Razorblade Tears

 Many writers don't like what they write being labelled genre fiction because it implies a narrow range of interest. Others welcome it. I'm not sure if [a:S.A. Cosby|20464985|S.A. Cosby|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1593596506p2/20464985.jpg] considers [b:Razorblade Tears|54860585|Razorblade Tears|S.A. Cosby|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1636739235l/54860585.SY75.jpg|85600094] as genre fiction, but it is, in the crime genre.
 Being called genre fiction can shield writers from criticism because the quality of the writing doesn't have to be as high, but Razorblade Tears is so badly written that I don't see how it could be.
 You know how you come across a buddy-cop movie on a streaming menu and the movie is so much like many others that you don't know if you've seen it or not? That's what this is like, and a redneck. Two dads whose sons were murdered execution style seek to find the killers and avenge their deaths. There's a motorcycle gang doing evil, heartless things, and they're funded for some of those things by a rich powerful man, a Doctor Evil type.
 I was surprised how indifferently edited and copyedited it was. Cliches abound, and not only in dialogue, where they are forgivable.
 Call me a bad person for saying this, but I think the only reason it got published is that much in it pushes currently popular social buttons: The author is Black, and so is one of the two men—both ex-cons with hearts of gold—and one of the sons. The other is white. The sons are gay and married and have a mixed-race child, a girl. A prominent character is trans.
 A lot of the dialogue sounds inauthentic and I suspect Cosby has watched The Wire several times.

I had such mixed feelings about this book. Two southern ex-cons, one black and one white, have only one thing in common: they both rejected their gay sons who had come together in marriage and fatherhood. It was only after both young men are murdered that they realize their homophobia had prevented them from showing how much they loved their boys - and hate their unidentified killers. Since the police are unable to make headway on the case, they join forces to find whoever is responsible and take them out. returnreturnIt's a well-written and fast-paced story about two interesting male characters separated by historic racial animus but united in grief and a determination for revenge. returnreturnWhich is where the mixed feelings come in. While the two men come to terms with the harm they did with their toxic masculinity (and seem to have a change of heart that is as profound as it is abrupt), they are also driven by the same idea of manhood to devote themselves to all-out warfare against their enemies. Most of the action is drenched in masculinity and, while there's some self-awareness, I got the feeling readers were supposed to cheer on their manly feats of violent bravado. That felt like an unresolved contradiction to me, and an imbalance between excellent character development and action scenes that border on cartoonish. returnreturnSo good, but not without a fairly fundamental flaw that kept it from being great for me.