“I was taken aback by the power in his fiction, how effortlessly he pulled me into his fictional world, all the effective and insightful nuances in characterization. I’ve seen an entire room mesmerized, people sitting up straight and leaning into his reading. James Ladd Thomas’ gifts as a storyteller are astonishing.” —- Barry Lopez, author of Arctic Dreams

“James Ladd Thomas’ stories are so warm and full of life, like a friend telling you about these people she knows, their funny absurdities and tangled messes. When you finish you find yourself connecting these characters to your own life, your own absurdities and messes. For me, that’s the aim of good fiction, helping the reader examine her own humanity.” —- Melissa Bank, author of The Girls’ Guide to Hunting and Fishing

“Lester Lies Down reminds me of why I started reading books in the first place—to be enchanted, to be carried away from my world and dropped into a world more vivid and incandescent.” —- John Dufresne, author of I Don’t Like Where This Is Going

“James Ladd Thomas is a hell of a novelist.” —- Tom Franklin, author of Hell at the Breech & Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter