FEBRUARY 2014 - AudioFile
Real people with genuine voices inhabit the work of novelist Willy Vlautin. As narrator, Vlautin uses his world-weary voice and deep emotional connection to create memorable characters like wounded veteran Leroy Kervin and stressed nurse Pauline Hawkins. It’s a connection listeners can hear and feel. Vlautin’s delivery is slow, with a tone that conveys a subtext of weariness and longing for “something better” for his characters. His descriptions are closer to reportage than imagination, making the characters’ journeys even more real and heartbreaking. R.O. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine
The New York Times Book Review - Marisa Silver
…literary realism [is] a tricky practice. Some novels are so wedded to a blunt rendition of reality that they seem, paradoxically, less real than life, which after all is studded with moments of poetry and metaphoric resonance. The challenge for the writer of social realism is to enlist the plastic qualities of fiction to produce something lifelike, in which artifice creates the shimmer of recognition. In his fourth novel, The Free, Willy Vlautin demonstrates an impressive ability to navigate this challenge…Vlautin's unadorned narrative is affecting; these unassuming characters bore into us in surprising ways.
Publishers Weekly
10/07/2013
This strong fourth novel from Portland singer/songwriter and author Vlautin (The Motel Life) follows three protagonists who find the strength to make the best of difficult situations. Leroy Kervin, an Iraq War veteran gravely wounded in a roadside-bomb explosion seven years ago, is an inpatient at a male group home in Washington State, where his longtime girlfriend, Jeanette, and mother, Darla, sometimes come to visit. Severely depressed, he attempts suicide by jumping out of an upper-story window, which leaves him bedridden. Freddie McCall, a night orderly at the home, works a second job at a paint store to pay off the debts incurred by medical treatment for his young, physically handicapped daughter, Virginia, who lives with his ex in Las Vegas. Pauline Hawkins, a hospital nurse now caring for Leroy, lives alone with her pet rabbit and keeps an eye on her dysfunctional father. As Leroy succumbs even more to his depression, he has a series of increasingly bizarre, violent dreams involving him and Jeanette being pursued by a relentless vigilante militia calling itself “the Free.” Pauline tries to save a 16-year-old patient who’s become addicted to heroin, while Freddie learns he may have a chance to be reunited with his family. Despite the grim trajectory of Leroy’s story, Pauline and Freddie’s innate decency adds a refreshingly positive note to Vlautin’s character-driven novel. Agent: Anna Stein O’Sullivan, Aitken Alexander Associates, (Feb.)
From the Publisher
A portrait of American life that is so hard and so heartbreaking that it should be unbearable, but it isn’t. The straightforward beauty of Vlautin’s writing, and the tender care he shows his characters, turns a story of struggle into indispensable reading. I couldn’t recommend it more highly.” — Ann Patchett
“Courageous, powerful, and mercifully refreshing, The Free is nothing less than an affirmation, that rare novel about lost souls which dares to be hopeful in the face of despair. Vlautin’s hard knock characters will break your heart with their humanity and grace.” — Jonathan Evison, author of The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving
“The Free is a graceful portrayal of an underrepresented side of American life. Willy Vlautin never overreaches, or takes the easy road, and his words have the heft of permanence.” — Patrick deWitt, author of The Sister Brothers
“The Free is another outstanding book from one of America’s most underappreciated artists.” — George Pelecanos
“Willy Vlautin is one of the bravest novelists writing.... An unsentimental Steinbeck, a heartbroken Haruf, Willy Vlautin tells us who really lives now in our America, our city in ruins.” — Ursula K. Le Guin
“Willy Vlautin’s magnificent novel The Free is as raw as it is beautiful, as brutal as it is honest. But despite the difficult truths of his intertwined tales, Vlautin’s characters will lift you up with their quiet compassion and profound dignity.” — Ivy Pochoda, author of Visitation Street
“Brilliant and beautiful...what a gorgeous book. There are so few writers out there with such ambitious humility.” — Sarah Hall
“Few contemporary western writers tell the truth with the unerring eye of Willy Vlautin, a literary realist whose emotionally charged characters achieve that rarest of goals in fiction-to tell a great story, and The Free is Vlautin at his best.” — Craig Johnson, author of the Walt Longmire Mysteries, the basis for A&E's hit series Longmire
“Willy Vlautin writes novels about people all alone in the wind. His prose is direct and complex in its simplicity, and his stories are sturdy and bighearted and full of lives so shattered they shimmer.” — Cheryl Strayed, The Oregonian
“...a story of our times-about the lack of work, the cost of health insurance, the demonizing of war and the damage to life in the working class. Vlautin writes cleanly, beautifully about the people who hang on despite odds.... A fine novel...bounded by courage and kindliness.” — Kirkus Reviews
“This strong fourth novel from Portland singer/songwriter and author Vlautin (The Motel Life) follows three protagonists who find the strength to make the best of difficult situations….Despite the grim trajectory of Leroy’s story, Pauline and Freddie’s innate decency adds a refreshingly positive note to Vlautin’s character-driven novel.” — Publishers Weekly
“With straightforward economy, he draws us into [the characters’] seemingly intractable problems, revealing their persistence and decency... Vlautin’s unadorned narrative is affecting; these unassuming characters bore into us in surprising ways.” — New York Times Book Review
“With heartbreaking yet hopeful prose Vlautin weaves together a brutally honest tale of pain and isolation in America....Vlautin’s novels cast a spotlight on the underclass and underbelly of this land and gives voice to those who may no longer have one.” — New York Journal of Books
“The Free is [Vlautin’s] best achievement yet, a profound look at characters living on the margins, honest people who have been hit hard by the dark realities of a difficult world.... Walking away from The Free, I felt a renewed sense of humanity and hope.” — Los Angeles Review of Books
“Vlautin’s writing is spare and straightforward, in the ‘dirty realist’ tradition of Carver. [The Free] confirms him as an accomplished novelist, not just a rocker dabbling in the form.” — Financial Times
“[I]t is love, in all-American, over-salted, extra-large portions, that in the end makes The Free original and compelling.” — The Guardian
“A heartbreaking but hopeful tale of three people navigating personal, physical and psychological crises.” — Shelf Awareness
“The characters in Willy Vlautin’s quietly brilliant new novel, The Free, embody the embattled middle class: they’re wounded (physically, emotionally, financially), they’re just getting by, they’re hardworking.” — Omnivoracious
“[Vlautin’s] gentle candour infuses his writing with an urgency that suits its hand-held filmic feel, and The Free is like a Sundance contender.” — Irish Times
Ursula K. Le Guin
Willy Vlautin is one of the bravest novelists writing.... An unsentimental Steinbeck, a heartbroken Haruf, Willy Vlautin tells us who really lives now in our America, our city in ruins.
Ivy Pochoda
Willy Vlautin’s magnificent novel The Free is as raw as it is beautiful, as brutal as it is honest. But despite the difficult truths of his intertwined tales, Vlautin’s characters will lift you up with their quiet compassion and profound dignity.
Patrick deWitt
The Free is a graceful portrayal of an underrepresented side of American life. Willy Vlautin never overreaches, or takes the easy road, and his words have the heft of permanence.
Craig Johnson
Few contemporary western writers tell the truth with the unerring eye of Willy Vlautin, a literary realist whose emotionally charged characters achieve that rarest of goals in fiction-to tell a great story, and The Free is Vlautin at his best.
George Pelecanos
The Free is another outstanding book from one of America’s most underappreciated artists.
Sarah Hall
Brilliant and beautiful...what a gorgeous book. There are so few writers out there with such ambitious humility.
Cheryl Strayed
Willy Vlautin writes novels about people all alone in the wind. His prose is direct and complex in its simplicity, and his stories are sturdy and bighearted and full of lives so shattered they shimmer.
Ann Patchett
A portrait of American life that is so hard and so heartbreaking that it should be unbearable, but it isn’t. The straightforward beauty of Vlautin’s writing, and the tender care he shows his characters, turns a story of struggle into indispensable reading. I couldn’t recommend it more highly.
Jonathan Evison
Courageous, powerful, and mercifully refreshing, The Free is nothing less than an affirmation, that rare novel about lost souls which dares to be hopeful in the face of despair. Vlautin’s hard knock characters will break your heart with their humanity and grace.
New York Times Book Review
With straightforward economy, he draws us into [the characters’] seemingly intractable problems, revealing their persistence and decency... Vlautin’s unadorned narrative is affecting; these unassuming characters bore into us in surprising ways.
New York Journal of Books
With heartbreaking yet hopeful prose Vlautin weaves together a brutally honest tale of pain and isolation in America....Vlautin’s novels cast a spotlight on the underclass and underbelly of this land and gives voice to those who may no longer have one.
The Guardian
[I]t is love, in all-American, over-salted, extra-large portions, that in the end makes The Free original and compelling.
Los Angeles Review of Books
The Free is [Vlautin’s] best achievement yet, a profound look at characters living on the margins, honest people who have been hit hard by the dark realities of a difficult world.... Walking away from The Free, I felt a renewed sense of humanity and hope.
Irish Times
[Vlautin’s] gentle candour infuses his writing with an urgency that suits its hand-held filmic feel, and The Free is like a Sundance contender.
Omnivoracious
The characters in Willy Vlautin’s quietly brilliant new novel, The Free, embody the embattled middle class: they’re wounded (physically, emotionally, financially), they’re just getting by, they’re hardworking.
Financial Times
Vlautin’s writing is spare and straightforward, in the ‘dirty realist’ tradition of Carver. [The Free] confirms him as an accomplished novelist, not just a rocker dabbling in the form.
Shelf Awareness
A heartbreaking but hopeful tale of three people navigating personal, physical and psychological crises.
Financial Times
Vlautin’s writing is spare and straightforward, in the ‘dirty realist’ tradition of Carver. [The Free] confirms him as an accomplished novelist, not just a rocker dabbling in the form.
Omnivoracious
The characters in Willy Vlautin’s quietly brilliant new novel, The Free, embody the embattled middle class: they’re wounded (physically, emotionally, financially), they’re just getting by, they’re hardworking.
Shelf Awareness
A heartbreaking but hopeful tale of three people navigating personal, physical and psychological crises.
Irish Times
[Vlautin’s] gentle candour infuses his writing with an urgency that suits its hand-held filmic feel, and The Free is like a Sundance contender.
The Guardian
[I]t is love, in all-American, over-salted, extra-large portions, that in the end makes The Free original and compelling.
FEBRUARY 2014 - AudioFile
Real people with genuine voices inhabit the work of novelist Willy Vlautin. As narrator, Vlautin uses his world-weary voice and deep emotional connection to create memorable characters like wounded veteran Leroy Kervin and stressed nurse Pauline Hawkins. It’s a connection listeners can hear and feel. Vlautin’s delivery is slow, with a tone that conveys a subtext of weariness and longing for “something better” for his characters. His descriptions are closer to reportage than imagination, making the characters’ journeys even more real and heartbreaking. R.O. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
2013-11-04
Vlautin's fourth novel (Lean on Pete, 2010, etc.), about damaged people caring for each other across a spectrum of society. Vlautin creates a community of survivors through a handful of well-wrought characters, each linked to the others through the attempted suicide by Leroy Kervin, a disabled Iraq war veteran who seizes a moment of clarity to escape his irreparable life. Freddie is a night caretaker at the group home where Leroy lives with his fear while fighting desperation at not being able to support his family. At the hospital, Pauline nurses him and another new patient, Jo, a runaway from a harsh world beyond her comprehension. The broken, the poor and the desperate fill this book--with dignity. Each one cares for another with grace and humility. Set in motion by Leroy's deliberate plunge down the stairs onto a wooden stake, the book examines the characters' individual humanness, peculiarly American in spirit. This is a story of our times--about the lack of work, the cost of health insurance, the demonizing of war and the damage to life in the working class. At first odd and magical, the narrative becomes more violent and hate-filled. "The Free" of the novel's title appear in a Cormac McCarthy–like vision of a demonic wasteland. Vlautin writes cleanly, beautifully about the people who hang on despite odds. This is a fine novel, grim but bounded by courage and kindliness.
