Scooter Chronicles

Sometime last week I finished reading “Beat the Reaper” by Josh Brazell. I got an ARC, though it has long been out in hardcover, from a friend of mine at BookMooch (Yaffa). I am not an active member of BookMooch any longer, but it worked out that if she reserved the book for me, and then sent me the points to request the book, she would still come out one point ahead on the deal since she lives in England. I couldn’t pass up the opportunity.

For a description I steal from Publishers Weekly via Amazon.Com:

Making a hit man turned medical intern a sympathetic figure would be a tall order for most authors, but first-time novelist Bazell makes it look easy in this breezy and darkly comic suspense novel. The Locanos, a mob family, take in 14-year-old Pietro Brwna (pronounced Browna) after a couple of thugs gun down the grandparents who raised him in their New Jersey home. Bent on revenge, Pietro pursues the killers and executes them a year later. Impressed by Pietros performance, David Locano recruits Pietro as a hit man. After more traumas, Pietro tries to make a break from his past by entering the witness protection program. Now known as Peter Brown, he eventually lands a position as a doctor at a decrepit Manhattan hospital, where by chance a former Mafia associate turns up as a patient and threatens to rat him out. The hero’s wry narrative voice, coupled with Bazell’s artful use of flashbacks to sustain tension and fill in Pietro’s past, are a winning combination.

I briefly read through this when Yaffa made the offer to send this to me. I actually went through so fast that when the book arrived (just a week or so before I started reading it) that I had forgotten what it was supposed to be about. So going into it, I was a bit blind. What is really interesting is my feelings at the end of the book given what I thought about the beginning. After about the first, oh, I don’t know, fifteen pages or less, I was thinking I was reading something that eventually I would think was garbage. Our lead character, and narrator, Peter Brown, is not the most well spoken fellow, even though he is well educated. F’ing this, and f’ing that, and other nice colorful language as well as other descriptions littered those first pages. This all coming from an author who actually does have an MD from Columbia and a Bachelor’s in writing from Brown. I couldn’t figure out why an Ivy League school writer would use such trivial language. Well, soon I found the beauty hidden beneath this stuff.

Josh Bazell

Interwoven in this chase to save a life or face certain death himself, Peter lets the reader into his past, his emotions, all his inner workings. It is still filled with the same language, but it starts to become more interesting that such a well educated man could author such a compelling and rich story and be able to continue such a character, AND make him endearing. Halfway through the book I was so thoroughly hooked, I just couldn’t stop reading it. Mr. Brazell threw out any pretentiousness that his Ivy League degrees could have brought and wrote a damn good story filled with excitement.

Now to be warned too, this is not for the faint of heart. Brown is also a doctor and goes on talking in quick detail about a surgery he sits in on and what is happening. For me, who is weak of stomach, these pages couldn’t be read quick enough. And then the ending sequence was even worse! I honestly skimmed over a couple of pages for fear of losing my lunch. This is not to say that it was so disgusting that no one would want to read it. I freely admit that I am a wimp when it comes to such subjects. (You should have seen my go pale at the thought of surgery when I tore my Achilles a few years back.)

Another interesting aspect of the book is that Peter Brown is Jewish. He visits Auschwitz of all places, and he gives the reader a bit of a history lesson. I was amazed that I could learn something about one of the most dreaded of places due to it’s tragic past because of a heinous crime in such a book. Amazing!

This may not appeal to all audiences. Like I said, when I started, I wasn’t sure I would make it through all of it. But it was a surprising good story that truly entertained.