- Bloggers occasionally write for hire and mobsters kill for hire. Ideally, both get paid.
- Bloggers have their tools of choice (laptops, tablets, desktop computers and cameras) and mobsters have their tools of choice (gun, knives, machetes … I don’t know about the last one but it sounds badass).
- Bloggers make an insular group online with lots of incestuous relationships formed by cross-posting and interacting virtually while mobsters have their own insular group made of genetics or initiations including murder, stealing, etc.
Okay, so my mobster knowledge is limited. And Kings of Brighton Beach Episode #1: Part One: Gangsters with Guns by D.B. Shuster didn’t really help the situation as the words gangsters and mafia were thrown about as though related. They aren’t, are they?
But first things first. You’ll note I didn’t share any books last week and that’s because it took me so long to finish Let’s Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir by Jenny Lawson, also known as the Bloggess. By all accounts, I should have loved this book. Her writing style is not dissimilar from mine, though she cusses a heck of a lot more. She did include a photograph of a raccoon wearing jams (do you remember jams from the 90s … sort of ugly shorts) and that made me laugh. A story about the five-foot-tall metal chicken waiting for someone at their front door had me laughing out loud at the gym. But, and I don’t want to spoil anything for you, those were the only two times I laughed. At this book that I’ve been told is hysterical. Meh.
Next up I read Kings of Brighton Beach Episode #1: Part One: Gangsters with Guns and I’ll freely admit that part of my motivation to read it was because the author, D.B. Shuster, sent me a signed copy accompanied by a handwritten note. Shuster has written two books – Kings of Brighton Beach episodes1 and 2 – and I have this thing I’ve been doing lately when I read new authors. I think to myself, “How would I feel about myself if I wrote this?” It’s a horribly condescending, insulting thought process I have because basically I am cutting people slack for being new. And yet. So would I be proud if I had written this book? Heck yes. Do I love that it’s all about Russian mafia and makes me feel like I am back in the 1980s? Definitely. Is it a book I’d recommend? I’m not so sure.
And there you have it. My week in books. I’m grateful to the upcoming week off of work where I’ll be reading tons of books and am sure to have a few winners about which I can write!
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