Fire Shut Up in My Bones

“A second wrong would restore me to right.”

As a college student with vivid memories of sexual abuse—memories that have tormented him his entire life and shaded his youth with shame, guilt, and depression—Blow makes the easy mistake of thinking vengeance is the best solution. For victims in the grip of such anger, the temptation of “an eye for an eye” is often too great to ignore. Blow, to his credit, is able to focus on the impressive list of things he’s accomplished despite the trauma. Rechanneling his rage into acceptance saves both his life and Chester’s.

“Gibsland was a place where the line between heroes and villains was not so clearly drawn.”

Blow’s hometown, Gibsland, is a small backwater whose only claim to fame is that Bonnie and Clyde were killed just south of there. The residents “still relished the infamy” (7). Blow’s observation reflects the American glorification of the outlaw in a society that prides itself on “law and order.” The line between law and lawlessness is frequently blurred in American culture—films such as Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Easy Rider, and Dirty Harry, which exalts the renegade cop, all place traditional antagonists at the front and center of the narrative. In Gibsland, Blow sees the characters in his own narrative—women shooting