S. A. Crosby’s Razorblade Tears

I just finished S. A. Cosby's Razorblade Tears and really enjoyed it!

It's about two violently flawed, but loving fathers coming to terms with how they mistreated their gay sons, and working together to seek vengeance on the people who murdered their sons. I was hesitant to start it because I thought it would be trauma porn, but I'm really glad I read it. While there is a lot of trauma and a lot of grief, the characters accept the mistakes as the past they can't fix, and focuses on the problems they can fix in the present. There's this constant forward momentum to the book that makes it very engaging, and almost hopeful.

The book is not without fault. While I absolutely, completely, unreservedly, 100% agree with Cosby's views on systematic racism, class privilege, and the mistreatment of people in the LGBTQ+ community, he is heavy handed with the message, sometimes to the point of breaking the narrative's flow. Though, I don't blame him for feeling like he really has to spell it out. He also loves to write in metaphors and similes and some are quite cringe. The foreshadowing is kind of obvious. Some of the character's motivation seems a bit convenient…

While it's not the best written book I've read this year, it is one of the most enjoyable. It feels kind of wrong to say that a book about some very heavy topics is enjoyable, but I burned through it very quickly because I was reading it every chance I got. While the who and the why was kind of obvious, the stakes got raised so high that I was really curious how, or if, they were going to return back to a normal life after everything that happened.

If you've read it, what did you think of the book?