Assumption

“Assumption is a novel-length trilogy of stories about Deputy Sheriff Ogden Walker of Plata County, N.M., and three intricate and unusual crimes that occur in his jurisdiction. In the first two stories (‘A Difficult Likeness’ and ‘My American Cousin’), Walker solves bizarre murder mysteries that have quirky twists. The third story (‘The Shift’), significantly more disconcerting than the first two, is uncanny in the way it captures the texture of a nightmare, as it presents an astonishing portrait of grim rural poverty along with the devastating effects of small-town ennui . . . Assumption, rather obviously, is about making assumptions in criminal investigations where things are not as they seem. But the title also can refer to Everett's diverse talents and what assumptions have been made about his literary output. In a sense, it could be about being pigeonholed. Thus, for those who know Everett's work, his vast knowledge of literary theory and insights into race are kept backstage, as they helped build the set. But for those who are unfamiliar with Everett, it makes no difference: These stories stand alone as fun and provocative tales.”—Paul Devlin, San Francisco Chronicle

“New Mexico is a place of great beauty and great melancholy, and, like all of the American West, a magnet for misfits. Willa Cather captured these aspects in her classic 1927 novel Death Comes for the Archbishop. Now Percival Everett, author of genre-bending novels like I Am Not Sidney Poitier and Glyph, vividly evokes the same elements in Assumption, his new trilogy of interwoven murder mysteries . . . Everett casts his line, as it were, pretty far, and some of the things he reels in, along with a few red herrings, are weighty indeed: racism, anomie, disillusionment, the meaning (or lack thereof) of one man’s life—the American nightmare, in brief, at the end of the line. The settings, the protagonist and the eccentric and pathetic cast of characters will haunt you long after you close the book. I haven’t read anything like it since Georges Simenon. And, as in Simenon’s Inspector Maigret novels, the prevailing mood is one of existential despair.”—Roger Boylan, The New York Times Book Review

“In Assumption, Everett takes his turn at the police procedural, featuring Plata, New Mexico, Deputy Sheriff Ogden Walker. At the outset of the book, the small-town officer investigates the murder of an elderly woman. But that murder is wrapped up about a third of the way into the novel, and then another case takes us through the middle section, and then one more closes the book out. It’s an ingenious if quotidian variation on the crime novel: Walker’s life becomes more about the daunting accumulation of crime than about the maze of solving just one. To say anything about what Walker is really chasing, or where he ends up, would count as an unforgivable spoiler. As in Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy, the metaphysics of the story are the most mystifying. Like many of Everett’s books, Assumption’s handling of race is complex and subtle, playing out both on the surface and the depths. Walker’s biracial identity—African-American father, white mother—puts him at vaguely menacing odds with his community at first, but then racial concerns fade away. But there’s a general discomfort to Walker, one that animates both his investigations and the book’s loose plot. Race isn’t at the center of the book; it pervades every page.”—Jonathan Messinger, Time Out Chicago