A glorious review of The Long Division

"Here is a book to scorch the heart and freeze the blood. Here is a story that leaves the reader gasping in shock and sadness, dry-mouthed and damp-eyed, dragging in air as the final chapters detonate. Here, in abundance, is live-wire language pumping beauty, desire and violence like electric currents; here are characters so exquisitely textured, the pages nearly shudder with their breath...extraordinary...'The Long Division' appropriates signature themes and devices of American independent cinema: fight-and-flight road trips, staggered chronologies, grungy motels, even jagged cross-cutting.

Tiny truths glint in the flicker of Nikitas's prose, bright and crisp as flame...Above all, this is an opus of compassion. 'The Long Division' loves its characters, fears for them, and when, in a flawlessly choreographed ballet of violence, someone meets an abrupt end, the shock sears. In his acknowledgments, the author [Derek Nikitas] modestly dismisses himself as a writer 'of minor talents.' This is his only mistake. Here is a major talent."

Thanks go out to Daniel Mallory at the Washington Post for his high praise!