Billy Tabbs (& The Glorious Darrow) Review

Billy Tabbs (& The Glorious Darrow)

Author: Michael P. Michaud

Average Rating: 4.0/5.0

Personal Rating: 4.0/5.0

Finished Reading: May

According to Biting Duck Press:

A youthful vagrant, Billy Tabbs has been living in the streets for as long as he can remember, scratching out a pitiable existence in a city that doesn't much care if he lives or dies.

Amid rumors that his kind are disappearing from the alleyways and the overpasses, Billy is recruited into a bizarre homeless sect living in the underbelly of high society. It is here where he meets Darrow — the mysterious and volatile leader of an organization committed to escalating acts of civil disobedience; an organization meant to force the people of the city toward equal respect for all inhabitants of society.

Following a brazen public initiation, Billy is accepted into the group, soon becoming a valued member. However, as their movement gains popularity, and their own numbers continue to swell, can they avoid becoming that which they’d originally set out to fight? Compounding this disturbing trend is the growing divide among their leadership, with their ideology ever teetering between violent and non-violent activism.

My Opinion:

I received an electronic copy of this book to review, but in no way does that have an impact on my views and opinion. 

This novel is the debut novel of Michael P. Michaud. For a debut novel, I was pretty impressed. I was a bit skeptical when I first started reading it. There was not a real attention grabber that would grab my attention for an extended amount of time. I found my mind drifting to other things that I needed to finish, or just zoning out in general. One thing that really irritated me was how the chapters were not consistent in length. I am not saying that every chapter needs to be exactly the same, but I felt like there were chapters that could have been made into separate chapters. 

I bet you're wondering how this novel got a four out of five star rating. I have this rule for myself that I must finish a book no matter how terrible it may be. Like I've said, I thought this novel was going to be torture to get through when I began reading. However, I set myself down one day to read it, and really focus my mind on it. A little over a third of the way in I started enjoying it. I began to understand what was going on, and I started thinking about what the outcome would be. Events began to take place, and more characters were being introduced resulting in the speed of reading to pick up. 

My favorite character out of the novel would be Darrow. Darrow is the leader of the House of Darrow. I feel like he embodies the concept of greed and desire that so many people fall victim too. He starts out with good intentions, which allows him to gain a small following. He is able to provide an abundance of supplies for his followers. The small organization begins developing, and pretty soon it expands considerably. Darrow sees this as great progress, and begins to desire an even larger impact on the society they are fighting against. All this desire and greed eventually goes to Darrow's head causing him to lose sight of what he originally built his organization on. 

Overall, I'm glad that I stuck with this book, because it did end up being a wonderful book. It was refreshing to read, because it wasn't about vampires or girl falls in love with boy who lives next door. The novel was difficult at first to grasp, and at times difficult to swallow due to events that took place. I would recommend this novel, especially if you are looking for a novel that isn't the norm right now.