Why did Marjorie love this book?
Dark Ride made me laugh out loud. It also broke my heart.
Lou Berney is known for writing complex, memorable characters, but Hardy Reed, Hardly to his family and friends, doesn't appear - when we first meet him - to be a promising protagonist.
Hardly is an easy-going 21-year-old stoner who works a dead-end job at an amusement park and is perfectly content to drift through life without conflicts or challenges. But despite his limitations (he's under-educated and lacks anything approximating marketable skills). Hardly has a big heart, and as we find immense courage.
When he crosses paths with two young children he suspects are being abused - and whom, he learns, are falling through the cracks of the overburdened Child Protective Services, Hardly decides to rescue them, discovering unexpected reserves of tenacity and resourcefulness within himself.
His mission becomes his reason for being, and I was on board for…
1 author picked Dark Ride as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.
From Lou Berney, the acclaimed, multi award-winning author of November Road and The Long and Faraway Gone, comes a Dark Ride
Sometimes the person you least expect is just the hero you need
Twenty-one-year-old Hardy "Hardly" Reed-good-natured, easygoing, usually stoned-is drifting through life. A minimum-wage scare actor at an amusement park, he avoids unnecessary effort and unrealistic ambitions.
Then one day he notices two children, around six or seven, sitting all alone on a bench. Hardly checks if they're okay and sees injuries on both children. Someone is hurting these kids.
He reports the incident to Child Protective Service.
That…