Nothing but Waves and Wind

A musty bar in off-season Cannon Beach, Oregon, provides the setting for an unsuspecting Frenchmans introduction to the many ways life can go wrong for the unlucky in America. He listens as the barflies nightly recount their tales of woebetrayal, broken families, financial ruin. Though they seem at first to tolerate the newcomers presence and sympathy, a tide of violence is rising, one he perceives only dimly until it is too late to escape. Made doubly powerful by her poetic fascination with the violence and volatility of the American landscape itself, Montalbettis novel is a thrilling study of the senseless cruelty disappointed men are capable of.