Kill Beth – Jon Cohn

5 stars

Kill Beth is by far the cleverest story I’ve read in years!

From the start, I felt a lot of connection with our main character, Mike, as I’m a milder form of his anxiety and OCD. Reading his descriptions of what he deals with felt really familiar to me, even if I couldn’t completely relate to his extremes. And as the book went on and certain things about him were revealed, I felt a lot of empathy and a lot of sadness.

Despite everything that happened, Mike is just a regular guy who went through something extremely traumatic when he was young and dumb. He never fully processed things, so coming back to where it all happened so many years later was too much for him to handle, especially after things started to go dramatically wrong. In the end, my heart bled for him after knowing how far gone he really was.

On the lighter side, I really enjoyed learning about the production process of a play! I love going to see them, but I’ve never actually thought about what goes on behind the scenes and how it all comes together. Getting a glimpse behind the curtain, so to speak, was absolutely fascinating! Any time I get to learn something new makes me really happy, and you never know where that learning might come from.

Much like I’m Thinking of Ending Things, this story has me wanting to do a re-read with eyes that are aware of all the nuances to see how my awareness changes the story!  I love that rereadability, and it’s so satisfying to go back through and unravel everything!

This was a huge departure from what I’m used to from Jon, but it’s a beautifully done book that completely caught me in its grip from start to finish. I’ll never read another story that’s so profound and heartbreaking like this was. There are few books in my life that have hit me so hard in the soul, and Kill Beth is joining that exclusive list.