Although I was honestly expecting another raunchy, poorly written book about a gay man, Hell's Pawn was a complete surprise to me! Although there are a few sex scenes and a central romance, the book is definitely not dominated by these themes. In fact, Hell's Pawn turned out to be an incredibly philosophical book diving into beefy topics like the nature/reason for religion, as well as the supposed finality of death. This is a book that has you questioning what you personally believe about religion and death and etc., it's not simply another steamy gay book. This is what I especially like about Jay Bell, he is able to write beautiful stories that, even though centered around a gay man, are able to make the whole being gay thing seem like an arbitrary character detail that is too insignificant to deserve an entire book about it.I also liked how he handled the central romance in the book. Throughout most of the book I was expecting a Disney Movie ending where the two characters who have been flirting the entire way through inevitably end up together. Not so! Bell writes this romance in an impeccably realistic way. In most books about gay men the first other gay man the protagonist meets ends up coincidentally being their soulmate. I feel like Bell knew this and made it a point to depict a real romantic relationship that is often messy and unsatisfying.Beautiful job. This book honestly made me want to kill myself but in the best way possible! Not because it was depressing, but because Bell's depictions of life after death seemed too fun and interesting to wait for :) An amazing work of dichotomies. Words cannot even suitably describe it.It's simple, yet strangely complex. It's straight forward in such a way that you can understand it, but there are also hidden depths that take much more thought and that one can get glimpses of on a cursory inspection. I've put it in my favorites, but I'm not quite sure if I like it, and for that, I like it all the more. It makes me think of a lot of things and brings up a lot of philosophical ideas that really have no answer. It's that strange almost-balance of conceptuality and functionality that philosophers strive for, yet it's not quite that either.It's not perfectly ideal, but still leaves you with that vague feeling of hope. Beautiful in and of itself.Something like that.
What do You think about Hell's Pawn (2011)?
AWESOME, LOVED IT, ALL OF THE DEITIES TOGETHER,TEAMED UP.
—Camspear
Interested thought process of the afterlife.
—missy
