Razorblade Tears - 4 Stars

A review of Razorblade Tears by S.A. Cosby.

Welcome to "A Fleeting Thought" where I post relatively short and to the point book reviews.

Book summary at end of review.

A lot going on in this one: Bikers, upper echelon men, LGBTQ+, racism, convicts, white trash, homophobia, regret, vengeance, learning, righting past wrongs.

This book was hard hitting and uncomfortable, just like Cosby's other works. I feel like this book had a great message. As we follow two fathers who fucked up a majority of their time with their sons, we follow their story as they attempt to right those wrongs. They just do it a bit too late.

This story resonated with me for several reasons. I feel like this book gave such important insight to what it's like to be Black and White in America, to highlight the disparity between races, and then on another level show how marginalized communities can marginalize other marginalized communities.

It was amazing to see the growth of these two fathers. It prompted me to wonder, as I often have, why it takes extreme cases for people to be able to look outside of their narrow scope of view to see things differently.

I felt proud and disappointed in these two men often throughout the book. I felt happy and angry with their progress as well as their reflection. I wondered "why do you have to do it that way?" when I felt there were easier ways. Or "why are you so thick in the head?!" I often felt the urge to yell at them, telling them they were making things more difficult than they needed to be.

This was a great story about love, learning, and rectifying past mistakes with life lessons peppered in.

I think it was an important story to show how race truly can impact our lives on such a deep-seated level that many people may not realize it if it doesn't directly impact them.

Why didn't it get five stars from me?

I struggled to connect with these characters a little bit more than I did with his other book, Blacktop Wasteland. With that as a comparison, it made it a bit harder for me to enjoy this book as much. It also felt like the story structure was similar to that book, making this book feel a bit redundant and too familiar. There were a few parts throughout that made it feel a bit corny to me-- I didn't totally love the biker gang aspect. It sometimes felt like Cosby was trying to fit too many different pieces into the puzzle.

Personally, I loved Blacktop Wasteland more than this one.

Book summary:

Ike Randolph has been out of jail for fifteen years, with not so much as a speeding ticket in all that time. But a Black man with cops at the door knows to be afraid.

The last thing he expects to hear is that his son Isiah has been murdered, along with Isiah’s white husband, Derek. Ike had never fully accepted his son but is devastated by his loss.

Derek’s father Buddy Lee was almost as ashamed of Derek for being gay as Derek was ashamed his father was a criminal. Buddy Lee still has contacts in the underworld, though, and he wants to know who killed his boy.

Ike and Buddy Lee, two ex-cons with little else in common other than a criminal past and a love for their dead sons, band together in their desperate desire for revenge. In their quest to do better for their sons in death than they did in life, hardened men Ike and Buddy Lee will confront their own prejudices about their sons and each other, as they rain down vengeance upon those who hurt their boys.