Last One Out Shut Off the Lights

Soileau’s vivid debut collection delves into snapshots of rough-hewn Louisianan lives, where harsh realities and callous personalities rule the day. In “The Whiskey Business” a high school girl is raped by a boy whose family wields their power to keep him from being prosecuted, and in “So This Is Permanence,” a teenage mother hides her baby in a closet to sneak off with friends, riding in the bed of a pickup across swamps and canals; after this taste of freedom, “dumpsters and rivers started to look like good options.” Other stories, such as “Cut Off, Louisiana: A Ghost Story” and “The Boucherie,” highlight economic desperation in the wake of natural disasters, while “Mr A” tells of a children’s theater director who takes advantage of a road trip to seduce a boy in the troupe. Many stories stand out with exceptional, sometimes poetic phrasing, such as “When Pluto Lost His Planetary Status” (“I have felt love just as profound and worshipful and inimitable and hopelessly banal”). Filled with dense disquietude, these tales portray lives that are wrung dry by relentless conflicts and challenges. The characters are markedly distinct among the stories, though they share in having little or no chance of joy, hope, or redemption. Soileau shines a memorable light on a lesser-seen slice of Louisiana. (July)