Humidity, Dan Kaufman

The opening line of HUMIDITY made me laugh:

Word gets 'round when you're a nude model in a small country town.

That would most definitely get around our nearby small country town, even though it could never be said that we have the rampant violence and hellish humidity referred to in the book's blurb.

An unusual crime novel, HUMIDITY is set in a one of those small towns that has lost most of its economic basis and is slowly dying as a result. The story revolves around Ben, a broke, desperately lonely, lost sort of a young man with a sad family backstory, who lobbed into town and ended up working as a nude model for the local art class. He lives in a tiny, mould infested granny flat at the back of the house his best mate shares with his elderly Granny, and sort of just mooches about. Until he falls for the local barmaid. Marty's whip smart, violent, and rapidly muscling in on her own brother's drug and gun-running business, dragging Ben with her, who frankly is more than a bit sex struck and in way over his head - sex, relationship, business, and friendship wise.

It may take a little while to get into the swing of HUMIDITY because there's a lot of nothing in Ben's life, and his lost and directionless act plays out slowly, and in a slightly meandering manner. Until it's not anymore, and there are bikies, drugs, guns and violence aplenty, as well as some athletic sex and unexpected interpersonal relationships building. The story is kind of less a murder mystery, although there are dead bodies, and more how the hell are these people going to keep living mystery though. As well as a little too realistic a portrayal of a lost young man who got himself into the wrong company and missteps constantly in his attempts to get back out again.

Slyly funny in places, mightily violent in others, the build up is steady, the resolution twisty and unclear, and the reality of the whole thing shone, sadly, through.