Norman Mailer: "I think that in Jim Nichols we have one more of a rare breed..."
Praise for Closer All The Time, 2016 Maine Book Award for Fiction winner:
"Jim Nichols Makes me happy...Closer All The Time is a novel built of stories, and a story built of sentences so beautiful I want to keep them like wild honey in a jar."
- Bill Roorbach (Life Among Giants, Remedy For Love)
"Nichols is one of my favorite writers, not just because he writes with such - dare I say - feminine insight about men's men...His men and boys become so real, I feel as if I know what it might have been like to grow up with brothers."
- Monica Wood (The One In A Million Boy, When We Were Kennedys)
"These intertwined narratives creaste a memorable novel that vividly renders a town and its denizens. Jim Nichols never condescends to his characters. Though readers might question their choices in life, we never doubt their humanity."
- Ron Rash (Serena, Nothing Gold Can Stay)
"...No one paints a more vivid portrait of coastal Maine towns and their native sons and daughters - the clammers and bartenders, diner waitresses and business owners - than Nichols. With his latest work, Closer All the Time, this regional writer should receive recognition beyond the borders of his natal state, so others might appreciate his rich narratives, rolled out in his plain yet penetrating writing style..."
- Georgeanne Davis, The Free Press
"Any discussion of candidates for the title ‘Fiction Laureate of Maine’ will quickly conjure names of the usual subjects: Stephen King, Elizabeth Strout, Carolyn Chute and Rick Russo spring to mind and all of them have carved out a unique niche in the Maine literary landscape. But for my money, when it comes to capturing the ethos of the people and culture of the Pine Tree State, perhaps no one does it better than Jim Nichols..."
- Bill Lundgren, Lundgren's Lounge
"In a style reminiscent of Hemingway, Nichols's spare, plainspoken prose buzzes with emotional grit and tenderness, bringing dignity and vulnerability to alcoholics, poachers and bullies. Damn beautiful!"
- Susan Henderson (Up From The Blue)