect so that at dinner last night I asked my family 'Yall want some grits with that' but I quickly adapted and enjoyed the read. The book tells the story of two men Larry Ott and Silas Jones. The setting is a very small town in Mississippi where Ott is a social outcast who lives a lonely life having been accused of a crime in the early 1980's, Silas known as .32 is a local police officer who formed a short friendship with Larry Ott at one point in the early 1980's when he and his mother moved there from Chicago and live in a cabin on Larry father's landholding. Another crime has been committed and Silas investigates it and the story alternates between the two time periods so we learn about the earlier crime and follow the current investigation. It was an engaging story and a page turner but from my perspective I did not feel anxious about the outcomes for the characters and felt it lacked any threat , however it was well crafted with an interesting story at it's heart and I would read more by the author if I came across him again.