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What a crazy, wonderfully human ride.

I started this before, but didn't finish for some reason or other, nothing to do with the book itself. So I'm reading it again. I love the premise, love the character-narrator, love the humour...

Let's see what the fuss is about.

Je ne sais pas si je vais le finir. Il est drôle (quoique d'un humour un peu spécial), mais pas hyper intéressant.

At first, I thought the tone was all over the place: was it a dark comedy? or a horror fairytale? But now it seems to have smoothed out and I'm really along for the ride. That said, I don't think I like the episodic structure, kind of an Alice in Wonderland vibe. I did enjoy the Crab character (and the twist about him).

I loved Auerbach's first novel "Penpal" and was expecting something similar. This is not that, although you can see the common themes.

This is a slow-burn that keeps you asking yourself what the f* is going on. About 25% through, I thought I had guessed it. I was wrong, but frankly, my guess was more interesting than the actual reveal. Luckily, Auerbach's writing is very effective, so I never found it boring.

I do think it's too bad that details that were often introduced as if they were going to be meaningful turned out not to be, and that interesting threads that were opened went undeveloped. I believe Auerbach made the "Bad Man" world bigger than it need to be for the story he ended up telling.

But all in all, an enjoyable read, albeit with a slightly disappointing resolution.