I appreciated your opinion…you made some really good points…especially your last one about female characters with more reasons to exist besides providing sex.*

Guess Bazell tried to present the protagonist’s story from a mobster’s pov in crude speech, thought and actions as he thought Peter should be portrayed.

I will be interested to see what the author writes next. I did say I might be nuts…right?

*I agree completely…and that can be said about several books out these days!

And it would be nice if the author could imagine a female character with a reason to exist other than to screw the narrator and let the narrator demonstrate otherwise hidden (and thoroughly unconvincing) humanity.

*Though I like fictional footnotes.

I read the book not long after it first came out and really liked it. Maybe one reason is because I have a son that was interested in studying about the mafia when he was in high school so I watched all these “Godfather”-type movies with him and scanned the books he checked out and purchased. Okay, some were a bit too violent for my tastes and the language…well, had my mother raised these guys when they were baby mobsters they’d still be spitting soap out of their potty-mouths and would have grown up to be model citizens or, at least, wouldn’t have used profanity…especially around my mom. So, basically, I had a brief ‘mafia education’ in book and film and wasn’t too surprised by the language or violence in “Beat the Reaper”. Given that it’s been last spring since reading this title, I’d have to re-read it again to remember how much gratuitous profanity is in the book. Guess I just breezed over it and figured it was a given as you commented for doctors and mobsters.

Bazell writes with a great sense of humor and has a unique take on a storyline…a doctor/hit man that wants to get out of the mob for good. I don’t recall reading one quite like this before. And although I thought it a bit bazaar and possibly a stretch of the imagination, especially when Peter rips out his own lower leg bone to use as a weapon, Bazell’s got something different here with a very wry/dry sense of humor that I appreciate and a great stretch of imagination. All I could think of while reading the story was that my son would really like this book. Okay, so maybe I’m a bit nuts.

I wouldn’t recommend this book for everyone but I think Josh Bazell really has something going for him with his first novel and look ahead to reading more from this author. Hopefully, he’ll continue Peter’s story and find a way for “Bearclaw” to finally escape his past in the mob and become the doctor he wants to be.

*You youngsters, if you’ve never had your mouth washed out with soap, I can guarantee you it is a very unpleasant experience…and I don’t even know what I said! What’d I say?!

**No, I don’t use the type of profanity found in this book, at least, not out loud and especially around my mom.

***Yes, I did buy the book for my son and he liked it, too!