'A backwoods drama that is part Crime and Punishment, part Deliverance, and all white-knuckled suspense...it packs a helluva punch' -- People 'A harrowing literary thriller...a powerful blend of love and violence, of the grotesque and the tender.' -- New York Times Book Review 'A terrific novel...you can hardly breathe while you're reading this book...his crisis evokes every palm-sweating, heart-stopping, seemingly undoable mistake you've ever made' -- Los Angeles Times 'A harrowing, high-voltage thriller...A gritty, claustrophobic blend of Jim Thompson and James Dickey.' -- Publishers Weekly 'Jones owns a fine writer's eye for the kind of details that matter.' -- Washington Post

Matthew F. Jones is also the author of the critically acclaimed novels Boot Tracks, Deepwater, The Elements of Hitting, Blind Pursuit and The Cooter Farm, as well as a number of screenplays, including adaptations of A Single Shot and Boot Tracks, both which are being filmed in 2011. Deepwater was made into a film in 2005. He grew up in rural upstate New York and lives now in Charlottesville, Virginia.