King novel `Reuben’ has fluid writing, sense of humor

Sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll might have been the subtitle of Tabitha King’s new novel “The Book of Reuben.” Add to that the elements of a coming-of-age story, an expose of small-town life, of lust, of love, of murder, alcoholism, adolescence and war, and you have the makings of yet another King book that depicts the fixations of the past three decades.

To fit all of this into one — at times fantastic — tale, King takes us back to Nodd’s Ridge, the fictional Maine town that has been the setting for King’s “Pearl” and “One on One.” With Reuben Styles at the center, the story moves through the 1960s and roughly spans 25 years of his life. We watch as he breaks away from father and friends to take a job at the local garage, which he eventually inherits. We watch as he has sex for the first time — with an older widow who is a rich summer person and a wreckless drunk. We watch as he drools over his young Catholic wife, cares for his three children and vomits his way through a nasty mix of liquor and despair.

As with many of King’s unfortunate characters, Reuben has to face the stinging realities and unpredictable situations of life in the raw. He may not smash any stereotypes of men who get stuck in adolescent fantasies, but none of the characters in this unforgiving little town is blazing any trails. And King makes no apologies. This is life in Nodd’s Ridge: stark, harsh and cold in the winter.

Although King overstates some of the imagery, her fluid writing, sense of humor and frankness keep the plot moving. She is at her best when she describes the Maine terrain. At a favorite diving point on a local lake, King recounts that “the night water glistened silkily, reflecting and multiplying diverse and minute sources of light — a quarter moon, faint stars, the single outdoor light the town maintained near the picnic area under the pines.”

Many of the peripheral characters, such as the curmudgeonly Sixtus Rideout who teaches Reuben to run a garage, are also drawn in colorful strokes that make them recognizably Maine-bred. The backdrop of down-home folks who talk in clever language and reflect the Yankee life in all its humor, discernment and judgment give this novel its regional flair and literary strength. You may find yourself wishing that there were fewer details of what’s going on between the sheets with Reuben and his sex-crazed friends and more about what’s going on between the ears of some of these local yokels.