You’re talking to yourself again.

And why not? A conversation with someone glib and interesting is fun, even when it’s one-sided. Reminders, debates, profundity, nobody listens to you better than you. Sure, it might look funny. You’re probably teased for talk-talk-talking to thin air. But as in “End of Active Service” by Matt Young, maybe you’re not alone after all…

He was just “trying to feel alive.”

It had been two months since Dean Pusey had left the Marine Corps. For two months, he’d been sleeping in his old childhood bedroom, listening to his pacifist stepfather’s pontifications and creeping around the house when everyone else was gone, pretending to secure it from hidden enemies.

He was 23 years old. The “biggest thing” he’d ever done was join the Marines.

But now, he was trying to be a civilian, which is how he ended up at a bar. Which is how he met Max – Maxine – and ended up dating her for awhile. It’s how he ended up on the floor of the men’s bathroom, beaten down by a couple of good ol’ boys and it felt good.

He missed Ruiz, his best friend in Iraq, the guy who kept him sane. He didn’t like thinking of the things he and Ruiz did there, the sheep, or a game called Nervous. And yet, he couldn’t stop his thoughts about Ruiz. He couldn’t stop hearing Ruiz talking to him.

Then Max got pregnant, said she was keeping the kid whether Dean wanted to be around for it or not. Dean was adopted, but he hadn’t told Max. He’d looked for his birth mother every now and then, and being some kid’s father felt… well, he didn’t know how it felt. Ruiz didn’t think he was cut out for fatherhood, and maybe Ruiz was right about that.

He wished he could tell Max about the sheep that was killed in Iraq, and how it followed him everywhere, and how Ruiz kept talk-talk-talking. The words he learned in the Marines bounced around in his head: “Complacency kills.”

Oh, my. Jumping into “End of Active Service” is like jumping into an active volcano. From the middle of page two, it seethes with stuffed-down anger and fear that the past and the future will never stop colliding so hard.

That’s just the beginning, as author Matt Young throws his main character at readers and runs, waiting for the inevitable explosion to happen. And it does, much to our dismay as Dean spirals in his trauma and memories and machismo that he doesn’t seem to want anymore. He wants to move forward, to a good life. You’ll want him to.

Be aware that if you’re easily triggered, this is not your book. “End of Active Service” is profane, intense, and taut, like knowing a car wreck is imminent and being powerless to stop it. Bad things will happen before good ones do, which is something to remember before you open this novel. But open it, you should. This is one book you’ll talk about.

“End of Active Service” by Matt Young
c.2024, Bloomsbury
$28.99
304 pages