This book is a feat of storytelling, and also feels totally indescribable, if almost unfinished (but only in plot! For sure all author goals were achieved). Maybe it’s an achievement in setting? Of character creation? Of character abandonment? Of humor writing? Certainly the most fully Pitbull has ever been rendered in a novel!

Every perspective was a gift, and there were so many observations that felt culturally monumental (emotional crippling via machismo! Female prospects in a patriarchal religious world! Pop culture as a life plan!). And poor Izzy - a sympathetic dope who only understands grandiosity - whose potential for growth is always countered by the prescient narrator that reminds you he is, in fact, not growing. So much of everything, in short, but maybe also too experimental to feel completely satisfying. (I’ve also never seen Scarface or read Moby Dick, so perhaps my perspective is moot!)

Tl;dr — what a ride! Recommend.