Bring Me the Head of Yorkie Goodman

In this violent, darkly funny novel from the pseudonymous Yates (Jared Yates Sexton, editor-in-chief of the literary magazine Bull), Bill Wallace, an enforcer for a small-time East Coast drug lord known simply as Boss, has to collect an unpaid debt from Yorkie Goodman, a seemingly innocuous 62-year-old schlub. Goodman happens to live in Seymour, Ind., where 14 years earlier Wallace got into trouble and had to split town fast, leaving a broken-hearted woman behind. Boss pairs Wallace with Carp, a hit man who appears to be dying, and orders them to bring back macabre proof of a successful mission: Goodman's head. Naturally, things go south quickly, as Wallace has plans of his own. Carp, meanwhile, proves himself to be indestructible. The duo quickly end up on the radar of the local police chief, whose laconic old-school commentary addressed to his deputy provides comic relief. Yates (An End to All Things) gives obvious nods to the works of Cormac McCarthy and the Coen brothers (Fargo, in particular) in an over-the-top tale whose infectious energy will prove irresistible to devotees of modern noir. (June)