Underground Voices presents Richard Klin’s Petroleum Transfer Engineer, its locus is a Twilight Zone–like gas station at the Jersey shore, circa 1983: a place of outlaw bikers, ex-Marines, and drunken tourists.

South Jersey was a distinct sub-region, as if a section of the south or midwest was grafted onto the east coast. And—via the pages of this novel—that sub-region beings to disappear: the farmland and country character giving way to development; the louche resort of Atlantic City morphing into its soulless casino incarnation.

Richard Klin is the author of Something to Say: Thoughts on Art and Politics in America (Leapfrog Press), a series of profiles of various artists discussing the intersection of art and politics, and Abstract Expressionism for Beginners (For Beginners). His work has been featured on NPR’s All Things Considered and has appeared in the Atlantic, the Brooklyn Rail, the Forward, Akashic Books’ “Thursdaze” series, Riding Light, Flyover Country Review, and many others.