WHERE ALL LIGHT TENDS TO GO is beautifully, fearfully and appropriately named. It’s a debut novel by David Joy, who has been critically acclaimed for his nonfiction and short stories. Even if you have been exposed to his previous efforts, this book is a surprise, a master work of southern literature that puts one in the mind of William Faulkner or Cormac McCarthy in some spots, and Ace Atkins in others. In a way, the story it tells is the antithesis of the admonition set forth in the title of Thomas Wolfe’s YOU CAN’T GO HOME AGAIN: it’s not that you can’t return so much as you can’t really leave.

The opening pages are darkly poignant and sets the theme for the remainder of the book. Set in the very rural reaches of Jackson County, North Carolina, WHERE ALL LIGHT TENDS TO GO begins with Jacob McNeely, the narrator of the piece, climbing the town’s water tower. His purpose is neither for vandalism nor for bravado as it has been in the past; rather, he wants to view what would have been his high school graduating class exit Walter Middleton School. Jacob, who is 18, dropped out two years previously; he indicates a bit later in the book how those two years have made him almost a total stranger to his former classmates.

"...a master work of southern literature that puts one in the mind of William Faulkner or Cormac McCarthy in some spots, and Ace Atkins in others.... There is imagery here, beauteous and otherwise, that you will not soon get out of your mind."

The one major exception would be Jacob’s love for Maggie Jennings, who he has known since their childhood. Jacob, who has known little else than the hardscrabble poverty of the area coupled with the physical and emotional abuse of his criminal father and neglect of his drug-addled mother, realizes, as many others do, that Maggie is meant for better things than she will ever hope to find in Jackson County.

Joy never seems in love with his own voice. He is more concerned with the story, where things start off badly and get worse, while being made more so by the faint promise of escape. Despite dropping out, Jacob has had a keen education in matters criminal. His father is a Tobacco Road crystal meth kingpin who directs the ebb and flow of the terrible drug through his county and into adjoining states, keeping control of things with a balanced combination of money and terror while giving Jacob a rough education in and entry to the family business.

It is almost all that Jacob knows, but for one person: Maggie. His former girlfriend may be his ticket out of the area, and out of a life that is so terrible that it almost cannot be adequately described, a task that Joy meets head-on and vanquishes. Leaving his life behind will not be easy, even if he chooses to do so. It may not even be a viable option for him, and the price could be more than the market of his life can bear.

Put WHERE ALL LIGHT TENDS TO GO on your must-read list. There is imagery here, beauteous and otherwise, that you will not soon get out of your mind. Oh, and Joy is not done by any means. His next novel visits similar themes from a somewhat different perspective. You will be waiting impatiently and eagerly for it if you read this one slowly and repeatedly.