Still reeling from the scandal that cost him his badge, Randy Mayhill—fallen lawman, dog rescuer, Dr. Pepper enthusiast—sees a return from community exile in the form of a dead hog trapper perched on a fence. The fence belongs to the late Van Woods, Mayhill’s best friend and the reason for his spectacular fall.Determined to protect Van’s land and family from another scandal, Mayhill ignores the … ignores the sherriff who replaced him and investigates the death of the unidentified man. His quest crosses with two others: Birdie, Van’s surly, mourning daughter, who has no intention of sitting idly by and leaving her father’s legacy in Mayhill’s hands; and Bradley, Birdie’s slow, malnourished but loyal friend, whose desperation to escape a life of poverty has him working with local criminals, and possibly a murderer.
A riveting debut novel about family and loyalty, old grudges and new lives, AIN’T NOBODY NOBODY is like a cross between Faulkner and “Breaking Bad”, from a talented new writer with an authentic Texas voice.
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Poignant and hilarious in tandem, Ain’t Nobody Nobody is the book you didn’t know you should be reading. From the moment I saw the hog beneath the title on the cover, I knew I had to read this book. Because I, too, grew up checking on hog tracks and waking the next day to the devastation they could wreak on your yard. Ellett is a local to East Texas, and it shows from the colloquialisms, the mannerisms and the true grit of its characters. I was watching out for certain things when I dove into Ellett’s dark comedy, and more than pleased when she delivered in spades.
Ain’t Nobody Nobody takes place in “the thicket,” or what most would consider the middle of nowhere. Former county Sherriff, Randy Mayhill is living with one foot in the past and the other in denial. You could say this story is the world according to Randy Mayhill. The disgraced Sherriff has little to his name: a one-room shack on his dead best friend’s property, three dogs and a desperate need to somehow make a difference. When his former best friend’s daughter Birdie finds herself in the worst possible pickle—how to dispose of a dead body—Mayhill rises to the occasion. Caught in the thick of things is poor Bradley, Birdie’s “just-a-friend.” All three people (because soon enough you stop thinking of them as characters) want simple things. Randy wants affirmation, Birdy wants her dad back, and Bradley just wants a better life. Finding a dead body is just the beginning of their story, and as you hope, lead them to a satisfying ending.
Everything about Heather Harper Ellett’s crafting is superb, in particular, her gift for blending humor and subjects you never would have thought could go so well together. You will laugh and you may shed a tear, but you’ll certainly love every witty turn of phrase. Above all, I dare you not to be pulled in by the heart of this fantastic book. The truth is in the title, after all: Ain’t Nobody Nobody. The perfect read for fans of Fargo and Justified, Heather Harper Ellett’s debut highlights truths and mystery within the Piney Woods.
Extreme is the best way to describe Randy Mayhill, former sheriff and current hermit. Extreme, with strict personal beliefs that make complete sense to him but not everyone. He means well and truly wants to be a hero – both the helping people part and the front page glory part. He doesn’t begin as a particularly sympathetic character. It appears he must have been a rather incompetent sheriff. For a man who claims to love the law and deeply misses being sheriff, he never feels compelled to follow a law that doesn’t suit his needs. But it’s also clear he’s in mourning and looking for a way to get his life back on track. Mayhill misses his friend Van, and wants to help Van’s daughter and mother. Mayhill feels it’s his duty to protect them even if he has to cross lines to do it. When Mayhill finds Birdie (Van’s daughter) and Bradley (a young man working for their family) standing over the dead body of a stranger on Birdie’s property, Mayhill doesn’t think twice – calling the police is not an option. He immediately takes action to cover up the crime, but his cover up goes incredibly wrong leaving him in the position of having to investigate the crime. If Mayhill can crack the crime and get his name in the paper as a hero while also keeping Van’s family out of it, it’ll all be to the good.
The story is told from the points-of-view of Mayhill, Birdie, and Bradley. I particularly enjoyed Birdie and Bradley’s perspectives. Both are young and not very worldly, but both are dealing with a lot – Birdie is grieving and attempting to navigate her grandma’s grief; Bradley is grieving while doing all he can think of to get out of poverty and dealing with serious family problems. Really, everyone in this book was grieving something (a person, loss of safety/security, loss of position of authority and community respect), and they’re all doing their best. How do you define morality when you’re just trying to get by?
Recommended for fans of darker character-driven mysteries.
Content Warnings: SPOILERS suicide; begins with killing and gutting a hog; mental illness; drugs; racism; grief END SPOILERS
Peopled with a wonderful cast of characters who are endearing while also being incredibly flawed, this story reinforces the truth that nobody is all good or all bad. One of the things that comes across very profoundly is the fact that some people do what they believe they have to do out of a sense of duty and justice, like Randy Mayhill one of the main characters in the story. After the death of his friend, Van, Randy makes a vow to protect Van’s mama, Onie, and his daughter, Birdie, no matter what he has to do to ensure that protection.
Randy is a disgraced former lawman, who lost the sheriff’s job for trying to protect his friend, Van. Randy lives in a small shack on the edge of Birdie’s land, where he is happy being a hermit and sharing space with a collection of dogs.
That is until the dead man.
The mystery in this book revolves primarily around who was the dead man who was found across the fence on Birdie’s land? Why was he there in that area of East Texas? Was he really there just to hunt the feral hogs? And who hired him? But as the story progresses, it becomes clear there is another mystery to be solved. It would be a spoiler to say just what that mystery is, but it’s a good one and it pulls some of what seems like random story elements together quite nicely.
The author did an incredible job with unfolding the various levels of this story and revealing new aspects that could turn the plot one way or another. It was also a delight to read the descriptions of characters and places, depicting the way some people live deep in the woods in run down trailers with scrappy dogs hanging around.
I’ve seen those places in East Texas.
This book is so engaging that a reader might consider setting aside a whole weekend to read it from beginning to end. And hang on to your hat for the big surprise at the end. It was so well camouflaged that I didn’t see it coming. Although in retrospect, I could recognize the signs that were very gently pointing that way, but they were so well done that they didn’t really give it away until it was time.
When you finally get to the point in the story where the title finally makes sense it is a poignant moment for Birdie and it resonates again for Bradley and then Randy. It speaks to the spirit of the men and women and underscores the moral of the whole story. The mystery of who killed the dead man that is found on the fence on Birdie’s property is only the vehicle the drives the theme of this most enjoyable story.
It’s 1996 in a dysfunctional small East Texas town. It is a time before cell phones and computers and when rifles were commonplace in pickup trucks. It is a time when people knew their neighbors and would help each other out should the need arise. But when a dead body is found, it changes beliefs and perceptions until the truth isn’t decipherable anymore.
While this book is fiction, there is a mystery peppered throughout the pages that had me questioning my thoughts about various characters as the story meandered down dark paths revealing truths that cast them in a light one may not expect. The author provides for a twist or two which erases all that you thought you knew to be true about the story you have read and the characters you have come to understand.
This story is also about losing family and friends, finding love, uncovering the truth, and learning to continue with life despite the curveballs thrown your way. There are dogs and hogs…the dogs are wanted, the hogs are not. And in true Texas fashion, an obsession with Dr. Pepper because no other beverage will do for some.
If you are looking for a fast-paced book, this is not the book to read. The book slowly reveals the truth, much like petals unfolding while a rose blooms. I took my time reading this book so I could embrace the characters, the town, and how I felt about each character. It is somewhat dark and deals with death, deception, drugs, and despair. But there is some hope at the end and multiple possibilities when it comes to how the story ends.
Some of my favorite lines:
“Mayhill approached life like hand-to-hand combat.”
“Lying required an intellect that Bradley simply did not possess.”
“Even at the road’s worst, when it took a nail-biting, gut-jiggling forty-five minutes to drive only two or three miles, it never occurred to anyone to get out of their trucks and walk, any more than it would occur to a bird to take the bus to Cancun for winter.”
“The air conditioner was so high that Pat Sajak shut his eyes and his short hair managed to somehow to blowback dreamily in the stream of air.”
“Bradley was nobody to everybody. That was the beauty of Bradley, if there was a beauty to him.”
“The dog flopped down next to Pat Sajak on the porch, with Boo and Atticus on the other side, and Mayhill realized then her name was Vanna because dog names are revealed; they are not chosen.”
“All of the juices of Birdie’s rebellion dried up right then, and she ran through the thicket and back to the house, the limbs tearing at her jeans like claws.”
“it’s a slippery slope, letting go of your ethics.”
“He couldn’t breathe and his chest tightened in the confusion of it all – a baking soda and vinegar mix of shame and redemption that threatened to erupt in him.”
“Revenge was for scorned ex-wives and small-town football teams. This was of greater consequence. This was karma.”
“An entire CBS mini-series of scenarios played out in his head, assassination attempts from the simplest (sniper drive-by) to the most complex (Rube Goldberg machines, infinite knives) and Mayhill twitched as he thought about it.”
We give this book 4 paws up.
Gotta Love a Hero Who’s Addicted to Dr. Pepper!
What a crime story! This story is told in the slow back-woodsy style of the characters. The story slowly unfolds until the final reveal. Awesome, different and entertaining. I received this ARC book for free from Net Galley and this is my honest review.
Randy Mayhill loves to sit on his front porch in only his boxer shorts and pistol holster, scheming how to catch feral hogs. He is “retired,” unceremoniously relieved of his duties as sheriff for protecting his felonious best friend, and Mayhill is fully committed to the hermit lifestyle. And for one year, that is all right with him, until a dead body appears draped over a fence he shares with his neighbors (Onie and Birdie, who happen to be his dead best friend’s mother and daughter, two people that are more like family to him than mere neighbors). But before he can find out who the dead person is, the body disappears. Hence, the mystery begins.
Ain’t Nobody Nobody is the debut novel of Heather Harper Ellett, a zany, witty, and heartfelt ode to rural Texas, where colloquialisms have a wisdom that is hard-earned, and the sleepy town has secrets that can be easily hidden in the wooded areas of private property. Harper Ellett has created a large cast of unique and eccentric characters that would easily fit somewhere between an Elmore Leonard novel and a Coen Brothers movie. The mystery of the dead man on the fence (who he is, how he got there) becomes entwined rather quickly in the history of Mayhill and his relationship with his best friend’s family. Moral boundaries are blurred. Illegal activity abounds. It all makes for a riveting mystery wrapped up in literary ambition.
One thing of note: Harper Ellett devises an interesting and fun narrative strategy that straddles the line between third and second person. The narrator knows the cast intimately, although it’s never revealed who the narrator is. But the narrator often interjects things about the characters or the citizens of the town that elicits a response from the reader, as if to say, “Don’t YOU think so? Don’t YOU think that’s crazy?” I laughed out loud often to this commentary from the narrator, something akin to the gossipy tone of a group of folks commenting on the foibles of the people they know, then sitting back as if to say, “Those poor bastards.” Pretty funny stuff.
This is a fun read with literary flourishes that drives a murder mystery into a suspenseful, climactic showdown. My only quibble is I wanted more of the backstory and less of the mystery as the novel progressed. Maybe Harper Ellett has another novel in her—set a few years earlier—about Mayhill and Van and Onie and Birdie and Bradley. That would be amazing, don’t you think?!
Fun, smart, surprising. The language hums, and there are hogs. Highly recommended!