Words, scenes, characters, and settings ebb and flow through Brian Francis Slattery's third novel, a post-apocalyptic nightmare that manages to make Cormac McCarthy's The Road, or The Book of Eli movie, look like a trip through Disneyland. Taking place almost entirely along a small stretch of the north branch of the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania, a stream of consciousness flows through the text like the river on which it takes place.

More a tale of life and war, death and hope, rather than one dealing with liberty, the novel could just as easily have taken place along the Euphrates in the current Syrian war or the Mekong in the late 1960s, or the Mississippi in the 1860s. The book relates casual tales of violence, random bullets and brutality along with friendship and family, love and loyalty. Although not as coherent a tale as Slattery's other two novels, it's clearly darker as everyone seems to be waiting for the Big One to hit, even after other massive events have sent American society into a long death spiral. Although his previous novel, Liberation, also dealt with a post-apocalyptic future, Lost Everything, as the title reflects, goes far beyond anything in Liberation's future.

Here the two main protagonists set out to see a son, left behind for safety, as a resistance group battles soldiers in a never-ending war. Agents are sent against these two, with orders to kill, aware of their destination. As the boat on which they've hitched a ride lazes up river, stories and characters whip in and out like flotsam drifting along the current. Slattery's prose is elegant at times, but often dizzying. There is little room to pause, to get to know the characters, and I came away disappointed, given how much I enjoyed his previous two books.