How The Hula Girl Sings (2005)

Meno's 2004 Hairstyles of the Damned was a great ''write what you know'' slice of Chicago life. How The Hula Girl Sings is more a ''please keep writing, just easy on the gas'' concept piece that's two parts hard-boiled ex-con fiction and one part trying too hard. Luce Lemay is a suffering romantic, out on parole after nearly three years behind bars (convicted of manslaughter after a drunk-driving accident); his only friend is former prison mate Junior Breen, a giant who writes inadvertent poetry with black letters on the sign outside the Gas-N-Go. Junior's got a secret that harkens back to Of Mice and Men; sadly, when shifting the book to Junior's POV, Joe Meno sends this sucker flying like a tooth in a fistfight. But then there are descriptions like this of Luce's town: ''There was something underneath it all, though. Something like blood or gold.'' Wow, can he turn a phrase.