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Cherry
a novel
336 pages
A brutally deadpan, adrenaline-fueled spiral through war and addiction that reads like a fever dream of American disillusionment.
What it feels like
Reading this book feels like being strapped into a car with cut brake lines, hurtling toward an inevitable crash while the driver cracks deadpan jokes. It is a propulsive, suffocating experience that drags you through the absurd horrors of modern warfare and the numbing, frantic desperation of the opioid epidemic. The prose is brutally stripped down, firing off in staccato bursts of profanity, dark humor, and startling moments of bleak poetry. There is no moralizing here, only a raw, detached documentation of a life spiraling out of control. It will deeply resonate with readers who gravitate toward unflinching, gritty narratives, offering a visceral, unforgettable portrait of American disillusionment and self-destruction.
- Mood
- gritty
- chaotic
- suffocating
- bleak
- Tone
- deadpan
- cynical
- raw
- darkly comedic
- detached
- Pace
- propulsive
- Themes
- American disillusionment · trauma and PTSD · cycle of addiction · loss of innocence · institutional absurdity
- The writing
- Staccato, profane, and brutally unadorned, blending military jargon with the frantic, fragmented poetry of addiction.
- The arc
- A rapid descent from aimless youth into the chaotic, numbing depths of trauma and addiction, ending in a bleak but inevitable surrender.
- Who it's for
- Readers who appreciate unflinching, gritty realism and dark, deadpan humor in the face of systemic failure and personal ruin.
Content notes
- drug addiction and overdose
- graphic war violence
- PTSD and trauma
- profanity
- criminal behavior
About the book
The unnamed narrator, a young man from Cleveland, drops out of college and enlists in the United States Army as a medic during the Iraq War. Suffering from PTSD, the narrator starts self-medicating with opiates while deployed and continues once back home. His opioid use quickly becomes a devastating addiction that hurts his attempts at furthering his education and his personal relationships. After entering into a relationship with a woman who enables his opioid abuse, the narrator begins to run out of money, and decides to start robbing banks to pay for his habit.
Description from Open Library.
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