Tuff : A Novel

Rating:
Summary: Outlandish. Entertaining
Review: In Tuff, Paul Beaty presents us with one of the most unlikely casts of characters you're likely to encounter this year.

We have Winston "Tuffy" Foshay, the 300 pound neighborhood strongman turned politician from Spanish Harlem. His father, an aging Black Panther turned Poet. His mother-figure, a Japanese concentration-camp survivor turned radical activist. Tuffy's multiple sclerosis stricken sidekick. His mentor, a dreadlocked black rabi with a taste for easy listening music and imported lagers. Toss in the token ghetto white-boy and his bank robbing mother, Tuffy's street smart wife, a trio of Puerto Rican triplets (who happen to be cops) and a few of Japanese Sumo wrestlers for good measure and you have Paul Beatty's latest novel.

Not everything here works, but then again how could it? But this is an enjoyable novel with a highly authentic voice. Tuffy is a complex character; a tough-guy from the streets who happens to develop a taste for imported films. He is teetering on the verge of aspiring to higher things, and although he's not an altogether likeable character the reader finds himself pulling for him.

At times the book reads like a string of situation comedy episodes. Here's Tuffy's narrow escape from a drug hit. Then we get Tuffy in the City Council debate. Next: Tuffy sumo wrestles. Not everything ties together seamlessly.

But to save the novel we have Paul Beatty's excellent eye and authentic literary voice. An highly original novel, and entertaining in it's audaciousness.

Rating:
Summary: Tuff is Tough
Review: Tuff is the story of a young man's transformation from a hopeless youth to a man who is willing to try a new way of life. We read the book in a book club and our feelings about the book varied greatly. One member liked how ambitious the characters were in their quest to make money. Another member liked how Beatty forced his readers to question their stereotypes, by constantly placing the characters in unexpected roles. Another member liked how Beatty gives a vivid account of what the less fortunate, when faced with obstacles, are willing to do to improve their living situations and the living situations of people around them. Overall, our book club would reccommend the book.

Rating:
Summary: No lighthearted romp
Review: Unlike Paul Beatty's "White Boy Shuffle", his new novel "Tuff" is no lighthearted satirical romp, but rather a more sombre, hard-edged work with a tone closer to Chester Himes's detective series set in Harlem, and Richard Prices' "Clockers". Where "White Boy Shuffle" was a funny book that said serious things, "Tuff" is a serious book that says funny things. Told from an omniscient point of view, it follows a few months in the life of Winston "Tuffy" Foshay, an alienated young black man who survives a crackhouse shootout, and starts to reappraise his life. A more fully developed character than "White Boy Shuffles'" protagonist Gunnar Kauffman, Winston is a lover of cinema who ironically cannot see the larger picture of life. We are taken into his thoughts, and they are not pretty. Displaying once again his gifts of language, humor, and description, Beatty catches the bleakness, casual violence, and desperate schemes of those in the ghetto in a naturalistic, almost documentary way that is grimly compelling. Many scenes in the book are wonderfully drawn, particularly the intervention scene where Tuff's friends, and family try to help him set a new path. The deep estrangement between Tuff and his father in this scene is both funny and poignant. Following Tuff's adventures is like watching Tony Soprano. Both have the ability to love, and yet are capable of such astonishing violence and brutality, that it is hard to care about their ultimate fate, and as a consequence, while "Tuff" is an extremely well written, more substantial book, it is ultimately less satisfying.