There’s a lot going on in The Bouncer – FBI agents, high military security classification, mafia, strip joint, terrorists, high stake robbery, CIA, murder, drugs, organized crime, stolen firearms, cross dressing, grand theft, germ warfare, double crossing, and more. Unfortunately, there’s too much going on. Each of these storylines is poorly elaborated and underdeveloped. I felt the author tried hard to create interest and had too many situations to cover properly.

Terrorism was alluded to often, but the terrorist himself – along with a quick one-paragraph history lesson explaining his reasoning – didn’t show up until about 70% into the book, and, I’m afraid, wasn’t very credible. The terrorist/terrorism premise is weak at best.

I never got to like or dislike any of the characters since I never really got to ‘know’ them.

Somewhere in the book’s description was mentioned that there would be a heavy dose of fun. I never saw it. There was, however, definitely a lot of action in the book. I think this book has a lot of potential but that it needs to be whittled down a bit in some places and expanded in others.

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to review this book.

Great book. Some of the "bad" guys were truly bad and some of them, like the main character Joe, were quirky "bad" and very likable. The author managed to make crime bosses sympathetically human as they deal with everyday life. Hope this is the start of a series. It's well laid out with a lot of story lines started.

Interesting and different thriller with an odd cast of character. Mafia, Chinese gangs, viruses and cross dressing adds up to a unique thriller. Appears to be the first in a projected series.

A thriller filled with characters like we've seen on a hundred pages in a hundred books: the crook with a conscience, the divorced cop, the mobster with a secret. And yet, I couldn't put this book down. David Gordon clearly had fun bringing his story to the page (although I am quite aware of how unfun the process of writing a novel can be), and this enjoyment translates directly to the reading experience. If you are looking for high-paced entertainment, this is the book for you. I for one do indeed hope to see more of Gordon's characters in the future.

HUMOUR, STRIPPERS, AND A KICK-ASS HERO


A thoroughly enjoyable foray into the world of a bouncer in a strip club - who just happens to read Dostoyevsky; crack some pretty good one-liners; be a highly trained ex-special forces operator; and, oh yes, saves the USA from terrorists.

A hugely entertaining story around how organised crime bosses end up with one of their own rooting out a terrorist plot.

When you mix in a few parts of strip club bouncer with a few parts of ex special forces guy and a few helpings of transvestite mafiosos and throw in a heist crew, the FBI, the CIA and others, this is apparently what you get

This is the first book I've read from the author, but I was not disappointed with it at all. While the plot was a bit here and there, it was part of the style of the book. It was an imaginative plot that seemed to draw a whole bunch of things into it - high action chases, diabolical plans and heists, an unassuming lead character who just happens to be a highly trained black ops ex-member. If this was a movie, I'd pay good money to see it. It even had a bit of laugh out loud humour to break the tension of the storyline up perfectly. I enjoyed the read for what it was - a chaotic, high energy read where the author's vision was strong enough to carry along the cast of characters. It was hard to keep all the characters and arcs straight, but maybe that was part of the appeal - I'm picturing tipping out a container of those little rubber bouncy balls and watching them bounce all over the place. That's what this story is like - fun, colourful, sometimes a bit hard to follow, but entertaining and worth a read. The main character is not perfect but he's relatable - he's educated, fit, funny and chivalrous. Fun read.

Thanks Netgalley

I did not finish this one. It was very one dimensional, not realistic and kind of predictable. I don't mind it being not realistic but it was just not well written

I had such high hopes for this book.....but was absolutely disappointed.

I made it to chapter 6 and DNF'd it. Awful editorial errors as well as a story line that was not very easy to follow. I was not impressed

A vague but favorable recollection of Gordon’s Serialist had me interested in this one, the author’s latest. And it didn’t disappoint. While Serialist may have had more of a plot for my interests, this mishmash of high octane action, irreverent slapstick, cops and robbers (and gangsters and fanatics) crime thriller was just oodles of fun. Easy to imagine as a movie and just the kind I’d watch for pure mindless entertainment, with mad pacing, dynamic vibe, great energy likeable characters across the board and a high five all around happy ending…this book was, in fact, bouncy and thus aptly titled. Although the main protagonist is actually a bouncer, among other things. And the dude is seriously awesome, he fights, he jokes, he reads, he’s got a strong customized take on justice and he’s irresistible to the ladies. Sort of like a Queens’ (maybe Brooklyn’s) James Bond. Quick and very entertaining read. Thanks Netgalley.

David Gordon’s crime novel, “ The Bouncer,” is a kaleidoscopic story crammed into a book that’s almost too hard to decipher. Some claim that his writing is too hard to understand; that it’s better to “disregard the disorientation and just enjoy being in the hands of an earnest storyteller.” Really?

Joe, the strip-club bouncer in the title, is a Harvard-expelled secretive war veteran suffering from PTSD who enjoys Russian novels, subdues his demons with booze and drugs, and has ties with a top Mafioso. He gets caught up in a Fed sweep on terrorists and the threat of a dangerous vial of virus that can kill hundreds of thousands of people with one whiff.

The myriad of characters are swirled about much like the glass particles in a kaleidoscope and just as difficult to separate into individual entities. Fight scenes are jumbled and chaotic as are the relationships between the characters. The saving factor in the entire conglomeration is the story that’s somewhat intriguing and the author’s mind that was able to conjure up the overall theme. He acknowledges his weirdness and is defensive about it.

My patience and lack of time to focus made this a skimming read for me. Someone with more ability to sit down and zero in on Gordon’s well-intentioned writing will probably find it more enjoyable.