Hick

Tired of going hungry while her parents get drunk and fight, thirteen-year-old Luli, who has just discovered the power of her sexuality, leaves Palmyra, Nebraska, for Las Vegas, Nevada, to find a "sugar daddy," and soon meets two grifters who use her while teaching her how to get by.

Foreseeing a hopeless future in barrooms and parking lots, cagey 13-year-old Luli McMullen bolts headlong from the heartland, aiming at Las Vegas where she expects to find herself a sugar daddy.

Almost immediately, Eddie Kreezer, a roving obsessive with a violent streak, and his erstwhole victim, a fading but lovely grifter named Glenda, begin to do battle for Luli's head and heart.

On their perilous journey west, Luli is introduced to drifters, lowlifes, strippers, speed freaks, gold-diggers, and a Libertarian with a dog named Karl. Along the way, she learns the truth of American rootlessness and discovers both the power and the peril of her own sexual curiosity.

Part coming-of-age story and part raggedy picaresque, Hick is quite a ride — raw and edgy, hilarious, hopeful, and heartbreaking. But always, Luli charts her own course with a vivacity and vision that will mark her indelibly in any readers memory.

Hick is at once a true-to-life portrait of an inviolable spirit and a stubbornly idealistic novel about growing up in America.

Publishers Weekly

Portes's chilling debut tracks a 13-year-old Nebraska girl's hard-going life on the road. Young Luli knows losers her "aging Brigitte Bardot" mother, Tammy, and her father, Nick, go at each other every night at the Alibi, the watering hole in hometown Palmyra, Neb. Tammy runs away one morning, and Nick soon follows, leaving Luli alone at home with the Smith and Wesson .45 her Uncle Nipper gave her. Pistol in tow, she hitches rides heading west to Vegas. A crooked man (literally; he "looks like an italic," says smart-alecky Luli) named Eddie picks her up briefly before throwing her out of the car. Next comes cocaine-snorting grifter Glenda, who enlists Luli as an accessory to a robbery that goes awry. Glenda takes Luli under her wing. The two cross paths again with Eddie, who rapes Luli and ties her up in a secluded motel. Glenda comes to her rescue, but the confrontation with Eddie ends badly. Luli's flippant narration makes for a love-it or hate-it read. (May)

Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Foreseeing a hopeless future in barrooms and parking lots, cagey 13-year-old Luli McMullen bolts headlong from the heartland, aiming at Las Vegas where she expects to find herself a sugar daddy. Almost immediately, crooked-bodied Eddie Kreezer, a roving obsessive with a violent streak, and a fading but lovely grifter named Glenda begin to do battle for Luli's head and heart. On their perilous journey westward, Luli is introduced to drifters, lowlifes, strippers, speed freaks, gold-diggers, and a Libertarian with a dog named Karl. Along the way, she learns the truth of American rootlessness and discovers both the power and the peril of her own sexual curiosity. Part coming-of-age story and part raggedy picaresque, Hick leads us at a blinding pace down broken roads through a world that seems to this extraordinary and indomitable young girl dangerously uncharted. Though its first-person narrating voice is fast-paced, powerful and unquestionably authentic, Hick is a debut novel. Beyond this voice, what makes the book so extraordinary is that, although all of the worst things imaginable do befall this 13-year-old girl, she is never defeated by them. Luli always fights back; she always resurfaces. Set as a coming-of-age novel, Hick tracks the real perils that modern teenagers so often face. And it does so with bright wit, energy, and an indomitable spirit. This is a book that will grab the reader from the first page and not let go. And it is written by a woman who is becoming a cultural force in the hippest parts of Los Angeles.