 Hello everybody, E here. Welcome back to another book review. Today we are talking about the weight of this world by David Joy. First and foremost, this author is fantastic. If you like literature, period, you need to check him out. But if you're a fan of Hicklet or whatever they're calling it these days, a darker literary side of like redneck noir. If you dig that kind of thing, I dig it quite a bit because this book might as well be about half of my family, if not more at this case, at least my side of the family if not Shell's extended side of the family. It deals with everything you're going to deal with when you get around these type of people. You got the prejudices, the drugs, the activity that is less than legal. I speak especially about there's something to have to do with copper in here that we are dealing with in our area right now. We're dealing with the copper problem and the book pretty much opens up, not exactly, but there is a copper thieving situation going on in there. Definitely not a main plot or really a spoiler at all. With Aiden and Thad, I have to say I didn't care much for either one of these guys, but I absolutely loved reading about them. They both have their issues, they both have their problems. Aiden's a little more on the likability scale until he starts bitching about Mexicans. Dan, Mexicans come to steal our jobs and he's supposed to be like the hero of the story. Not really, I don't guess the hero, but he's the one you're supposed to be rooting for, the one you're supposed to feel sorry for, I guess. With David Joy, I've come to find out that I have to be in a certain mood to read his kind of stuff because I've lived around this stuff. This is like my day to day are these people. But I do know that I can't read David Joy back to back and it has a lot to do with the emotional quality. He writes really, really dark, dark stuff. And there's a scene in this book that made me, it didn't really make me put it down as much as I was like, wow, yeah, okay, I'm gonna take a step back, I'm gonna take a breather and we can come at this from a new angle. I didn't expect it to get that crazy so early on. But the main thing that I remember about the last book of his that I read, which was where all light tends to go, is that it had a really, really bleak ending. Now with this one, I would say it's maybe a little more hopeful, but not really, it's still a very dark, dark book. They have to be in the right frame of mind for that type of book. It's kind of like reading the Bachman books from King. I have to be in the right frame of mind. And I was in the perfect frame of mind to read this one. I've said all that to say there's nothing wrong with this book. It's a perfect book in my opinion. Five stars easy. I didn't even have to really think that much about it. The things that I love about this, most about this book is its honesty. The way it deals with the prejudices and the problems inherent in situations like this. It's also a great arguing point for when you'll hear a racist person saying, well, there's a reason why ghettos are full of black people. Okay, pumpy breaks there, sister soldier. There's just as much crime and terrible shit going on in southern majority white areas also. It tickles me when people, it doesn't actually tickle me, but I find it extremely odd when people ignore the bad parts of certain areas based on or promote the only the bad side of certain areas based on their own prejudices. So I find that interesting and I appreciate the way that joy is just dealing with broke ass people. There's a certain type of mindset that comes along with being generation, generation, generation broke. Your people have been broke all the way since God created them, that kind of thing. The main thing is just the honesty. It feels rooted in reality. This is the way these people act. This is the way these people talk and it feels honest, just like with Jesmyn Ward. Her stuff feels honest. It doesn't feel like somebody taking a side. It doesn't feel like someone harping or preaching or any of that stuff. Now there's some great turns of phrase in here, nothing I would call preaching, but there's some great stuff in here that's very literary that made me stop and reread sections probably two or three times just so I could make sure that I grasped the full, you know, breadth of what he was trying to get across. David Joy has quickly become one of my favorite authors. I remember the very first time it was his fishing book that is supposedly hard to find nowadays. I found it in a doctor's office and I ended up stealing it from the doctor's office. I believe that's what happened. Either that or it was given to me at the doctor's office. I did not leave the doctor's office in the same frame of mine. They gave me a bunch of drugs. As I did when I went home, I did not leave in the same way I arrived. So I don't remember how I got the book. I remember it was at the doctor's office and then I brought it home with me. So if I stole it from you doc, I'm sorry. I don't even remember which one you were. I just remember it was at doctor's office. Anyways, so I had that one but I since lost it and when we moved up to, I think it was when we moved up to Maine and then moved back down here, I got lost in the move. But Where All the Light Tends to Go is a fantastic book. I think I preferred this one just a little bit more. If you're looking for a completely disturbing, gritty, hard-felt life, live, that kind of, if you're looking for characters like that, definitely pick up anything by joy. If you're looking for something that's just going to rip your heart out of your chest, stomp it on the ground, set it on fire and then piss on it to put it out, that's going to be Where All Light Tends to Go. This one, it's more a bucket of water than it is, you know, a stream of piss putting out the fire kind of deal. It's a little bit nicer, but I think I prefer this one because of that and I normally don't rank hope above hopelessness usually, but this time I'm going to. So have you guys read The Weight of This World by David Joy? Have you read anything by joy? Do you like it? Do you not like it? If you don't like him or the book, please go into detail about why you do not like it, especially since I liked it. I like to know the opposing viewpoint and I would love to hear someone's argument for why this book is bad. I don't mean that sarcastically, I would love to hear it. So, but yeah, leave all your comments down there in the doobly-doo, but until next time, I have been E, you have been U. This has been another book review. I'll talk to you guys later. Bye-bye! And for those people who get upset when I just like throw the book all around, here's what it looks like. I hope it's all nice and prettified and all framed up and everything. Look at that. Max, if you're watching this dude, I'm glad you grabbed a copy because this book was amazing. Donde esta mi pantalones? Adios!