If I read a better book this year I'll be surprised | The Devil All the Time by Donald Ray Pollock

Added: 2026-05-12

[00:00:00]Hello, I'm Ollie and this is Criminal Olly, where I talk about crime, pulp, horror, that kind of thing. Today, the best book I've read so far this year, The Devil All the Time by Donald Ray Pollock.

[00:00:16][music] Not only was this the best book that I've read so far this year, but I strongly suspect that by the end of the year, it will still be the best book I read this year, and I'm filming this in May. So, that shows you what an impression it made on me. It was just a book that for me as a reader worked perfectly. It's not very long. It's about 260 pages, but every element of this book felt like it served a purpose and that all those things came together in a really, really wonderful and slightly magical way. It's really unusual for a book to grab me quite as much as this one did. It grabbed me by the scruff of the neck right from the start and I couldn't stop reading it.

[00:01:01]Um, and that is despite the fact that it doesn't really have a strong central plot running through it. I tend to think of books that are for one of a better word unput downable as books that that you know that have that kind of single central story line running through them.

[00:01:15]Um, The Devil All the Time is more of a mix of different story lines. There are a load of different stories and a load of different characters competing with each other for your attention and they all manage to kind of coalesce at the end in a really really fantastically satisfying way. Um this is just a a brilliant brilliant book and I urge you to read it. And the thing that I find particularly fascinating about it I think is the fact that Donald Ray Pollock has only published three books at this point. Uh and his first book Noam Stiff he didn't publish until he was 54. So, you know, relatively late on in his life, and I say that, by the way, as someone who is 53. Um, so his first book, Nokamstiff, was a short story collection that came out in 2008. Um, The Devil All the Time. Uh, this novel came out in 2011, and he subsequently published another novel, Heavenly Table, and I really, really am very keen to read, uh, both Heavenly Table and KnockMstiff now, cuz I loved The Devil All the Time, as you could probably tell. In fact, I've tried to film this video about 10 times, and I keep on kind of tripping over my words in my enthusiasm to talk about this book. So, let me tell you what it's about. It's set in Ohio and West Virginia. And it takes place between the end of the Second World War in 1945 and kind of the early 1960s. And as I say, it doesn't have a central plot line. It's more about a group of different characters, all of whom have their own stories. And those those stories, those kind of paths intertwine with each other as the book progresses. Um, so you've got, for example, a guy who's come back from fighting in the Pacific and has been like really psychologically damaged by what he's seen there, and he comes home to a wife who is who is very ill. Um, you've also got a couple of kind of traveling preachers, one of whom handles spiders as part of his act. Um, and then you've got a couple who go on these um, Macab vacations where they travel around kind of looking for hitchhikers to pick up. I won't tell you what they do with those hitchhikers, uh, but it is truly truly shocking at times. So, you've got all these different things going on. And the thing that impressed me most about this book is that it manages to to show you some really dark and horrible stuff without ever feeling like it loses its humanity, but also without ever feeling like it's mlin. It's not a um you know it it covers things like um you know like parental death and things like that but but in a way which isn't either kind of hallmarky you know it it never feels kind of schmaltzy or anything like that despite the fact that it is often deeply moving. Um but equally the darkness in this book the you know scenes of graphic violence and things like like that in this book never overwhelm the characters. there's always a central humanity to to everybody in this book even when they are doing terrible things that makes it I think even more compelling. Um I was interested to note when I was looking at the book uh online that it was nominated for the Goodreads Reader Choice Awards for best horror novel in 2011. And that baffled me slightly because I don't think of it as being a horror novel at all. It's definitely horrific at times. It's definitely horrifying at times, but it's the kind of book which is somewhat unclassifiable. I suppose if you were going to call it anything, you could call it a southern gothic. It's definitely got that feel of um you know, kind of decline and decay that you associate with um with Gothic literature, but it but it is in no way a horror novel. And equally, despite the fact that there is loads of crime in this book, it's not really a crime novel either. It's just a it's just a book. it exists um in and of itself rather than rather than I think being being a work that you can define by a particular genre. And I think that is really its strength is the fact that it combines so many different things, so many different styles into something that is completely convincing both as a work of art, but also as a a reflection on the people that that Pollock is writing about in this book. These characters that he has conjured up. Um, as I say, there's something completely human about all of them. Um, and he also manages, despite all the darkness, to weave a huge amount of humor into this book. Very dark humor at times. Um, but it is like genuinely funny. Some of the dialogue in particular in this book had me laughing out loud. The kind of turns of phrase um that characters use are just absolutely wonderful. Um, and as I say, it's a book that I just kept turning the pages of. I was so appalled at times by what was happening. But I needed to know what was going to happen next. I needed to know what happened to these characters, how their lives turned out. Both the characters that I felt um you know completely sympathetic for and there are some of those but also the characters that I felt appalled by because all of them despite the things they do feel like real people. you feel like you are living in this community um and living with these people um as you you know explore their lives through through the book and there is you know to all of this this incredible sense of authenticity. It really feels like Donald Ray Pollock knows the place that he is writing about. Um and as I said nostiff his his short story collection um was based on the town that he grew up in and indeed he worked in Ohio. who worked in a paper mill until he was 50.

[00:06:42]So it was only after that that he you know started writing and became a published author. And that sense of um just complete reality to everything he writes about even when it's stuff that is completely like unimaginably horrible feels, you know, it fills the book with this this authenticity which is incredibly compelling and incredibly moving at times as well. Um, it's just a wonderful, wonderful piece of fiction.

[00:07:10]As you can probably tell, I'm I'm kind of having trouble collecting my thoughts about this book because there is there's so much that is so good about it. Um, it it really is worth reading, but it does come, it must be said, with a bunch of trigger warnings. Um, so, you know, do research those before you read it. There is a lot of brutality and cruelty in this book, but ultimately it feels like a book which is deeply deeply human and and all the more effective because of that. So those are my rather jumbled thoughts on The Devil All the Time by Donald Ray Pollock. I just can't get over how good this book is and hopefully if nothing else that has come across in this video. Um so if you like the sound of it, do check it out. Um do let me know in the comments if you've read other stuff by Donald Ray Pollock and what you thought of it. And as always, thank you very much for watching. Hope you're safe and well out there. Hope you're reading good stuff. And I'll speak to you again very soon. Cheerio.