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    This Dark Road to Mercy: A Novel
    This Dark Road to Mercy: A Novel
    This Dark Road to Mercy: A Novel
    Audiobook7 hours

    This Dark Road to Mercy: A Novel

    Written by Wiley Cash

    Narrated by Jenna Lamia, Erik Bergmann and Scott Sowers

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    About this audiobook

    The critically acclaimed author of the New York Times bestseller A Land More Kind Than Home—hailed as ""a powerfully moving debut that reads as if Cormac McCarthy decided to rewrite Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird"" (Richmond Times Dispatch)—returns with a resonant novel of love and atonement, blood and vengeance, set in western North Carolina, involving two young sisters, a wayward father, and an enemy determined to see him pay for his sins.

    After their mother's unexpected death, twelve-year-old Easter and her six-year-old sister Ruby are adjusting to life in foster care when their errant father, Wade, suddenly appears. Since Wade signed away his legal rights, the only way he can get his daughters back is to steal them away in the night.

    Brady Weller, the girls' court-appointed guardian, begins looking for Wade, and he quickly turns up unsettling information linking Wade to a recent armored car heist, one with a whopping $14.5 million missing. But Brady Weller isn't the only one hunting the desperate father. Robert Pruitt, a shady and mercurial man nursing a years-old vendetta, is also determined to find Wade and claim his due.

    Narrated by a trio of alternating voices, This Dark Road to Mercy is a story about the indelible power of family and the primal desire to outrun a past that refuses to let go.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperAudio
    Release dateJan 28, 2014
    ISBN9780062283870
    Author

    Wiley Cash

    Wiley Cash is the New York Times bestselling author of A Land More Kind Than Home, the acclaimed This Dark Road to Mercy, and most recently The Last Ballad. He is a three-time winner of the SIBA Southern Book Prize, won the Conroy Legacy Award, was a finalist for the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize and the Edgar Award for Best Novel, and has been nominated for many more. A native of North Carolina, he is the Alumni Author-in-Residence at the University of North Carolina Asheville. He lives in Wilmington, NC with his wife, photographer Mallory Cash, and their two daughters.

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    Reviews for This Dark Road to Mercy

    4/5

    304 ratings58 reviews

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    • 4/5
      Nothing is at it first appears in Wiley Cash’s newest book, This Dark Road To Mercy, making it such a wonderfully compelling and complex read. Twelve year old Easter and six year old Ruby find themselves placed into the foster care system in Gastonia, North Carolina upon the death of their mother, a traumatic enough experience, until they are kidnapped by their father who legally no longer has claim to either girl. Reunited with their father is not a blessing, as he has people after him, and not just for abducting Easter and Ruby. This Dark Road To Mercy by Wiley Cash is taught with emotion, treachery, love and redemption. Cash delicately weaves together multiple storylines allowing the reader to view all sides and choose what is and is not right. Cash’s characters are extremely realistic and one cannot help but be rapidly drawn into this complex story. I strongly recommend This Dark Road To Mercy to book discussion groups, it will not disappoint.
    • 5/5
      I want MORE! EXCELLENT audiobook, writing and narration A+! I am checking now, hopefully there is a volume 2 of this series (Cash MUST have meant this as a series, otherwise it was ended abruptly, with a few too many "loose threads"). As enjoyable as cotton-candy and your favorite ride at the state fair; as refreshing as an ice-cold beer (or lemonade if you are either too young or not alcoholically inclined) after a hot day of lawn mowing!
    • 5/5
      Awesome book. I felt as if I were there !
    • 4/5
      This is a really good book. I think this would make a good movie.
    • 5/5
      excellent storytelling. story of parental love
    • 5/5
      First of all, I absolutely loved listening to Jenna Lamia reading this. Her voice is awesome. In fact, all of the narrators did an excellent job.
      Now, this is my first Wiley Cash novel and from the first page, I basically devoured it. What an awesome author!! This book reminded me a lot of "November Road" by Lou Berney minus the political aspect.
      My only issue was there was an inconsistency with the ending that I didn't understand.
      Also, semi spoiler alert--- but the worst part of this was the scene with Wade's mother, but it also was such a strange encounter and scenario but also very well written and expressed.
      Really enjoyed this book
    • 5/5
      Synopsis/blurb............

      The critically acclaimed author of the New York Times bestseller A Land More Kind Than Home—hailed as "a powerfully moving debut that reads as if Cormac McCarthy decided to rewrite Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird" (Richmond Times Dispatch)—returns with a resonant novel of love and atonement, blood and vengeance, set in western North Carolina, involving two young sisters, a wayward father, and an enemy determined to see him pay for his sins.

      After their mother's unexpected death, twelve-year-old Easter and her six-year-old sister Ruby are adjusting to life in foster care when their errant father, Wade, suddenly appears. Since Wade signed away his legal rights, the only way he can get his daughters back is to steal them away in the night.

      Brady Weller, the girls' court-appointed guardian, begins looking for Wade, and he quickly turns up unsettling information linking Wade to a recent armoured car heist, one with a whopping $14.5 million missing. But Brady Weller isn't the only one hunting the desperate father. Robert Pruitt, a shady and mercurial man nursing a years-old vendetta, is also determined to find Wade and claim his due.

      Narrated by a trio of alternating voices, This Dark Road to Mercy is a story about the indelible power of family and the primal desire to outrun a past that refuses to let go.
      -------------------------
      My take.......
      The author’s debut novel – A Land Less Kind Than Home – is something I have had on my TBR pile for around a year or so. I was hoping to get to it sometime last year, but hey, I was going to read a lot of things, but never did. When Cash’s second novel popped up on Net Galley, I couldn’t resist. I will probably re-visit the author’s debut for my USA state reading challenge.

      Cash kept my attention throughout. Two sisters, in foster care, fearful of adoption by their maternal grandparents in Alaska, who they have never seen. Wary of their father, who years after apparently abandoning them, comes to recognise his parental duty. A father who may just have committed the most stupid act of his feckless life and may have compounded it by stealing away with his daughters.

      This was absolutely fantastic, trying to see Wade connect and form an emotional bond with his daughters, all the while pursued by the authorities and a ruthless bounty hunter, with his own personal score to settle.
      Played out against a back-drop of an exciting climax to the 1998 baseball season when Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa went head to head chasing a years old home run record. (I understand next to nothing about the game and I was hooked by this tangent!)

      Loss, family, abandonment, foster care, adoption, Alaska, teenage love, baseball, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, bank robbery, beach, the sea, amusement pitches, secrets, pursuit, death, guardianship, responsibility, forgiveness, love.............all figure to a greater or lesser degree.

      A wonderful, satisfying, scary but rewarding read to almost finish a great year’s reading with.

      5 from 5

      Accessed via Net Galley, I believe this is published later this month.


    • 2/5
      Wow. To say this book is flat is an understatement.

      Once I cracked the book open and saw how it was going to be, I couldn't finish it fast enough even though it's a short novel with little real substance to necessitate attentive reading.

      The novel is set in 1998 Gastonia, NC and follows the story of two sisters, 12-year-old Easter and 6-year-old Ruby Quillby, who have been placed in an orphanage after their mother dies. Their father Wade Chesterfield, a hopelessly inept criminal who has no rights to them, wants a second chance to be their father. Wade shows up out of the blue and kidnaps them, putting them in danger because of his own illegal activities. Wade is being pursued by a deranged ghost from his past, Pruitt. Sounds like an interesting read, right? So wrong.

      I didn't really connect to any of the characters. Even the main characters are mostly 1D. Wade's careless and child-like character was the only one that I felt had a little depth, but it wasn't enough. Easter had the most boring and lifeless thoughts and reflections (even about the day her mother died), and Brady (the ex-cop and legal guardian) I couldn't have cared less about. The one guy who should be the most interesting was Pruitt, the quintessential homicidal maniac. He was just as dull, if not more, than the others. Pruitt was as flat as a cardboard cutout. He didn't seem real in any way. His whole demeanor was off and unfortunately his random, choppy back-story was not very enlightening, unless his problem is supposed to be mostly genetic. You would think that Wiley would have mentioned more about Pruitt's history with Wade at certain parts, instead describing things that didn't matter to the story.

      Most of the descriptions are banal and pointless, and I now officially don't want to hear another thing about baseball for a long time. The story is paralleled by the 1998 race between Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire to break Roger Maris' home run record. That might have been all the baseball the story needed. The constant mentioning by every character of playing baseball, watching baseball, loving baseball, remembering baseball, and daydreaming about baseball may be of interest to baseball fans; to me it was pure torture. The story seems to be mostly about baseball. Maybe baseball really is a big thing for Gastonians but I refuse to believe that the residents only play and talk about baseball 24/7.

      Things began to heat up around chapter 20 (there are 35 chapters in my version). Still, the flat characters, the flat conversations, and some of the coincidental scenarios gave the feel of a '90s Lifetime movie. I didn't care for the writing style, which was confusing at times and not just because of the constant change of POV. As brief and tidy as the ending is, it's probably the most decent part of the book.

      The story was lacking as a whole, with loose ends everywhere and details that take up space and yet come to nothing. As shallow as the central story is, Wiley could have built upon that instead of adding padding. I also think the setting could have been further elaborated upon. I was raised in Fayetteville, NC and the setting, 1990s Gastonia, NC was still not interesting to me. As many times as Gastonia is mentioned, it almost could have been any other city in the U.S. what with the lack of detail. This could have been such a good story, but in the end it just felt empty.
    • 5/5
      This tightly written, suspense-filled story combines the child's point of view, the adult's regrets, and a mix of motives colliding in unforeseen ways. The three narrators add vivid texture to the interweaving threads of greed, vengeance, and baseball, as the climax plays out against the race for Roger Maris' record. The minor leagues with their disappointments entangle two men who do not make it to the majors but are entangled again years later in a struggle to settle past debts, even as two small girls try to understand lost and absent parents.
    • 2/5
      The story was okay. Not thrilling or mysterious, but nice. The devil's in the details though, and the details were killing me.I'm from North Cakalacky and was anticipating something that felt like home. This didn't. It was like being in a house that looked just like the one you grew up but didn't quite smell right. I love stories that jump through multiple perspectives, but if you do that in a first person voice, the voices must all sound strongly distinct from one another. These do not. Waffle House doesn't serve pancakes. Why on earth wouldn't they just tell Ruby that?The Alaska inaccuracies were maddening. I spent 10 of my 44 years there. It is not continuously dark in Alaska for 6 months of the year. You wouldn't come to AK before baseball season to earn a little money working in canneries because seasonal canning jobs are during baseball season. North Slope jobs (aka oil field jobs) are not something you come up to get seasonally as an inexperienced worker. They are some of the most desired jobs in the entire state. Getting a job with these companies requires the right education, experience, and connections. There also isn't an oil field outside of Anchorage. These jobs are all located in the North Slope which is over 800 miles away. A character saying he drove into town with some buddies for a burger is like saying you drove to NYC for a burger when you got off work in Atlanta.Getting stuff like this wrong in contemporary fiction with absolutely no literary need to change reality massively detracts from the story.
    • 4/5
      Wiley Cash's This Dark Road to Mercy is an intriguing and suspenseful novel about a desperate father who kidnaps his daughters and finds himself on the run when a person from his past seizes the opportunity to exact his revenge.

      Set in 1998, readers are whisked back in time to Sammy Sosa and Mark McGuire's heated battle to break Robert Maris's homerun record. As the drama between Sosa/McGuire plays out, ex-minor league ballplayer Wade Chesterfield kidnaps the daughters he abandoned years earlier. Twelve year old Easter and her sister Ruby are living in a foster home following the death of their mother and while at first, Easter wants nothing to do with her wayward father, she willingly leaves with him. Their guardian ad litem, Brady Weller, an ex-cop who can never atone for a tragic accident, and Robert Pruitt, a vengeful psychopath from Wade's ball playing days, are soon in pursuit of Wade and the missing girls.

      This Dark Road to Mercy unfolds from three of the characters' perspectives. The most compelling and sympathetic voice is that of twelve year old Easter. Easter grew up way too fast and she is wise beyond her years. She is very protective of Ruby and with clear memories of Wade's neglect, she is suspicious of his reappearance in their lives. She struggles to maintain an emotional distance but she is still a little girl whose mixed feelings for her dad slowly evolve over the course of their travels.

      Brady's point of view is just as riveting. His concern for the girls is genuine and when he realizes the kidnapping is not a high priority for the police, he begins his own investigation. He uncovers important evidence that links Wade to the missing money from the armored car robbery and the trail eventually leads to some very unsavory individuals.

      Robert Pruitt is motivated by more than greed to find Wade. He has a score to settle and he is ruthless in his attempts to track him down. He is merciless and methodical in his quest for information and the suspense builds as he closes in on his quarry.

      My feelings for Easter, Ruby, Brady and Pruitt stayed pretty much the same throughout the novel. But Wade? I went back and forth between feeling sorry for him and wanting to shake some sense into him. He truly loves his daughters and he really does want to be a father to them. But Wade is immature and selfish and his impetuous decisions demonstrate his lack of common sense. He has a good heart, but does that mean he is should regain custody of his daughters?

      This Dark Road to Mercy is a dramatic and engrossing novel with a cast of characters that invoke a wide range of emotions. The setting is perfect for the story and Wiley Cash once again paints a vibrant and gritty portrait of life in the south. It is a wonderful story of redemption with an ending that is as surprising as it is satisfying.
    • 5/5
      Wiley Cash is an author who won't let you go as a reader. Long after you have turned the last page, you will remember a passage of dialogue, a moment in the story line, and the one character whose voice resonates above all others. I found this to be equally true with the author's debut work, "A Land More Kind Than Home", and now with his second book, "This Dark Road to Mercy". Both books are set in Wiley Cash's home state of North Carolina, and he writes "Southern" with an appreciable style. This time, the author tells the tale of two young sisters, one older than her time, whose mother, Corinne, gives herself the gift of eternal sleep with an unintentional drug overdose. After the death of their mother, twelve-year-old Easter Quillby, and her six-year-old sister, Ruby, are shoved into foster care. Their father, Wade, who had struggled to make it out of minor-league baseball, had signed away his parental rights years ago. Eventually, Wade shows up at the foster home and tries to reconnect with his girls. His decision to take them on a misguided, but heartfelt, flight from reality will change all their lives forever. Following Wade and the girls are Brady Weller, the guardian appointed to them by the court, and Robert Pruitt, a man with a deadly grudge against Wade. When information links Wade to a high-dollar armored-car heist, he becomes even more of a wanted man, but will his girls decide they want their daddy? Told in alternating turns by three voices, it is Easter's story you will most remember. Some people never have a future--they are swallowed by the past. For some, the future moves them forward in ways they never expected, but ultimately must accept.Book Copy Gratis Amazon Vine
    • 5/5
      Beautifully written story.
    • 4/5
      Well written, quick noir-ish thriller lite. Will make a good movie!
    • 4/5
      In 1998, baseball fans (and some of the rest of us) were caught up in a contest between Sammy Sosa and Mark McQwire to see who might break Roger Maris's home-run record. Against that background, Wiley Cash has set a suspenseful road-trip featuring 12-year-old Easter Quilby, her 7-year-old sister Ruby, and their ne'er-do-well father, Wade, a former baseball player himself. The girls haven't seen their father in several years, but suddenly he has re-appeared, determined to be a Dad, starting by kidnapping them from the foster home where they have been placed following their mother's death from a drug overdose. Easter is relatively fearless, old for her years, and protective of her little sister. Her memories of her father are colored by her mother's disdain for him since he's been gone, but she is still trying hard to form her own opinion---is he a loser, as she's come to think of him, or can he be trusted? Who is the guy that seems to be looking for Wade, and what is in that heavy black bag Wade is so attached to? The story evolves through multiple narrators---Easter, herself; the man Pruitt who is following them across the country with clearly evil intentions; and Brady Weller, a former cop who is now the girls' guardian ad litem and who has drawn some conclusions about just how much trouble Wade may have got himself into. There are dark moments, but Cash does not overdo the grim bits, and even when the devil takes a round, we are never led to fear he will win in the end. Reviewers have compared Easter to Scout Finch, and Cash to Cormac McCarthy. I think both associations are off base. I see way more of Addie Pray than of Scout in Easter--in fact there are a lot of similarities in the story lines of [This Dark Road] and [Paper Moon]. And Cash's outlook is never so bleak as McCarthy's. This is not quite a terrific as [A Land More Kind Than Home], but it's pretty fine.
    • 3/5
      This Dark Road to Mercy is the story of two sisters, twelve year old Easter and six year old Ruby, who lose their mother to a drug overdose. Years earlier their father has signed away his rights to the girls so they end up in a foster home in North Carolina once their mother passes away. Wade, their father, was a former professional baseball player, shows up at the foster home and kidnaps the girls. The social worker on their case goes looking for the girls and Wade and turns up information on a big robbery that Wade had been involved in. Other more dangerous fellas are on the look out for Wade as well since he ran off with their money. The story is told from alternating narrators and is quite suspenseful. In the end, the girls are returned back to foster care and their relationship with their estranged father is on the mend.
    • 4/5
      I had high expectations for This Dark Road to Mercy by Wiley Cash after having been so impressed with his debut novel, A Land More Kind Than Home and, for the most part, the author came through. This is a story of family, forgiveness and making the right choices interwoven with a darker tale of stolen money and revenge.Wade Chesterfield has a history of failure. He failed as a professional baseball player and he failed as a husband and father. At his lowest point, he signed away his parental rights to his two daughters. Those daughters, Easter and Ruby, are living in foster care as their mother recently died. Wade, enabled by his finding money seeks to find redemption with his daughters and lured them away one night. The found money is from an armoured car heist and the crime boss from whom the money was taken, wants it back. He puts Robert Pruitt on Wade’s trail. Pruitt hates Wade, blaming him for ruining his life. He intends to make Wade and his girls suffer. Brady Weller, an ex-police detective and now the girls’ court appointed guardian has put most of the pieces together and realizes that someone needs to save these two young girls.The story unfolds through three voices, that of Easter, the twelve year old daughter, Pruitt the violent ex-con after them and Brady Weller, who sees the authorities are paying more attention to reclaiming the money than to care about the lives of the three people in danger. Although this was a familiar “cat and mouse” style story, I was glued to the pages and eager to find out what was going to happen. I especially like the voice of Easter. A self-sufficient, resolute and determined twelve year old who comes to realize the loyalty of blood ties and that although many mistakes have been made, there is hope for her family.
    • 4/5
      After their mother’s death from drug overdose, twelve-year-old Easter Quillby and her younger sister are adjusting to life in foster care. Wade Chesterfield, their errant father, re-enters their lives unexpectedly – but Wade has previously signed away his legal right to the girls, so he can only get his daughters back by kidnapping them.Brady Weller, an ex-cop and the girls’ court-appointed guardian, is certain Chesterfield has stolen Easter and Ruby. But when he begins looking for Wade, he uncovers disturbing information linking him to an amoured car heist. And Weller isn’t the only one looking for Wade: Robert Pruitt, a shady character nursing a years-old grudge, is determined to find him and have his revenge.Set in North Carolina, This Dark Road to Mercy is narrated alternately by its three main characters: Easter Quillby, Brady Weller, Robert Pruitt. Resonating with themes of love and atonement, blood and vengeance, and written in Cash’s fine prose, the novel drew me in immediately and held tight through its conclusion. Highly recommended!
    • 5/5
      This Dark Road to Mercy by Wiley Cash is very highly recommended.

      Wiley Cash's latest novel, This Dark Road to Mercy, is set in Gastonia, North Carolina where two sisters, twelve year old Easter and six year old Ruby Quillby, are placed in the foster care system after their mother dies. It's 1998 and Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire and trying to break Roger Maris' home run record. Easter is following this competition along with her friend Marcus and the rest of the country when her father, Wade Chesterfield, shows up unexpectedly and kidnaps the girls. The problem is that Wade signed over any legal rights to the girls years before and they haven't seen him for at least three years. If that's not enough, there is a bigger problem. Wade has stolen a lot of money from a local thug who wants it back so he sets a bounty hunter on Wade's trail. But this bounty hunter, Robert Pruitt, relishes finding Wade for the money and for revenge: it's personal and he has a score to settle. The girls' court-appointed guardian, ex-police office Brady Weller, is also trying to find Wade and the girls.

      The story is told through three very different narrators: Easter, Pruitt, and Brady. Easter is a girl on the path to maturity who struggles to understand the world around her. She is trusting and doubting, cocky and insecure - just like any 12 year old - only she is under a tremendous amount of pressure and isn't sure she can truly trust her father. Pruitt is one scary mean, vindictive evil guy and the tension mounts as he looks for Wade. It looks like the girls will just be collateral damage if they get in his way as he seeks to eliminate Wade once and for all. Brady is a good guy beaten down by circumstances. He's trying to fine redemption after the terrible accident that had him leaving the police force. And the girls' father, Wade, is a washed-up minor league ball player whose attempt to do something right has been set on a crooked track right at the start.

      The characters are captured to perfection. Even with all their flaws and foibles, you will be hoping that mercy, forgiveness, and redemption will be found somewhere for all these characters (with the exception of Pruitt). All of these characters are flawed and hurting. Easter and Ruby are trying so hard to keep their family bond intact and stay together while they really don't know and have little control over what their future holds. Even while you want Wade to be that strong father he wants to be, you know, deep down inside, that he may not be strong enough to make that leap. Brady is wounded, trying to look out for the best interest of the girls and find them, but he is still struggling with his own issues.

      This Dark Road to Mercy is extremely well-written Southern fiction that captured my attention right from the start and held it to the end. I'm going to have to read Cash's debut novel, A Land More Kind Than Home, based on how much I enjoyed This Dark Road to Mercy.

      Disclosure: I received an advanced reading copy of this book from HarperCollins for review purposes.
    • 5/5
      I loved this book. Wiley Cash is definitely one of my fave authors now whose works I'll keep reading.

      What was special to me in this story was Easter Quillby's "voice." Many times books are compared ad nauseum to one writer or another, yet ultimately fail to deliver on that promise, or leave us wondering how the comparison came to be at all.

      Not so when a blurb compared Easter's voice to Ellen Foster in Kaye Gibbon's book by the same title. In his own unique way, Cash succeeded in giving us a comparable, yet unique voice of a twelve year old girl, much like Ellen's. I'll admit I looked forward to Easter's Chapters more than any of the other character's.

      I also give it five stars because I felt the ending was perfect, because at various times throughout the story, I couldn't figure how he'd write it. The last sentence? Brilliant.

    • 3/5
      Overall an enjoyable well-written book, however it just ended quite abruptly.
    • 3/5
      Good story with satisfying ending that squeezed tears out of my eyes. A good follow up to his first book.
    • 5/5
      This book is probably at the very edge of the crime fiction genre - crimes have been committed, even murders, but that is not the central theme of the story. What is central is a father's attempt to re-establish a relationship with his two daughters. He gradually wins both of them over, but they are all on the run.The story asks a moral question - when Wade, who signed away his legal rights to his children, decides he wants to re-establish them, should he be allowed to? Or are they better off without him?An engrossing read.
    • 4/5
      Many reviewers here have given story descriptions so I wIll refrain. What I liked about this story was the ability to identify with various characters, which Cash builds well. As our families expand with children and grandchildren we have more opportunity to experience dysfunction. Some of the characters here represent that, and we can see ourselves in them. Experience with absentee parents, abandoned, fostered or adopted children place our hearts in the story. The father here had good intentions but poorly implemented decisions. The older daughter, through life experience, is common-sensical beyond her years and her protection of her sister feels real and natural. Telling the story with three different voices worked for Cash and was not disjointed as some other books with this trick seem. Not sure I loved the conclusion but overall a great read. Recommended.
    • 4/5
      I received this book from a Goodreads firstreads giveaway.

      I really enjoyed this book...it has all the components of a good novel and then some. The description on the back of the book describes it as a more of a suspense novel, and in a way, it definitely is. But there's so much more to it. There's baseball, crime, violence, drugs, family, love...and it didn't feel like the author was trying to throw too much together. It all just worked. The characters were flawed in a realistic way and I liked them in spite of (because of?) their flaws. The story of a parent trying to do right by their children, even when what they think is right may not actually be right for them, broke my heart. I rooted for Wade while wanting those girls to be safe.

      I'm so against happy endings because I don't think real life ties up that way - this ending was perfect. Without giving too much away, it was, in my opinion, an ultimately happy ending, but not in a nice neat bow type of way. It acknowledged that even happy endings aren't always the way we want them. That sometimes the best ending is not the one that makes us the happiest.

      I would definitely recommend it.

    • 4/5
      Wiley Cash's first novel A Land More Kind Than Home was a New York Times bestseller. It garnered rave reviews, and I remember putting it on my never ending must read list. Well, I never did get to it, but his second novel, This Dark Road to Mercy, has just released in trade format - and I jumped at the chance to review it.Twelve year old Easter and her six year old sister Ruby are now living in a foster home. Their mother has died and their father Wade signed away his parental rights years ago. But it is something in the way the man watching the ballgame Easter is playing that rings a bell.....it is Wade and he wants his girls to come with him. There's another man watching too - Wade has something that belongs to someone else. Pruitt will do whatever it takes to get that something back - and extract vengeance on Wade for an event from both their pasts. Easter, older and wiser beyond her years, makes a decision -and the three are on the run. There's a third man as well - Brady is the girls' court appointed guardian - and he too is on the trail of Wade and the girls.I loved Easter's voice from the first line...."Wade disappeared on us when I was nine years old and then he showed up out of nowhere the year I turned twelve." She presents a hard exterior to the world, shielding herself and her sister from further hurt. Small vulnerabilities - wondering if a boy likes her for example, were all the more poignant as she is feeling her way through life without a parent.Each of the characters in the book has a past - a past that influences the direction their present is taking. Wrongs that need righting, hopes, dreams, what could have been and what could be are entwined in the narratives of the three main characters. And somehow, to all three, this moment in represents redemption.From the author's notes "....As a six-year-old, you're called a liar when you tell a story that you know isn't true. But if you can keep telling stories and wait just a few more years, people will eventually call you a writer. Even when they know your stories aren't true." I think Cash is a great storyteller. This Dark Road to Mercy had mystery and suspense elements, but it was the characters themselves that captured me - especially Easter, with Wade a close second. The ending was absolutely perfect. (And I quiet enjoyed the baseball references.)
    • 3/5
      Two little girls lost their mother to cancer and were put into a foster home in North Carolina. They seem to be doing fine until their father comes back and kidnaps them in the middle of the night. The girls learn more about their dad, who they haven't seen since they were little, as the novel uncomfortably rolls along. This book is a bit dark - not a "beach" read by any means, but I love the way Wiley Cash tells this story. In the end, you feel that these girls are much smarter and much better off than many little girls with much more given to them. Pick this up for a great read.
    • 2/5
      Readable but kind of caught in-between a suspense novel and wanting to be slightly more literary. A good story with some interesting characters...just not the jaw-dropping lit that was Cash's previous book.
    • 4/5
      I really enjoyed this book. All of the characters were interesting and easy to identify with.
    • 3/5
      This is a story of two recently orphaned girls and their kidnapping by their father. The father had signed away his parental rights years ago, but shows up out of nowhere and takes the girls on a road trip after stealing money from another criminal. So they are running away from the "bad" guys while Wade, the father, tries to show his girls a good time. I liked the girls- Easter and Ruby, but the rest of the characters were weak. The book hints at the past of Brady and Wade as well as Easter adn Ruby, but you never get a full picture. Still, it was a pretty good read, it just needs a lot of polishing.