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Critics' Opinion:
Readers' Opinion:
First Published:
Jul 2021, 336 pages
Paperback:
Apr 2022, 336 pages
Book Reviewed by:
Elisabeth Cook
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A Black father. A white father. Two murdered sons. A quest for vengeance.
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.
Provocative and fast-paced, S. A. Cosby's Razorblade Tears is a story of bloody retribution, heartfelt change - and maybe even redemption.
ONE
Ike tried to remember a time when men with badges coming to his door early in the morning brought anything other than heartache and misery, but try as he might, nothing came to mind.
The two men stood side by side on the small concrete landing of his front step with their hands on their belts near their badges and their guns. The morning sun made the badges glimmer like gold nuggets. The two cops were a study in contrast. One was a tall but wiry Asian man. He was all sharp angles and hard edges. The other, a florid-faced white man, was built like a powerlifter with a massive head sitting atop a wide neck. They both wore white dress shirts with clip-on ties. The powerlifter had sweat stains spreading down from his armpits that vaguely resembled maps of England and Ireland respectively.
Ike's queasy stomach began to do somersaults. He was fifteen years removed from Coldwater State Penitentiary. He had bucked the recidivism statistics ever since he'd walked out of that festering wound....
Cosby leans away from a simple redemption arc, instead showing the emotional silence that follows Ike and Buddy Lee's chaotic behavior. In this space, the reader can feel their grief as well as the stark consequences of their choices. They thrive on conflict, and part of what makes losing their sons so hard is that they can no longer deal with their own uneasiness by antagonizing Isiah and Derek. They are left alone with their residual bigotry, which is no longer their sons' problem. Even as they support each other and attempt to right at least one wrong, they are aware that it will not make up for the past, and this lends a distinct sense of gravity to the book's events despite Cosby's entertaining writing...continued
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(Reviewed by Elisabeth Cook).
Michael Connelly, #1 New York Times bestselling author
Razorblade Tears is superb. No doubt, S. A. Cosby is not only the future of crime fiction but of any fiction where the words are strong, the characters are strong and the story has a resonance that cuts right to the heart of the most important questions of our times. P. J. Vernon, author of Bath Haus
S. A. Cosby is a once-in-a-generation storyteller — and he's only getting started. In Razorblade Tears, Cosby delivers a jaw-dropping thriller of vengeance, cruelty, and heart. His iconic voice, cinematic prose, and brilliant plotting will have you hearing an 80-piece orchestra at full crescendo as you race towards an ending so explosive, you'll literally duck for cover. This book is far more than a work of art; it's the gold standard.
In S.A. Cosby's Razorblade Tears, Ike Randolph and Buddy Lee Jenkins attempt to solve the murder of their sons, Isiah and Derek, by sorting through the married couple's former lives in Richmond, Virginia. As they speak to Isiah and Derek's friends and acquaintances, they put together a better picture of who their sons were, and of the struggles and community that made up their reality as queer men. A bartender, Tex, explains to Ike and Buddy Lee, "Richmond's a pretty good place to live if you're gay or queer or whatever, but ... we still in the South. Unless you straight and white you gotta watch your back." Tex's statement arguably doesn't only apply to the Southern United States, but his larger point rings true: Richmond, like many ...
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