Athol Dickson’s 2007 novel, The Cure, captures the atmosphere of a Maine small town in an exciting tale of man-made redemption.

Riley Keep has been burying the shame of his past for years in alcohol, but now that his friend is drinking himself to death, he remembers a rumor that a cure can be found in their hometown. They drag themselves to Dublin, Maine, and find a place in the homeless shelter.

When Riley stumbles across a white powder with a note claiming it will cure alcoholism, he tries it, shares it, and becomes a hunted man for it. Some won’t believe he ever had a miracle drug for alcoholics, and those who do won’t believe he can’t make it for them. On the one hand, he wants people to believe he just found the formula, and on the other hand, he doesn’t correct their assumption that he discovered it himself. Every attempt he makes to repent or make up for his years of failure turns against him. When hundreds of homeless alcoholics arrive in Dublin, looking for a miracle, has the cure Riley hoped to find become a curse?

This is Athol Dickson’s fifth novel and the one that follows his popular story based in Louisiana, River Rising. He beautifully brings out the nature and people of a small, fishing town in Maine, much like he does in Winter Haven. For instance, the man Riley hires for legal council is a full-time lobsterman who had trained in the law several years ago but would rather live off the ocean. The dark story of Riley Keep, the alcoholic, failed professor and failed missionary, is as much a part of The Cure as the miracle formula is. The history of the intertwined characters is revealed piece by piece as memories and conversations arise, building to a great climax at the end.

This novel spoke to me, perhaps because of my familiarity with some counseling techniques. Dickson says he was a drug and alcohol abuser early in life, so it may be out of personal experience he draws the metaphor of the homeless feeling like ghosts. That’s hasn’t been my experience, but I feel I’ve rubbed up against it. That nagging perception of failure, that desire to apologize for something undefined—I know those feelings. It’s akin to hoping for a cure apart from the work of Christ Jesus. But there is none.