The World’s Smallest Bible

This debut novel from Must, who has previously written short stories and plays, retains many of the characteristics of those mediums. Chronological scenes from the lives of the two Mueller boys—little brother Jeremiah and big brother Ethan, Must’s grown-up narrator—read like vivid set pieces viewed through the scrim of adulthood. Must opens at a moment of crisis for Ethan: the blue-collar Pennsylvania mill town he calls home has begun to lose its young men to World War II, and their ghosts, among others, torment him. Must homes in on the special bond those fears cement between Ethan and Jeremiah. He then fast-forwards to the boys’ discovery of a murky dichotomy at home between their mother’s religious fervor and their father’s philandering; flashpoints in their sexual coming-of-age; Ethan’s fascination with a Polish neighbor, a scrap-metal artist with an imagination beyond his means; and, finally, the rift that grows between Ethan and Jeremiah. There are too many characters and the sometimes theatrical diction can be distracting, but in tracking how our closest relationships change with age and loss, Must composes an honest portrait of brotherly love. (Mar.)