John Hornor Jacobs

One of the perks that result from making connections with other people involved in this genre is occasionally getting the opportunity to read something that has yet to be published. This can be a two-edged sword, since sometimes there's a reason something hasn't been published, but by and large, it's a great opportunity to get an early glimpse at what's to come.

Recently, a friend, John Hornor Jacobs, asked me to take a look at the novel he is working on and let him know what I think. I hesitated a bit. I like John a lot, and one of my flaws is I will answer a direct question truthfully, which I think is a mental disorder (if you don't think this is a flaw, try it for a day). I've already pissed off one or two people I like by telling them I wasn't thrilled with something they wrote, and John darkly hinted at deep problems. But he assured me he wouldn't hold it against me, so I told him to send it on.

I'm not going to do a full review of the novel here. I'll save that for when it's published. I will tell you that the story (currently titled Southern Gods) is a Lovecraft-influenced blast set in the Mississippi Delta region of the early 50s, filled with rich characters, and infused with the Southern blues that would change music forever. It's a world of smokey dives, small-time radio stations, and the Tennessee Williams-style sexual humidity of the mid-20th century South, in which a man takes a journey from villain to hero.

The novel, in second draft, does have a few weak points, as anticipated, but they are correctable, and even in its current incarnation I think it falls into the top 10% of what is currently published. I don't know when it will find a publisher, the vagaries of the business being what they are, but when it does (and it will), it will make a splash. So remember the name: John Hornor Jacobs. With two "o"s.