This reprint of Wilson’s 1985 novel A Hidden Place is a nice edition with a cover that gives very little clue as to its contents. Having just complained about the skimpiness of Michael Connelly’s The Overlook (see previous review), I have to admit that this, at 224 pages, is even skimpier. If not exactly a novella, it’s not much longer.

That said, though, this is far less formulaic than The Overlook, and wears its genre clothes awkwardly. It’s a depression-era mix: Of Mice and Men meets The X Files.

Wilson’s prose is superb, and this strange little tale of small town America unfolds gently, so that you do in fact feel inclined to take your time not to rush through the 224 pages and instead savour every word.

Travis is taken in by his Aunt and Uncle in Haute Montagne (terrible name) after his mother dies. He’s not a happy kid, and his Aunt’s house is not a happy home. They already have a lodger: an astonishingly beautiful woman who definitely does not belong in this place. Travis takes up with a local waitress, a slow scandal unfolds, and the brutality of the Depression is never far away.

Meanwhile, a confused and apparently simple-minded hobo, Bone, rides the rails around America with two other displaced persons, who take advantage of his memorable looks and size), as well as his apparent ability to take punishment that would kill anyone else. Bone is definitely out of the same literary tradition as Steinbeck’s Lennie, and of course we wait to find out what Bone’s connection with the mysterious scandal of Haute Montagne is all about.

One of the few books I’ve enjoyed this summer: and I’ve yet to read a bad Robert Charles Wilson novel, so: recommended.