Have you ever finished reading a book and immediately felt the bottom of your stomach drop upon turning the final page? It’s not simply a case of being sad from reaching the end of a story, but more of a need to dive back into that world, and to make sure everything will still be alright.

I blame Charley. Charley Thompson did this to me. He’s fifteen, alone, and has taken a job helping the grumpyfuck Del look after his racehorses down at the track. If a person could read this book without their heart breaking for Charley, I would be surprised. And slightly suspicious. Charley and one of Del’s horses, Lean on Pete, form a beautiful friendship that results in a trans-American escape. You know how I said Charley was alone? There’s one exception, his aunty, who was told to piss off by Charley’s father. And she’s the only person in the world that Charley’s placed hope in. So Charley and Lean on Pete are off to find her.

Sometimes when you’ve been reading too much Bronte or Proust, you can sort of get caught up in the literary fanciful goodies that great writing can contain. Vlautin’s writing sort of brings you crashing back to reality. There’s something incredibly raw about his writing, completely devoid of bullshit. Charley narrates honestly. He finds himself in all sorts of scrapes, forced to shoplift band-aids for his injury, siphoning petrol from other cars with his mouth, to fuel his stolen truck, you get the idea.

Charley runs. He hides. He cries. He’s the most real fifteen-year-old boy I’ve known, and through the hopeless situations he finds himself in, he never gives up.

Vlautin’s no-bullshit, straight, clean prose echoes Charley’s loneliness. The one-sided conversations Charley has with Pete leave him exposed and vulnerable, and well, they made me want to reach into the pages and grab him and hug him and tell him everything was going to be alright.

As Richard Fidler brought up in an interview with Vlautin at the Sydney Writers’ Fest, there is something very Huckleberry Finn about “Lean On Pete”, and to me, something wholly American about it. When I say American, I refer to the themes I’ve commonly found in American contemporary fiction: the rough journey, that physical and emotional rollercoaster that sees the protagonist fall, and then rise, and then fall again, where the reward at the end is comfort, or security, or family. It’s impossibly sad, yet at his lowest moments, Charley continues his narration in a matter-of-fact voice. His drive, and ability to retain an essence of childhood despite the trials of his journey, keep a sense of hope alive throughout the book.

There are times when it’s difficult to fathom the absence of any caring adult in Charley’s life. And he has a tendency to make the frustratingly wrong choice. But this is, again, the raw human element that Charley possesses (as does Vlautin’s writing).

I’m almost afraid to read his other novels. What if they’re not nearly as involving and hugable as this one?