Sadly this book just was not for me. This sat on my kindle for quite some time - twice I have attempted to read and twice I did not finish.

Thankyou for the opportunity but I will not be providing feedback on any commercial sites for this book.

If you're searching for an irreverent romp, look no further. This is a very dark comedy, and I loved the vacation from reality it provided. It isn't a book you would recommend to your grandmother. It isn't a book you'll call beautiful. But, I can honestly say that I've never read anything exactly like it. And that, for me, is the mark of a good read!

One third into the book, I still do not grasp where we are leading to.
I researched and learnt that is a cynic ironic take onto what if the government was a cooperation who had to downsize. Apparently I just do not get the wittiness of this novel.
I'm happy that this book has already received so many positive reviews on goodreads and I hope I will enjoy it more when I try it again in the future.

3 STARS: I was hoping this would be a lot better as I liked the premise and hey, the setting is in Dublin involving the CIA. Unfortunately, I could not get interested in the storyline and it just did not work for me.
American Joe Chambers is a CIA operative, working in Dublin for an agency fronted publishing house, Whetstone. He was sent there to work after he messed up big time, and this was his punishment, of sorts. I’m going through chemo so that probably doesn’t help as well. Maybe next book.

Did not finish, despite the other book by Jay Spencer Green that I thought was very good (a hoot, really)... this one was not for me.

Breakfast at Cannibal Joe's is definitely not for everyone! I found the writing to be pretty well done and did find myself laughing at it at different points. However, the fragmented story seemed to lack much storyline for the majority of what I read. Unfortunately, I got to the point where the humor (which I did enjoy) did not outweigh the feeling of not knowing what exactly was the point of the story and I DNF.

Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC of this book. This one won't be for everyone, but if you like dark comedy with a bit of a nihilistic touch, this one is for you. I personally think the author is brilliant and searched for more books by him after reading this one.

I really tried hard to like Jay Spencer Green’s “Breakfast at Cannibal Joe’s,” because there was some great humor found at the start of the novel and I was in the mood for some great funny writing. Green is a comedic writer, although calling him great might be stretching it a bit, but there were some very funny aspects to some of his writing. It was also scatological, crude, full of sex and drugs, and over the top nasty that tended to dull his humorous efforts. That said, I didn’t enjoy it as much as I wanted to.

It hasn’t received a lot of raves, although it has won some awards. Okay. I get that. A lot of books win awards but I don’t like all of them. Some of the judges are not looking for what I enjoy. And why should they? I have definite views on what’s good and what isn’t. For instance, I like characters that I understand and can enjoy. They don’t have to be Boy or Girl Scouts. Not many real people are. But Green’s characters are all unlikeable without a single redeeming value. The plot is also standing out as unbelievable, incomprehensible, and uninteresting. Throw those characters in there and they assume the same characteristics.

I won’t bore you with the plot. Not sure I can explain it anyway. But if you like dark humor and the chore of figuring out what’s going on, try this book. Hopefully you’ll give the author more kudos than I’m able to.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this! The world the author has created is chaotic and dark, creating a very unique story. This is balanced out nicely with the book’s frequent comedy. The reader is given an interesting and varied cast of characters, in a dystopian world which instantly draws you in. I would definitely recommend this book and couldn’t wait to finish the story. I loved the cocktail recipes at the beginning of every chapter too.

Breakfast at Cannibal Joe's is a dark, disturbing comedy ostensibly about espionage in a dystopian Dublin, Ireland, either in the present or near future. The focus is CIA operative Joseph Chambers and his exploits to avoid repatriation to the States by keeping afloat the front company he runs in the face of financial, political, and underworld challenges. The book is also an immensely funny - but almost nihilistic - satire on contemporary capitalism, including agribusiness, Big Pharma, the surveillance state, and neoliberalism.

I suspect that this will be a challenging read for some, given its fragmented structure and surreal, almost absurdist plot. It features an unusual but very clever trompe l’oeil narrative, so that readers experience the narrator's distractedness and confusion directly. The plot is fractured and piecemeal, so that it is difficult to follow at times but deliberately so, as we discover. The story nevertheless repays persistence and provides a good deal of entertainment and amusement along the way.

All in all, it's a genuinely original and exciting work. For those who read to have their imaginations stimulated and who aren’t afraid of robust language, adult situations, and intellectual adventures, Breakfast at Cannibal Joe's offers something entirely new and fun.

Thanks to NetGalley and BooksGoSocial for the free copy in exchange for an honest review.

Not for me at all. Though witty in parts, it's so vulgar and crass, I just finally gave up halfway through. It seems to have a following though so maybe it's just not for me. Give it a chance and make up your own mind.

What a strange and unexpected story! If you're in the mood for dark humor and bleak satire (think a European Chuck Palahniuk) then you will appreciate this book.

While enjoying the assignment as the CIA operative for Ireland dark clouds are gathering on the horizon for Joe when headquarters are thinking that there is no need for an office in Ireland. Determined to push back and save the operations leads to a series of failed attempts.
The black humor had me in fits of laughter and critique about modern society spread throughout the story was just genius and like all good stories a fitting end.
This is an independent review NetGalley / Books go Social

Had a hard time really getting into this book. The writing style was very interesting and the narrator was witty in the beginning but I had a hard time connecting with the characters and plot and couldn't finish the book.

I could not connect to the book in the least. This book has a huge fan-base but I could just not find it interesting and I DNFed it after reading only 20 pages.

Well what can you say about Breakfast at Cannibal Joe's? After reading this I'm not too sure, Slaugter House 5 meets Robert Rankin with an unhealthy dose of vulgarity. It is either a work of genius or the worst thing ever written. and I'm sat befuddled on if I love the book or loathe it.
The story would be a very short one if not for the tangents, but it does have a lot of charm and in many a part it is genuinely funny. not one for the squeamish or easily or moderately offended.
If your on the fence about reading this, give it a go.
I'm going to go and ponder what it is I've just read.

Thank you to the author, publisher and Netgalley for the review copy

CIA operative Joe Chambers has been sent to Dublin as punishment for past blunder(s). There he is managing a CIA front company called Whetsone Publishing. Whetstone employs grad students and other over educated sorts to summarize books and journals for republication. Joe works there with his brilliant assistant, Sinead (who he mistakenly called Sinbad for the first bit of working with her) and gets frustrated by his boss' continued attempts to cut costs. Meanwhile, an MI6 agent keeps breaking into Joe's apartment to steal his alcohol stash.

This book is chock full of that absurdist, irreverent humor that you can find in the likes of Vonnegut, Christopher Moore et. al. This book is not for the faint of heart or easily offended. It is loaded with bawdy humor including brothel visits, sex scenes, tapeworms, organ thievery, curse words, etc. etc. You get the picture. I found this book to be amusing.

Chapters start with interesting cocktail recipes like the Litvinekenko Stinger, which is simply 8 oz. of Sloe Berry Tincture served in a hot teapot. yum???

The book is narrated in first person by our protagonist Joe Chambers. He has lots of interesting observations and turns of phrase.

<i>"You get the idea. Information is knowledge, knowledge is power, power is the ultimate aphrodisiac. This I am the king of sexy."

"...there was something unnaturally androgynous and depraved about him, like a balding Christina Ricci..."</i>

I enjoyed the bizzaro summaries created by Sinead and the Whetstone Publishing crew. They were very entertaining and probably one of my favorite aspects of the book.

Definitely an interesting read that will make you at the very least chuckle. I recommend this if you are looking for something a bit different and twisted.

This is one of those books that is both incredibly hard to describe and review, which if I'm perfectly honest has led to me procrastinating doing so. 'Breakfast at Cannibal Joe's' is described as a dystopian comedy, and I'd say that is a perfectly accurate description of this insane satire of Western capitalism and the Irish people. I found myself frequently and religioulsy highlighting both hilarious and hard hitting passages for later reference. Following Joe, the manager of a small firm producing article abstracts which doubles as a CIA intelligence gathering agency, we see look into the lives of the average Dubliner, foreign spies and the criminal underground. What Jay Spencer Green did so excellently in this novel was combining Joe's apathy and machismo with objectively horrible things to make both a poignant and amusing point.

While ~dystopian~, the setting of late-capitalist Dublin is so close to being within our own reality that at times it feels like a surreal look into the world in 20 years time. This made me incredibly uncomfortable but also left me laughing like an idiot while I read at the kitchen table, my family staring at me undeniably concerned. Coming off the heels of a research essay into the effect of deindustrialisation in Northern England, Green's discussion of deindustrialisation and unionism appeared particularly pertinent. While written in 2015, I found his commentary on globalisation in general especially interesting during a time when we are each seeing the consequences of our globalised division of labour and manufacturing.

This novel was fairly loose on plot, at least until you got around 60% of the way through, at which point it became an addictive mystery of sorts. At around 25% I had pretty much had enough, struggling to see the point. However, I am incredibly glad that I was able to push through as the satirical nature of the novel became more and more apparent. I was honestly quite taken aback by the brazen objectivisation and sexist remarks Joe made at times, but this appears to have been Green's intention, reflecting the coarse locker-room talk we so often hear excused. Furthermore, Joe's own self-doubt became apparent as we learned more of his past and tangled present which deepened my understanding of the way he chose to approach the world. Certainly, Joe was not always a likeable character and not necessarily 'good' either, but his humanity and complexity made him an excellent instrument through which we came to know his world.

As readers we start this book with 'The End'. It was so satisfying to finish the last written chapter and go back to the start, finally understanding everything that first chapter meant. I highly recommend this book for lovers of dystopian who ere on the side of weird, but I will say that it's not for everyone. I'll definitely be looking into Green's other novels and gave this 4/5 stars.

I would like to thank Jay Spencer Green, BooksGoSocial and NetGalley for giving me a copy of this book in exchange for review.

WARNING: If books had age ratings this would be MA15+ or R-rated. Don't read this if you're not comfortable with strong language and imagery (both violent and sexual.)

Everything about this book was enjoyable, from the unique title to the cover art. The storyline made along at a fast pace without any lags. Overall, I really enjoyed this one!

A really nice, enjoyable read for me. I've never read anything quite like it - the dystopian comedy genre is such a niche and Breakfast at Cannibal Joe's really filled that niche for me.

Thank you NetGalley for providing an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.