Praise for Books
“James Wade is a poet of the dark. With gorgeous lyricism, he writes of men and women caught in the bleakest of circumstances and the choices that must be made when desperate times require desperate measures. It’s been forever since I read a novel so stunning in its language and so moving in its effect. Read this book and prepare to be amazed.” —William Kent Krueger, New York Times bestselling author of Ordinary Grace and This Tender Land
“Wade’s pitch-perfect, personality-driven dialogue sings in the voice of life, and his ability to meld existential thought, situational metaphor, and cinematic setting is a full-bodied experience…A soul-deep exploration of a wounded man in crisis, James Wade’s Beasts of the Earth…secures his position as an author of extraordinary merit.” —New York Journal of Books
“Texas writer James Wade delivers a gripping and honest tale of a young boy confronting the evils of the world around him…If you enjoyed Jesmyn Ward’s Salvage the Bones or Daniel Woodrell’s Winter’s Bone, this is likely the book for you.” —San Francisco Book Review
“A debut full of atmosphere and awe. Wade gives emotional depth to his dust-covered characters, and creates an image of the American West that is harsh and unforgiving, but—like All Things Left Wild—not without hope.” —Sarah Bird, author of Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen
“In Hollow Out the Dark, James Wade casts a cold East Texas landscape in all its grim glory, reflecting the hearts of the men who battle for their piece of it. This prohibition-era Western is no simple tale of bootleggers and lawmen but a meditation on morality in which even the good must choose their own corruption. Wade imbues poetry, philosophy, and craftsmanship in his prose. From story, to scene, to sentence, his care is present in each word. A joy to read.” —Caroline Frost, award-winning author of The Last Verse and Shadows of Pecan Hollow
“James Wade’s Beasts of the Earth delivers on the promise of his first two novels with this scorched-earth tale of a solitary innocent struggling against the unrelenting misery of a rural community in the American South who believe him to be a degenerate criminal. Reminiscent of early McCarthy, Larry Brown, or the great Tom Franklin, Wade uses two timelines to weave this intricate story that culminates in a most satisfying crescendo of honor, violence, and the only kind of justice some folks ever get. It’s his depictions of noble suffering that strike deepest—I’ll be thinking about young Michael Fischer, a boy struggling to hold together that last fragments of his humanity, for a long time. James Wade has all the tools, imagination, and more than enough passion to be at the vanguard of the best Grit-Lit writers of his generation, and I’ll be reading whatever he puts out.” —Matt Bondurant, bestselling author of Oleander City and Lawless
“With echoes of Jim Harrison, Cormac McCarthy (and perhaps a smidge of Flannery O’Connor), River, Sing Out is a beautiful, brutal meditation on survival and love in the face of nearly unspeakable violence and depravity in an East Texas community ravaged by the meth trade. Taut, lyrical, and precise, the prose soars in this important new novel by James Wade.” —Elizabeth Wetmore, New York Times bestselling author
“Night, Victorian poet Algernon Swinburne warned, is but the shadow of light, and life just the shadow of death. That, in one breath, is the finely drawn dilemma James Wade turns over and over like a precious, light-refracting, darkness-harboring gemstone that is All Things Left Wild…This is artful fiction drawn with a deft, patient hand. The writing style is an ideal mashup of Larry McMurtry’s burnish and Cormac McCarthy’s grit…Wade’s writerly skill is topnotch and white hot in the visual, visceral quality of his description that breathes the landscape to life as a major character in the story…All Things left Wild is a magnificent, beautifully drawn montage of contemplation, lightning-fast action, uncertainty and inevitability, pain, enormous loss, empty gain, an extraordinary adventure lived, and certainly, in retrospect, one not to be missed.” —Lone Star Literary Life
“James Wade’s newest novel, Hollow Out the Dark, is a masterpiece of atmospheric crime fiction; a worthy successor to the likes of William Gay and Cormac McCarthy. Set in East Texas, it is an epic, and age-old, story of greed and generational betrayal—where vengeance is swift and forgiveness a long time coming.” —Kathleen Kent, New York Times bestselling author of Black Wolf
“James Wade writes a terrific story, but that isn’t what makes him so good. Wade is a craftsman. His books should be read slowly, to luxuriate in his word choices, his sentence structure, his character revelation. That is why he is a joy to read.” —James L. Haley, Spur Award–winning author of the Bliven Putnam Naval Adventures
“River, Sing Out is a poetic, exceedingly descriptive gothic fiction of place and time, and even more pictorial of living a poor life in the deep East Texas woods…Roger Clark, the narrator, has a voice that is rich and expressive. A richness that makes a girl like me swoon. Clark’s changing from the various characters even to a girl to a boy never broke its cadence. Without a doubt, Clark’s voice conveys River, Sing Out into a phenomenally memorable story…It is a story that can take miles off your long drives or commutes.” —Forgotten Winds
“Transfixing…The author takes a classic western setup and refreshes it with sharp writing, strong characterizations, a vivid evocation of place, and a body count to rival The Wild Bunch. Fans of All the Pretty Horses will want to saddle up for this literary ride.” —Publishers Weekly
“With addictive prose and a style all his own, James Wade delivers another powerful read. Part Western, part Southern lit, part thriller, part mystery, part character study set in rural East Texas in the 1930s, Hollow Out the Dark is a mesmerizing story, dark, raw, and original.” —Johnny D. Boggs, nine-time Spur Award winner
“Wade returns with another stark and chilling tale…From reptiles in the swamp hunting prey to reptilian men, cold and calculating, beasts feature in this disturbing novel…The prose is beautiful. —Library Journal
“If you read one novel this year, make it this one. James Wade’s River, Sing Out is an instant classic filled with characters that will break your heart, lyrical prose as haunted as the river it evokes, and a Southern Noir undertow that wholly sucks you in and keeps you turning the pages until its searing, masterful conclusion.” —May Cobb, author of The Hunting Wives
“James Wade’s debut novel, All Things Left Wild, is set in the still–Wild West of 1910, and it’s a chase novel/spiritual journey for all involved…Wade writes skillfully about the brutality and bloody history of the West, and of the United States. Every person his travelers meet has a story and a philosophy of life…This is anything but escapist fare, and some of the players might remind you of current leaders.” —Liz French, Library Journal
“If John Steinbeck and Cormac McCarthy have a present-day successor, it must be James Wade. As intoxicating and robust as its subject matter, Hollow Out the Dark is a Prohibition-era tale that poignantly reminds us although times may change, the human spirit remains frighteningly and unflinchingly the same. Wade distills language with the artistry of an expert craftsman and the fearlessness of a bootlegger. At once heartbreaking and hopeful, this book cements Wade’s growing stature as a standard-bearer of Southern-gothic literature while proving yet again that he is one of the most distinctive voices of our time.” —Rudy Ruiz, award-winning author of Valley of Shadows and The Border Between Us
“All Things Left Wild was one of my favorite novels of the last two years, as was River, Sing Out. But neither of those novels could have prepared me for the dark and compelling vision of Beasts of the Earth. I found myself rooting for the characters throughout their near-Biblical tribulations, and the storyline kept me turning the pages, desperate to find out what would happen next. Here we have a novel that blends realism with existentialist philosophy to redefine contemporary Southern fiction. Don’t miss this tour de force of modern literature.” —David Heska Wanbli Weiden, Spur and Anthony Award–winning author of Winter Counts
“A literary work of art, with exceptional characterization and philosophical prose guiding the story along the banks of the Neches…James Wade’s writing is rhapsodic…This novel will not disappoint readers looking for thought-provoking fiction about love and affection conquering the mud and debauchery of life, even if for a little while.” —Lone Star Literary Life
“This is the kind of novel readers can spend weeks discussing—the philosophical and moral nature of it as well as its fatalistic sense of justice…For a long time to come, All Things Left Wild will linger in the memory of all who read it—the tragedy, the hope, and the irony of it all.” —New York Journal of Books
“With his characteristic insight and imagination, James Wade takes us to another era and makes it tremble with authenticity. The manner in which Wade sees life so clearly, even in the dark, creates a psychology of characters carefully wrought. Wade’s distinctive lyricism threads the narrative and his pitch-perfect rendering of the biome of the piney woods throbs with metaphor, running through the novel like a river, clean and clear.” —Lucy Griffith, WILLA Literary Award–winning poet
“Like Flannery O’Connor, James Wade explores what it means to be human—our capacity for good rivaled only by our capacity for evil, our weakness alongside our urge for redemption and grace—with gloriously complex characters and gorgeous prose. Beasts of the Earth is a beautiful gut-punch of a novel.” —Stacey Swann, author of Olympus, Texas
“Powerful and well-written modern tragedy.” —Midwest Book Review
“This book is about courage, mistakes, and inner morals. It has adventure and passion. This being set back at the beginning of the twentieth century made it very interesting and exciting to read.” —Manhattan Book Review
“Hollow Out the Dark is a major achievement in Southern noir, a Prohibition-era crime epic that is at heart an affecting exploration of brotherhood in its many forms. With lyrical prose and sly period dialogue, James Wade builds a propulsive narrative that explodes with revelation. A haunting read that lingers in the memory long after the final page.” —Scott Von Doviak, Edgar Award–nominated author of Lowdown Road and Charlesgate Confidential
“James Wade is a writer of exceptional talent and this novel is his latest entry toward his path to greatness.” —Scott Semegran, award-winning author of The Benevolent Lords of Sometimes Island and host of Austin Liti Limits
“Wade, whose striking debut, All Things Left Wild (2020), traveled back a century in Texas history, uses an unlikely friendship to explore an equally wild present-day landscape…A haunting fable of an impossible relationship fueled by elemental need and despair.” —Kirkus Reviews
“An intense and lyrical journey through the borderzone of the American Southwest in a time before walls, infused with the real feeling of the land, and of the violence its conquest engenders.” —Christopher Brown, Campbell and World Fantasy Award–nominated author of Tropic of Kansas and Rule of Capture
“A war-for-whiskey Western in a small Texas town with prose that sings like Cormac, Woodrell, and Walter Hill formed a boy band. James Wade has packed a wallop of a gothic gut-punch about discovering where one’s moral compass may land while spinning in a Depression-era storm of violence, corruption, and the hardest of times.” —Mike McCrary, author of Someone Savage and the Remo Cobb series
“James Wade really impressed me with his latest release, Beasts of the Earth. It’s written in the style of great, serious fiction and called to mind tales of the modern West by writers like Cormac McCarthy and playwright Sam Shepard…Wade certainly has a way with the written word and creates images and moods of this small Texas town that become so vivid in the mind’s eye…Harlen LeBlanc is destined to go down as one of the great characters in recent fiction. I cannot recommend this exhilarating and soul-filled novel strongly enough for those who don’t believe that modern literature can hark back to the days of writers like Steinbeck.” —Bookreporter
“What lifts River Sing Out far beyond the ordinary is its exquisite, elegant writing which concisely confronts the ugly truth of rural poverty in American society. Souls are stripped bare with mesmerising intensity. The incessant rain, the oppressive heat and the river itself saturate the story. Author James Wade eloquently captures the brutal, beautiful reality of coming of age; first love, deceit, betrayal and rejection, and he weaves all these themes into a nail-biting plot that would do Hollywood proud. It can be hard-going at times as Wade explores just how bleak and brutal this world can be. Yet ultimately this is a celebration of the strength of the human spirit. It is relentless at times and it should be shocking, but River Sing Out also illustrates the strength of quiet conviction with poetic grace and understated compassion. If you admire the writing craft of James Lee Burke, Cormac McCarthy or Tim Gautreaux—their ability to immerse the reader in a vivid landscape so powerful you can smell it—then Wade is a new author to watch.” —Murder, Mayhem & More
“James Wade has delivered a McCarthy-esque odyssey with an Elmore Leonard ear for dialogue. All Things Left Wild moves like a coyote across this cracked-earth landscape—relentlessly paced and ambitiously hungry.” —David Joy, author of When These Mountains Burn
“In Hollow Out the Dark, James Wade’s latest Southern-gothic feat, Wade stitches a propulsive tale with Biblical thread, fueling it with whiskey, tucking secrets beneath the floorboards, and draping the Depression-era landscape with suspense. Wade builds himself a well-deserved seat, pulling it to the literary table to sit alongside the likes of Ron Rash, Faulkner, and Cormac McCarthy.” —Robert Gwaltney, author of The Cicada Tree, and Georgia Author of the Year
“James Wade got our attention with his debut, All Things Left Wild, that existed in a world between western, crime fiction, and the end of days. He proves his talent wasn’t a first-time fluke with his follow-up River, Sing Out. By setting up a simple crime fiction premise, he is able to delve deep into emotion and theme like a master bluesman with three chords.” —BookPeople
“A breathtaking debut! In All Things Left Wild, James Wade paints an exquisite portrait of the American West in all its splendor, violence, and mythic power. Messianic outlaws, deadly orphans, and soul-broken poets ride across a landscape both treacherous and beautiful, finding unthinkable viciousness and unfiltered compassion. With a voice reminiscent of Larry McMurtry and Cormac McCarthy, Wade has managed to craft a novel that is both a lyrical pilgrimage and a thrilling, page-turning adventure.” —Owen Egerton, PEN Southwest Book Award–winning author of Hollow
“Narrative prowess and atmospheric prose echo the works of Ron Rash and Cormac McCarthy, resulting in a rich, character-driven story.” —Deep South Magazine
“This story is not just a story to be read. It is a story to be experienced…Although this is the first book by James Wade that I’ve read, he has immediately become one of my favorite and most respected authors. If you believe in the magic of the written word and what can become of it, you need to read this story. You need to read this author. You will enjoy both very much!” —The Clueless Gent
“As a southerner, the very first sentence wove such a familiar and comforting tapestry, and it never let up. Wade presents rich, flawed, human characters who I feel I know personally even though I’m neither of their time or place. As someone who loves a terrific Western, this book sure did scratch my itch. I hope this book finds its way to Taylor Sheridan because that’s a collaboration I need Hollywood to hop on.” —Corey Ryan Forrester, comedian and author of The Liberal Redneck Manifesto
“This is a compelling and affecting story, spectacularly written and richly detailed with a descriptive atmosphere and realistic characters that will not easily be forgotten. A brooding and brutal coming-of-age story as enlightening in its harshness as it is in its wonder and beauty. Five stars.” —That’s What She’s Reading
“James Wade, as tall a whiskey-stained wrangler of words as has ever two-stepped across the dance floors of Austin, has set his debut novel in that post–Civil War domain of cowboys and cactus and corrupt caballeros, and, by Cormac, it’s some mighty powerful stuff…Wade handles all this old-fangled southwestern blood and thunder with a deft, sure hand…He takes a McCarthyan conjunction and uses it to build a cumulative power and that power fuels his sentences and the sentences penetrate your soul and it is good. This is some kind of literary lightning, this first novel of James Wade’s. And now we wait for it to strike again.” —Austin Chronicle
“Written with elegant prose that might remind a reader of Cormac McCarthy, Wade’s novel announces the coming of an astonishing young talent, a fictioneer for the Western genre’s best future.” —True West magazine
“A fast-paced, thrilling trip through the West you won’t want to put down.” —PopSugar
“Powerful and atmospheric, lyrical and fast-paced, All Things Left Wild is a coming-of-age for one man, a midlife odyssey for the other, and an illustration of the violence and corruption prevalent in our fast-expanding country. It artfully sketches the magnificence of the American West as mirrored in the human soul.” —Book Junkie Reviews
