... filled with the rich and complex texture of the American South ... vividly imagined lives ... Told in hypnotic and at times sharp-witted prose, Some Go Home asks what land means to us, what we will do for that land and who we’ll become along the way. It’s a story of class and race intersections, of how the haves often send the have-nots to do their bidding. With racially motivated violence and scenes of animal cruelty, Some Go Home is often difficult to read as it reflects on trauma, war, family and how the sins and shortcomings of our ancestors replay in our own lives. It’s a relevant story that begs us to reconcile the past with the present so that we can finally begin to move forward.
Spanning decades of class wars and racial tension, Lindsey’s novel is nothing short of the South’s social history in miniature, a tangled but moving portrait of restoration.
... incandescent ... captures a riveting slice of life from the deep South ... In dazzling prose, the author lassos complex subjects with acuity, from the legacy of racism in Mississippi to internecine class wars, the horror of combat, and the joy and terror of becoming a mother. This is a consummate portrait of human fragility and grim determination.
... ambitious ... an admirable bid to compete with William Faulkner at his own game ... Perhaps too complex: Some characters are underdrawn, as the ties among Hare’s family, friends, and enemies acquire ever thickening knots. (An issue in Faulkner’s fiction too, of course.) But the novel has some sturdy support beams in its central characters, especially Colleen, whose journey from soldier to almost–drug casualty to beauty queen to conflicted new mom is bracing at every turn ... A compassionate and complex debut, assuredly encompassing post–Iraq War fiction and old-fashioned Southern gothic.
