This is a weird book - full of murder, corruption, misspent religion and a very troubled youth. You don't always understand what is going on, but you can't put it down - you have the need to find out what will happen next. The Devil All the Time Donald Ray Pollock Doubleday July 2011 The setting is rural southern Ohio and West Virginia. William Russell is a tormented WW II Veteran with a wife who is dying of cancer, he isn't a really religious man, takes only parts of the Bible he deems appropriate to his present situation and runs with it. He builds a "prayer log" in the forest behind his rented property and makes blood sacrifices. He makes his young son Arvin go with him and they pray for hours asking the Lord to save his beautiful wife Charlotte. Sheriff Bodecker is corrupt. He is literally the hit man for the local criminal. He wants the town people to believe he is a straight as an arrow person, but behind the scenes he is really evil. Sandy is Sheriff Bodecker's sister. A shy girl, working in the local dinner, she meets Carl Anderson. She is fantasized by him and is soon caught in his web. Sandy and Carl get married and troll the highways looking for hitchhikers they dub "models". Carl takes photographs of them in compromising positions with Sandy and then murders them. Leaving their bodies in shallow graves along the highways. Roy, a spider handling preacher, and his crippled guitar playing sidekick Theodore. go from town to town and state to state preaching their so called religion. They get into trouble and are now running from the law. Caught in the middle in all of this is Arvin Eugene Russell. He tries to do right, goes to live with his maternal grandmother after his mother dies and his father commits suicide. Arvin gets into situations that turns him into a very angry young man. Sandy and Clyde are eventually caught, Theodore dies, and Roy ties to go home to see his daughter and Sheriff Bodecker finally gets what he deserves. Highly recommended. The Devil All the Time will entice you, seduce you and provide you with a very unique read. Mr. Pollock has proven himself to be a master story teller.