Night People

by Barry Gifford

Overview

The author of Wild at Heart and The Wild Life of Sailor and Lula writes of what Tennessee Williams called “something wild in the country/that only the night people know.” He draws his characters from the shadows of the Deep South, where they confront the chaotic horror of the United States at the end of the twentieth century.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780802133694
Publisher:	Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
Publication date:	01/18/1994
Series:	Gifford, Barry
Edition description:	REPRINT
Pages:	208
Sales rank:	917,449
Product dimensions:	5.38(w) x 8.25(h) x (d)

About the Author

Barry Gifford’s novel Night People was awarded the Premio Brancati, established by Pier Paolo Pasolini and Alberto Moravia, in Italy. He has won awards for fiction from the writers guilds in America and the United Kingdom, a BAFTA, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Christopher Isherwood Foundation, among others. His books have been translated into more than 30 languages. His film credits include Wild at Heart (winner of the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival), Lost Highway, City of Ghosts, and The Phantom Father. He has written librettos for operas by Toru Takemitsu, Ichiro Nodaira, and Olga Neuwirth. His most recent books include Sailor & Lula: The Complete Novels, Roy’s World: Stories 1973-2020, Southern Nights (which includes Night People), and Ghost Years. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Chris Condon is the low-down dirty scoundrel behind the ongoing Image Comic series That Texas Blood and its acclaimed Wild West spinoff, The Enfield Gang Massacre, both with artist Jacob Phillips. He waded deep into bayou waters to adapt Barry Gifford's Night People for Oni Press and has not been the same since.

Brian Level is a cartoonist, tattooer, writer who has contributed premiere comic books like Star Wars, Batman, Spider-Man, Avengers, and Deadpool. His work has been internationally recognized for over 15 years and won a GLAAD Media Award for his contributions to Poison Ivy for DC Comics. Level brings an element of the horrific and the ecstatic to the projects he touches with the goal of creating timeless, deep, and rich work. He lives with his family in the greater Cincinnati area, where he makes stories and operates Illuminaut Tattoo.

Alexandre Tefenkgi is an international comic book artist of Vietnamese-Djiboutian descent. He’s the visual creator of the Eisner and Harvey Award–winning comics The Good Asian with Pornsak Pichetshote, as well as the postapocalyptic love story Once Upon a Time at the End of the World with Jason Aaron. He specializes in character-driven stories and emotional poetry. His craft is devoted to expressing the complexity of human relationships.

Artyom Topilin is a freelance artist who has worked on such Skybound titles as I Hate This Place and Creepshow.

Marco Finnegan is an educator by day and writes and draws comics by night. He lives in Temecula, California, with his family. Finnegan’s books include the upcoming Calavera (Oni Press), Morning Star (Mad Cave), and The Keeper with writers Tananarive Due and Steven Barnes, which was nominated for a NAACP Image Award, three Glyph Awards, and a Locust Award (Abrams/Megascope). His other credits include 007 with writer Phillip Kennedy Johnson (Dynamite), Lizard in a Zoot Suit (Lerber/Graphic Universe), Where We Live (Image), and Crossroad Blues and Last Fair Deal Gone Down with Ace Atkins (Image, 12 Gauge Comics).

Editorial Reviews

Gifford (Wild at Heart) never shies away from confrontational fiction even when it strains credulity. Yet these four well-wrought, linked novellas, all dealing with struggle and violence--particularly violence toward women--and all set in dark corners of the South, all have the stamp of truth. Big Betty Stalcup and Miss Cutie Early, two lesbian ex-convicts, preach the gospel of Miss Jesus our Holy Mother as they search for one redeemable man--and leave in their wake the severed heads of the irredeemable. Beatifica Brown, a devout abortionist, is visited by the spirit of abolitionist John Brown, who counsels her to adopt his methods in fighting the anti-abortion zealots of Louisiana. Dallas and Dilys Salt, brother and sister rival evangelists and the parents of a 14-year-old with Down's syndrome, preach their respectively pro-life and pro-choice messages from the pulpits of the Church on the One Hand and the Church on the Other Hand. Fourteen-year-old Marble Lesson, who survives a bus wreck and an attempted rape, defines her philosophy in letters to Jesus. Gifford delights in improbable names: this volume is filled with characters known as the brothers Mano and Boca Demente, and places dubbed Egypt City, Fla., and Checkerboard Chucky's Change of Heart Bar. He writes with clarity and great economy, imbuing these weird and unsavory vignettes with an engaging lyricism. And the ever-present black humor buoys the narrative without trivializing either the characters or their plights. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Big Betty Stalcup and Cutie Early, lesbian cons on the lam, unleash a bloody reeducation campaign for ``Miss Jesus.'' Twin pastors Dallas and Dilys Salt engage in guerrilla warfare over choice and homophobia. John Brown's body returns to inspire abortionist Beatifica Brown. Alcoholic Wes Lesson tries to turn his life around but gets a job with dope smugglers. His daughter Marble survives a lightning strike and attempted rape to become Jesus' special pen pal. Gifford again employs the formula of quirky characters, desperate situations, hilarious black humor, steamy Gulf Coast settings, simmering sexuality, neo-gothic horror, and interweaving plotlines that worked so well in earlier books like Wild at Heart ( LJ 3/1/91) and Sailor's Holiday (Grove Weidenfeld, 1990). The results are anything but formulaic. Night People will enrage pious partisans of both the religious right and the politically correct left but will utterly delight lovers of good satire and thrill-a-minute road stories. Very highly recommended, but if you decide to motor on down to the Nabakov Juvenile Depository for Females in Thanatossa, don't pick up no strangers or fill up at the Red Devil, hear?-- Jim Dwyer, California State Univ. at Chico

Library Journal

Intriguing and violent.

IGN

A pulpy, scuzzy, addictive read that skillfully contains Barry Gifford's essence.

Comic Book Couples Counseling

Raw and gritty.”

Comicbook.com

I absolutely loved this [..] It’s just such a different and engrossing sort of comic."

The Comics Beat

Night People is the sort of comic book one devours as much with the eyes as with the mind. Each panel is an opera, a ballet of brutality and beauty... Whether or not you’re familiar with Gifford’s source material, Night People is worth the experience alone. Condon’s writing and the art from Level and Pattison is not for the faint of heart, but well worth it in the end.

Capes and Tights

Sometimes, life just calls for a gritty comic that defies all reason and sanity. An unapologetic deep dive into the minds of the ruthless and depraved. Night People satisfies that desire within the first few panels... readers will want to revel in the intense genius of this comic book literary masterpiece.

Fanbase Press

Writer Chris Condon takes Gifford’s novel, paring it down through the variety of director-like camera angles and character focus... Night People is an interesting ride.

Comic Crusaders