{"product_id":"dont-skip-out-on-me-a-novel-isbn-9780062684455","title":"Don't Skip Out on Me: A Novel","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eA FINALIST FOR THE PEN\/FAULKNER AWARD\u003c\/strong\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFrom Willy Vlautin,  award-winning author of \u003cem\u003eLean on Pete \u003c\/em\u003eand \u003cem\u003eThe Motel Life\u003c\/em\u003e, comes a powerful exploration of identity and loneliness pulled from deep within America's soul.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eDon’t Skip Out On Me\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e is going to make your heart crumple into a little wad of paper and then open it back up into a perfect paper airplane sailing the skies from the hand of a boy. How does a bi-cultural man find a self when he’s been abandoned by his parents? He invents it, that’s how, with his hands, his fists, and that fist-shaped muscle, a heart. No one anywhere writes as beautifully about people whose stories stay close to the dirt. Willy Vlautin is a secular—and thus real and profoundly useful—saint.”\u003cbr\u003e—Lidia Yuknavitch, author of \u003cem\u003eThe Book of Joan\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHorace Hopper has spent most of his life on a Nevada sheep ranch, but dreams of something bigger. Mr. and Mrs. Reese, the aging ranchers, took him in and treated him like a son, intending to leave the ranch in his hands. But Horace, ashamed not only of his half-Paiute, half-Irish heritage, but also of the fact his parents did not want him, feels as if he doesn’t belong on the ranch, or anywhere. Knowing he needs to make a name for himself, he decides to leave the only loving home he’s known to prove his worth as a championship boxer.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eMr. Reese is holding on to a way of life that is no longer sustainable. He’s a seventy-two-year-old rancher with a bad back. He’s not sure how he’ll keep things going without Horace but he knows the boy must find his own way. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTo become a champion Horace must change not just the way he eats, trains, and thinks, but who he is. Reinventing himself as Hector Hildago, a scrappy Mexican boxer, he heads to Tucson and begins training and entering fights. His journey brings him to boxing rings across the Southwest and Mexico and finally, to the streets of Las Vegas, where Horace learns he can’t change who he is or outrun his destiny. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA beautiful, wrenching portrait of a downtrodden man, \u003cem\u003eDon’t Skip Out on Me\u003c\/em\u003e narrates the struggle to find one's place in a vast and lonely world with profound tenderness, and will make you consider those around you—and yourself—differently.\u003c\/p\u003e | \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFrom award-winning author Willy Vlautin comes a powerful exploration of identity and loneliness pulled from deep within America’s soul.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHorace Hopper has spent most of his life on a Nevada sheep ranch but dreams of something bigger. Mr. and Mrs. Reese, the aging ranchers, took him in and treated him like a son, intending to leave the ranch in his hands. However, Horace, ashamed of his half Paiute, half Irish heritage and that his parents did not want him, feels as if he doesn’t belong there, or anywhere. Realizing he needs to make a name for himself, he decides to leave the only loving home he’s known to prove his worth as a championship boxer.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eMr. Reese is holding on to a way of life that is no longer sustainable. He’s a seventy-two-year-old rancher with a bad back. He’s not sure how he’ll keep things going without Horace, but he understands the boy must find his own way. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTo become a champion Horace must not only change the way he eats, trains, and thinks but also who he is. Reinventing himself as Hector Hildago, a scrappy Mexican boxer, he heads to Tucson and begins training and entering fights. His journey brings him to boxing rings across the Southwest and Mexico, and finally to the streets of Las Vegas, where Horace learns he can’t change who he is or outrun his destiny. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA beautiful, wrenching portrait of a downtrodden man, \u003cem\u003eDon’t Skip Out on Me\u003c\/em\u003e narrates with profound tenderness the struggle to find one’s place in a vast and lonely world, and will make you consider those around you—and yourself—differently.\u003c\/p\u003e | \u003cp\u003e“Willy Vlautin has been literature’s best-kept secret for far too long. He may well be our own Steinbeck, but with a haunting steel-guitar sensibility all his own.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eShelf Awareness\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Vlautin’s sparse, plan sentences are well-matched to the brusque world he depicts. At the same time, his compassion for his characters never wavers.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSunday Times (London)\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Vlautin’s latest novel…inches ever closer to a literary equivalent of his unrivalled ability to make us believe in the characters in his songs long after they’ve stopped believing in themselves.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eYorkshire Evening Post\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“An emotionally wrenching story of a ranch hand who dreams of being a championship boxer and an elderly couple trying to hold on in central Nevada.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eOregonian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Vlautin’s prose is deceptively simple, his clipped descriptions loaded with meaning. The narrative is as unsparing as Hopper’s fights, but what stays standing is a profound sense of hope, a hope that drives society’s downtrodden and provides the theme for much of Vlautin’s work.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eFinancial Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Riveting…Vlautin’s colorful characters inhabit both lonely Nevada ranch landscapes and gritty city scenes. Their world is painted with unflinching reality and raw emotion, yet also with compassion and heart, creating a compelling read.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eChristian Science Monitor\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“In this climate, a writer like Willy Vlautin seems like one of the last souls left standing on trad-narrative’s working-class battlements. He’s the literary version of a Neil Young or a Tom Petty, bearing a ragged standard for empathy, compassion and decency, defending notions of the story as a sorting office for the soul. In other words, he’s a throwback to a generation of novelists who still championed the underclass and promoted socialist values in fiction: everyone from John Steinbeck to Nelson Algren, or, more latterly, William Kennedy or Annie Proulx.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eIrish Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“[T]here’s a distinct sense of foreboding in the air as Vlautin slowly lets this poignant tale unwind to its inevitable, heartbreaking conclusion. A powerful, haunting portrayal of lives rendered in unflinching, understated prose.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eKirkus Reviews\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“(The book is) written in the sort of scorched, bare-bones prose, stripped of metaphors and similes, that has won him fans such as Roddy Doyle, Donna Tartt and Colm Tóibín.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Guardian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Vlautin is on to something about what’s wrong with America, and with many Americans, especially in the age of Trump...” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSpectator UK\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“(Willy Vlautin) is the literary version of a Neil Young or a Tom Petty, bearing a ragged standard for empathy, compassion and decency, defending notions of the story as a sorting office for the soul. “ - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eIrish Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e‘Willy Vlautin is the poet laureate of the downtrodden and disenfranchised underclass of American society, detailing with real empathy and insight the daily struggle of his characters in modern society.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBig Issue\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“The world needs more Willy Vlautin, and \u003cem\u003eDont’ Skip Out on Me\u003c\/em\u003e is his best novel yet.”    - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eJonathan Evison, author of This is Your Life, Harriet Chance and The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“No one anywhere writes as beautifully about people whose stories stay close to the dirt. Willy Vlautin is a secular—and thus real and profoundly useful—saint.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eLidia Yuknavitch, author of The Book of Joan\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Vlautin writes with patience, tenderness, and a sharp eye toward the subtle things that can wear a person down — the fights we don’t know we’re losing until it’s already too late.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Vlautin unerringly captures the heartbreak of the generational divide — as every older generation realizes it cannot protect its younger charges from making their own mistakes as they forge their own way.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eCoast Weekend\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Singer-songwriter Vlautin’s latest (\u003cem\u003eThe Free\u003c\/em\u003e) is another quietly devastating addition to his growing canon of spare and heartrending contemporary Westerns... Vlautin’s unerring ability to write without artifice or judgment about hardscrabble people trying to do good makes him the literary heir to the late Kent Haruf.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eLibrary Journal (starred review)\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“In this powerful novel, Vlautin (\u003cem\u003eThe Free\u003c\/em\u003e) writes about characters whose big dreams and plans are often stunted by fate and circumstance, but who’ve managed to find a way to push through, bruised but with hard-won wisdom. . . . excellent.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly (starred review)\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“I absolutely loved \u003cem\u003eDon’t Skip Out On Me\u003c\/em\u003e, just as I have loved all of Vlautin’s previous novels. Vlautin’s gritty, scrappy world bursts with a tenderness that will hook you in from the first line to the last. This is a writer who should never be ignored.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eJessica Anya Blau, author of The Trouble with Lexie and Drinking Closer to Home\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“I’m smitten in the most remarkable way. I’ve fallen from the ground up for Willy Vlautin’s newest character, Horace Hopper, the half-Irish half-Paiute ranch hand turned boxer. \u003cem\u003eDon’t Skip Out On Me\u003c\/em\u003e is going to make your heart crumple into a little wad of paper and then open it back up into a perfect paper airplane sailing the skies from the hand of a boy. How does a bi-cultural man find a self when he’s been abandoned by his parents? He invents it, that’s how, with his hands, his fists, and that fist-shaped muscle, a heart. No one anywhere writes as beautifully about people whose stories stay close to the dirt. Willy Vlautin is a secular—and thus real and profoundly useful—saint.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eLidia Yuknavitch, author of The Book of Joan\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Magnificent…. Willy Vlautin is now one of America’s great writers.”    - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eRoddy Doyle\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Beautifully crushing and complete.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eJohn Doe, author of Under the Big Black Sun and co-founder of X\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“A debut road-trip novel that echoes the spare, bleak style of such writers as Denis Johnson and Raymond Carver…[Vlautin] conveys the pain and desolate lives of his characters without a hint of melodrama” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eWashington Post (on The Motel Life)\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Willy’s novel \u003cem\u003eLean on Pete\u003c\/em\u003e was one of my favorite reads of the last decade. I might love \u003cem\u003eThe Free\u003c\/em\u003e even more. ‘Cinematic minimalism’ in the grand tradition of \u003cem\u003eFat City\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eIronweed\u003c\/em\u003e, and the works of the great Raymond Carver. - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003ePatterson Hood,  songwriter and musician, Drive-By Truckers\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Vlautin. . . . strips away our defenses with close-to-the bone prose that leaves us utterly exposed to the tragedy of being alive—and every bit as thankful for those moments of aching humanity before the curtain falls.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBooklist (starred review)\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Vlautin steers his characters down their hard path like a veteran scrive of the American road.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Times (UK)\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“The straightforward beauty of Vlautin’s writing, and the tender care he shows his characters, turns a story of struggle into indispensable reading. I couldn’t recommend it more highly.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eAnn Patchett\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Willy Vlautin is one of the bravest novelists writing... An unsentimental Steinbeck, a heartbroken Haruf, Willy Vlautin tells us who really lives now in our America, our city in ruins.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eUrsula K. Le Guin\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Vlautin is a writer with incredible heart, and \u003cem\u003eThe Free\u003c\/em\u003e is his best achievement yet, a profound look at characters living on the margins, honest people who have been hit hard by the dark realities of a difficult world.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“\u003cem\u003eLean on Pete\u003c\/em\u003e riveted me. Reading it, I was heartbroken and moved; enthralled and convinced. This is serious American literature.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eCheryl Strayed, The Oregonian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Vlautin’s eye for detail is sharp: every character is distinctly drawn and memorable.... for sheer cinéma-vérité detailing of American life right now, \u003cem\u003eLean on Pete\u003c\/em\u003e is a good place to start.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eJane Smiley, The Guardian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Northline shines with naked honesty and unsentimental humanity. The character of Allison Johnson, and the wounded-but-still-walking people she encounters on her journey, will stay with me for a long while. Vlautin has written the American novel that I’ve been hoping to find.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eGeorge Pelecanos\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“I love Willy Vlautin’s novels. Downbeat and plaintive as they are, the tenderness holds on like the everlasting arms…. Willy’s voice is pure and his stories universal. He never loses hope or heart and I believe every word he’s written.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBarry Gifford\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Few contemporary western writers tell the truth with the unerring eye of Willy Vlautin, a literary realist whose emotionally charged characters achieve that rarest of goals in fiction—to tell a great story...” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eCraig Johnson, author of the Walt Longmire Mysteries\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“With straightforward economy, he draws us into [the characters’] seemingly intractable problems, revealing their persistence and decency... Vlautin’s unadorned narrative is affecting; these unassuming characters bore into us in surprising ways.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eNew York Times Book Review on The Free\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Harper Perennial","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44888474091749,"sku":"NP9780062684455","price":22.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780062684455.jpg?v=1730229162","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/dont-skip-out-on-me-a-novel-isbn-9780062684455","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}