I got this book at least a year ago, and I'm surprised it took me this long to get around to reading it. The Neon Bible is the story of a boy named David growing up in a tiny southern town, referred to only as the valley. It offers a series of chronilogical snapshots from his early childhood to adolescence, which function somewhere between distinct stories and a continuous narrative. The writing is spare, personal, almost childlike in its directness, a tone than feels expected in the early pages but grows increasingly jarring as the story progresses and David ages, giving an interesting effect of arrested development.
As one might expect of a book of this style, the plot is minimal. The fo us is instead on David's thoughts and the provincial, stifling atmosphere of the town and its small-minded townsfolk. The characters are well written, but hew pretty close to type, lacking the idiosyncratic detail and literary force that propelled Ignateus Reilly and Burma Jones beyond parody into twisted, glorious archetypes.
The Neon Bible is no Confederacy of Dunces, but really, how could it be? Toole wrote it at 16, and while it feels nascent, clutching too tightly to its inspirations (particularly Flannery O'Connor) to be wholly original, it nevertheless betrays an emerging talent, and at it’s best moments hints at the genius to come.