FLORIDA PALMS

Two young Florida men make a series of poor decisions in this debut novel.

The year is 2009, and best friends Eddy and Cueball have just graduated high school in Palm Bay, Florida. The Great Recession has ensured that the world is not their oyster: “The crazy-ass life they’d imagined for themselves post-graduation—epic parties and mailbox baseball and fumbling sex in the back rows of the dollar theater—had quickly buckled under the unforgiving gravity of food costs and bills, as they were now expected to pay their own way through life.” They both take jobs moving furniture for Cueball’s father, Bird, an ex-con who moves in a circle of “honest larcenists, skippers of child support, casual bigots, hustlers, abusers of chemicals, and even a few killers.” Bird decides to shift his business from moving furniture to moving a new designer drug called shank, and Eddy and Cueball agree to come on board. The money is great, but so are the risks—both young men make a series of bad decisions, along with the rest of the crew, and it doesn’t take long for cracks to appear in the foundation of the criminal enterprise. This leads to a series of internecine rivalries, betrayals, and increasingly violent acts, which Pan writes about with gusto. The action barrels to an ending that isn’t quite shocking, but absolutely necessary. Pan makes effective use of suspense that he undercuts with passages of background that go nowhere—this book is about 100 pages too long, and Pan’s prose is occasionally a bit too purple. Nonetheless, the dialogue is good, and Pan displays some sharp instincts. This is so close to being a successful novel, it just doesn’t quite get there—but keep an eye on this author.

A gritty but uneven debut.