How to be Bulletproof # 1 by Kirt Burdick is an odd thing to behold. On one hand, it’s gritty and raw in a very Tarantino sort of way which makes it compelling at the very least, and on the other hand, its tonal naval gazing renders the book’s story incoherent at times and it tends to come off as pretentious. I’m just not sure how much of this is part of Burdick’s grand design.
Joe “Bulletproof” Blue is a junkie. He blames his former boss, Madame Ambrosia, for turning him on to his various vices then abandoning him in his hour of need. When Joe overdoses and dies, he decides to possess someone, or something – in his case it turns out to be a dog – in order to hunt down Madame Ambrosia and exact his revenge. His dog duties involve him in a web of tangentially related organized crime endeavors which inevitably lead him to within one degree of his nemesis.
Burdick’s world is uncomfortable in a very interesting way. You will read page after page which is the point of writing these things, I suppose. However, some of his creative choices beg the question: Were these odd and occasionally off-putting decisions made on purpose or are they just clumsy missteps by an inexperienced writer? I truly don’t know and that’s oddly compelling on its own.
I am looking forward to reading more, but occasional word choice mistakes found in How to be Bulletproof such as “their” vs. “they’re” and “your” vs. “you’re” don’t bode well for the eventual answer to the aforementioned question about this material. Stay tuned.
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