Me and the Devil

by Nick Tosches

A raw and blazing novel by "the single, most brain-searingly dangerous man of letters. Read him at your peril." (Anthony Bourdain)

An aging New Yorker, a writer named Nick, feels life ebbing out of him. The world has gone to hell and Nick is so sick of it all that he can't even have a glass of champagne. Then one night he meets a tantalizing young woman who agrees to come back to his apartment. Their encounter is the most strangely extraordinary of his life. Propelled by uncontrollable, primordial desires, he enters a new and unimagined dimension of the forbidden and is filled with a sexual and spiritual ecstasy that is as intense as it is unholy.

Suddenly Nick's senses are alive. He feels strong, unconquerable, beyond all inhibition and earthly morality. He indulges in life's pleasures, pure and perverse, sublime and dangerous, from the delicate flavors of the perfect tomato to the fleshy beauty of a woman's thigh. But Nick's desire to sustain his rapture leads him to a madness and a darkness far greater and dreadful than have ever ridden the demon mares of night.

Writing in a lineage that includes Dante, William S. Burroughs, Charles Bukowski, Hubert Selby, Jr., and Hunter S. Thompson, Nick Tosches may be America's last real literary outlaw-a fearless, uncensorable seeker of our deepest secret truths and desires, from the basest to the most beautiful. Me and the Devil is outrageous, disturbing, and brilliant, a raw and blazing novel truly unlike any other. Like the man said: Read him at your peril.

Genres: Fiction, Fantasy, Novels, Literary Fiction, Horror, Literature

400 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

Nick Tosches was an American journalist, novelist, biographer, and poet. His 1982 biography of Jerry Lee Lewis, Hellfire, was praised by Rolling Stone magazine as "the best rock and roll biography ever written."

Reviews

[Perry · Rating 1 out of 5]

Even Dung Beetles do Not Dare Go Near This.
(Little, Brown and Co. publishes Phantasmal Camp Muck in 12/2012.)

This book pretends to be some substantial psychological trip through darkness, hinting at the supernatural. As you read it though, you quickly realize that this is more the loser-laced inner dialogue of a drunk author sinking further and further into the hole of obscurity, as he gets shitfaced every night. For example, he imagines that he can suck the blood out of the whores he picks up off the streets. If there's a reason why or a purpose for telling us this I don't recall it.

Me (author's inane mumblings) and the Devil (author's own resentful responses to himself) makes for, I guess what you'd call it is, a book that sucks in the only category for which it qualifies:

phantasmal camp.


Hands down the worst book I've ever read

[Byron · Rating 1 out of 5]

Absolutely awful. I tried to read Nick Tosches' "Trinities" and couldn't get into the prose, and I still hope to read his Dean Martin bio. (Maybe his style jibes better with non-fiction?) But I was excited for what was supposed to be a very dark and very erotic and personal journey into the mind of a fucked-up bastard letting it all hang out. I did not expect the utter aimlessness of the thing. I did not like the casual celebrity name-dropping in this roman a clef, and the watch-me-fuck-myself coyness of soliciting blurbs from those selfsame celebs on the book jacket (Johnny Depp and Keith Richards). I did not like the show-offy $2 vocabulary words dropped as if handkerchiefs at a debutante ball? (Oh, ooopsie, me! Is that my diapason? How positively exundant of me!) I was unimpressed by the freewheeling racism of the narrator. I did not appreciate the digressions about luxury goods and fine dining. I did not cotton to the protagonist's (named Nick Tosches, btw) tough-guy wannabe pose. He imagines himself Mike Hammer, and then inserts his false teeth. It's unintentionally funny. I did not enjoy, but neither was I surprised by the flatly imagined female supporting characters. And though I could go on, let's end it with my mystification at what is supposed to be a battle with alcoholism that reads more like a polite detente than a bitter struggle.
I am guessing Tosches put much of his own life in this, and it is his baby. I'm sorry. His baby is horrid.
If you think Tosches is the dark prince of letters, you are an adolescent boy. Calm down and go read some Flannery O'Connor or something.

[Michael Seidlinger · Rating 3 out of 5]

"The older we get, the more ghosts crowd and claim us. Death does not deter the dead from living within us and around us. We are under their spell. The world becomes irrevocably haunted."

An old man faces the frigid fact of aging and sees nothing. It is in this nothingness that he finds a kind of fodder to fill the meaninglessness and bitterness of his life. He fills it with depravity for there is little more left to be done other than give in, debase and become demonic. Urge and sickness and possession pervades right on down to the bitter end of what is, right from the start, a bitter book. We will all have to come to terms with our lives; some simply deal with death differently.

The book is sick, full of stop-gap solutions for the terminally dispirited... not that anyone, ANYONE should view this book as anything more than a man's delusional last stand.

"If I could not bear the truth, I could at least close my eyes in the comfort of a lie."

[Kyle · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm going to be honest here, I skimmed the last 150 pages or so.

This was excrutiating. I have owned this book since its release, but only recently did I have the urge to read something truly wicked, wild, and dark. This novel was none of that. In fact, I found it exceedingly boring and aimless. I hated it. Actually, fuck past tense! I HATE it, and will continue hating it until I read something worthwhile to make me forget how utterly banal this novel is.

The whole story was laughable, albeit, unintentional I'm guessing on the author's part. I don't think Mr. Tosches expected much of what he had written (described as "edgy" and "dangerous") to elicit such chuckles. We have here with Me and the Devil a 60-year-old "writer" living in the LES of New York City. He has wires connecting false teeth he takes in and out, his skin is saggy, he drinks fancy drinks, he cooks and eats fancy food, he buys extravagant things, he judges the people he sees in his neighborhood from out his window in his fancy apartment...Nick Tosches wants you to know he's a polymath. It's the equivalent of going, "Look at all the crap I know shit about. Aren't I so well-learned?" "Look, look! I'm buying my meat from a special butcher and not 'Whole Foods' like everyone else, 'cause everyone else is stupid for buying things that I decree are unworthy and blahblahblah." This whole book angered me.

The narrator is overtly condescending, pretentious, pompous, misogynistic... he's an old hipster, passing judgment on people eating Dunkin Donuts and drinking cheap coffee, whereas he indulges in thick cut Irish bacon, quail eggs, salmon, and white truffles for breakfast. There was a passage early on where he's complaining about a woman at the butcher ordering "grass fed" beef, and he of course finds her insufferable because she just doesn't know that "grain fed" is better. He goes on to make superficial, rude comments on her older, heavily-made-up appearance. Pot meet kettle, much?

I haven't even arrived at the best part(s)! This pedantic 60-year-old supercilious fuck is the object of desire to many a-young (and I mean young) women. Apparently, intelligent, gorgeous girls in their early twenties find his smarmy lines fascinating, and that's all it takes to go to bed with him... and fucking let him bite their thighs and drink their blood! I just don't get it. He is obsessed with biting "young flesh" and drinking their blood, and they let him. And OBVIOUSLY the blood of younger women is better for his virility than the blood of older ladies... It happens quite often in this book, and I laughed every time I imagined this geriatric, vampiric jerk making girls moan with his incessant biting, hitting, fisting, etc. There is also casual talk of rape and violence against women, and weird run-ins with celebrities (who just happen to be friends with the author). I'm not even going to get into the cookie-cutter women of this book. They were dull and empty molds for the author to fill his fantasies with.

I am at a loss.
I am not being ageist, I should clarify. I just abhorred this MC who happens to be an older man.

I apologize if this review is jumping around and not very concise, but my anger is overshadowing my thought-process. Here, I will end what it seems is an overwrought rant, with my final words on this novel: It is self-gratifying drivel. It is not edgy. It is not fascinating. It is annoying, convoluted and smug.

[Mason Jones · Rating 4 out of 5]

First, to be up-front, I suspect that Nick Tosches could write a lengthy grocery list and I'd find it an interesting read. He's an erudite, learned guy who can put words together in beautiful ways, and make even the lowest of low-lifes spit out poetry. I've read more of his non-fiction than fiction, but found the description of "Me and the Devil" pretty compelling so I picked it up. I'm glad I did -- but, honestly, I'd have to be cautious about recommending this book, because it depends on your proclivities, interests, and tolerance for both philosophical wanderings and heavy carnal goings-on. The novel's essentially a first-person tale of Tosches himself facing his demons and the devil alike, whilst stumbling through everything from possible vampiric rejuvenation to losing months to an alcoholic downward spiral. As to how much is really him, and how much is fictional, well, the boundary's a blurry one, but that doesn't matter to the story. "Me and the Devil" feels to me like a New York-set mixture of "Against Nature", "Maldoror", and something that doesn't exist elsewhere. The blend of decadence, philosophy, perversion, misanthropy, and alcohol-fueled fantasy is pretty unique, and definitely my thing. Much of it is pretty dreamlike, but along the way you'll pick up bits and pieces of information about Heraclitus, Maupassant, Hesse, cooking, Japanese knives, wine, Buddhism, and more. There are moments of casual racism which, even if in character, would have been better smoothed out. But overall, so long as some rough sexual conduct won't bother you and the rest sounds interesting, then you're in for a great ride.

[Brenda · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book, for being supposedly shocking and 'dangerous', was terribly boring to me. Verbose and repetitive. Dull.

The content didn't bother me, but the main character was pretentious and transparent. Not interesting at all. Which is such a shame, because I'm rather enthralled by anti-heroes or even 'evil' characters. The female characters were one-note and dull as well.

So much of the text could have been clipped and nothing would have been lost from the plot. I don't understand how this could be considered deep in any stretch of the imagination. I found it very 'on the nose'.

Ah. Maybe I shouldn't have picked this up after having finished Albert Camus', The Stranger - a book that told the story of a disconnected, uniquely quietly rebellious soul far better than this book.

Where the mundane descriptions of days going by actually lend something deeper to the tone and plot, ultimately furthering the theme beautifully.

This book was a disappointment. I skimmed the last 3rd of it because it just rambled on and on and on - it really takes a lot to make me skim a book. I really try to give stories a chance to surprise me.

Unfortunately, this was one-note from start to finish.

[Jess · Rating 5 out of 5]

I went into reading this book with the preface that his writing would be like the authors detailed in the description and you wouldn't be doing the author nor the book justice if you don't.

I really enjoyed this book and its Burroughs' esk descriptions of the surrounds within the story and the no holds bar, blunt, and in your face writing style. This is both Burroughs and Bukowski to a T. There is no real theme but in fact this story is a journey and you stepping into the characters place for the journey. The tremendous amount of detail within the last 70 plus pages of the book might seems to be dragged out but in fact it is to place you there.

If you can't get thru books written with tremendous detail where you are forced into the story, don't read this book. No sense giving a book a bad rating when it truly isn't for you. If you are into those types of books, give this book a chance and read it!

[Brad Wojak · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is not a book for everyone, or for most. It is dark and cuts deep into our societies blood lust in all its forms. I have long been a fan of Mr. Tosches, and this book did not disappoint. Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate.

[Fack You · Rating 3 out of 5]

Changed my rating from five stars to three stars after reading Hermann Hesse's Steppenwolf. Many times throughout reading Steppenwolf, I thought, "Hey, this kinda reminds me of that one book I read a while back.... Me and the Devil? Nick Tosches?" and as soon as I thought of this, I couldn't stop seeing odd coincidences with Me and the Devil, reaching it's peak toward the end where Hesse ties in sexual themes with biting, blood, and killing. If you've never read Steppenwolf, it's basically a more brilliant Me and the Devil; an old, retirement age guy feeling totally alone in an everchanging world, suicidal, writer, likes younger women, is in constant battle with the darker side of himself... And if you take all the content similar to Steppenwolf OUT of Me and the Devil, the only differences you're left with are slight details; it's all the same type of existential crisis in the end. The more I read Steppenwolf, the more I became annoyed with Me and the Devil. It's like Tosches used the Johnny Depp and (other famous guy) references, and overly sexual themes as ways to sell the book, rather than those having anything to do with the story. The whole thing began to seem like a really, really, poor rendition of Steppenwolf... I mean come on... meeting a young, intelligent chick at a bar that adds quality to the life of some lonely old guy having an existential crisis and being swallowed by his own insanity? Weird, biting, death fetish? Psychoanalytical acid trip in which the protagonist loses all sense of previous reality and meets versions of himself that teach him about his own life? I mean, Tosches even makes tons of Hesse references (or maybe just one really long one, I don't remember). The guy has obviously read his literature. I just find it a little strange how deeply inspired he was by this brilliant novel, to write one so similar and not give a little credit. I don't blame him, though. Steppenwolf is one of the greatest novels I've read recently. But it does make me change my opinion on Nick Tosches, and how genuine Me and the Devil really is, even though I really did enjoy it back when I first read it.

ORIGINAL REVIEW:


"I'm getting really sick of all these terrible reviews from people complaining that this book had "no plot" or was "disgusting". I went into reading this book expecting it to be so disturbing, I wouldn't be able to handle it. But you people have underrated this book. You simply do not understand it, you're taking it too seriously.

First of all, to clarify, this book is about an alcoholic. Not only is he an alcoholic, but he's also a writer. So he's double fucked, basically. He's reaching an age where he's hitting rock bottom and the whole book is set in first person, as he's watching himself go further and further into this madness. Throughout the story, he tries to find escapes (while trying to abstain from alcohol), many of which are very perverse sexual adventures with really young girls (And everybody says "No intelligent girl would fall for someone like that omggg!!" but these girls are also sort of fucked up themselves. He even says in the beginning how girls all look for their fathers). One of them is only 19 and he's in his 60's. He falls for them, mainly because he has some temporary fetish of blood-drinking. He somehow feels that their fresh blood will make him better, younger, more god-like.

If you've never known an alcoholic, or even just suffered with your "dark side" and felt alone in your own mind, this book is probably not for you. This book is about struggling with your inner self, and having that reflect itself outwardly. It's not just meant to disturb you. It's supposed to make you think about your own "devil". It pushes limits. It's the ramblings of a madman, and if you like to think, it'll be wildly entertaining.

It also talks a lot about problems in modern society, from the viewpoint of a sort of loner who is reaching retirement age. He talks about death, about consumerism, about how literacy is basically dead due to technology taking over the world. The guy's just a really lonely dude. And he's afraid of dying, afraid of a wasted life, and has lost all hope for humanity. In the end, he sort of found his own peace in his own weird way.

If you are religious, you probably won't like this book. If you have a Nook or a Kindle, you probably won't like this book. If you can't tolerate smokers, or recreational drug use, or if missionary position is your favorite position, by god, please do not read this book! It crosses lines. It opens you up to your devil. You have to be mildly fucked up yourself to enjoy a book like this. And that's a good thing! Better than that Twilight or 50 shades of grey shit!"

[Nick · Rating 3 out of 5]

I tend to agree with both sides of the argument on this book. I agree it's an interesting and depraved look into the mind of an aging man, and a self-indulgent, at times, rambling narrative... but in an interesting way.

I believe this is written as a semi-autobiographical story. The character in the book is Tosches, even if parts are exaggerated. I find him to be quite an ingenious, albeit bitter writer, which is why I think this is a great book. He doesn't seem beyond writing a book just to piss people off, which he even ruminates on towards the end of this book.

While the scenes and incidents are things most people cannot relate to, the motive behind them is something we can all relate to– fear and loneliness, that is the devil in this book in my opinion. I think he does a great job of tying that theme throughout the book, through his psychotic episode to his moments of clarity free from substance.

To say that it isn't interesting to hear an old man rant about his day to day searchings for comfort has no place is understandable, but I'm sure that people in the 50s thought a guy writing about driving across the country and getting drunk had no place in literature, and yet we consider Kerouac to be a seminal influence. Tosches is no Kerouac, but he does some great stuff here.

He tells as honest a tale of himself as any person could tell of themselves. He subtly points out his faults as he's building himself up into this "God" of sorts, by hinting at his positive thoughts as being weakness and bullshit and his negative attributes and working on them. He's making himself worse by feeding the devil in him. In reality he's insecure and as upset with his life as any of the clock-punchers and normal people he rails against.

What I find interesting is that almost all literature is self-indulgent to me. To write something you expect others to appreciate is indulgent. Tosches address this when he says “Exceptional men do not hold their experiences to be out of the ordinary or of interest to anyone else."
He's prefacing the rest of this tale as self-indulgent..

His tirades against consumerism after first seem trite, but from his perspective it's interesting. It comes from a place of fear. Things have changed and he can't handle them. "His" New York is gone and it bothers him, probably like the people before him who felt their NY had disappeared. And as he lambastes them for being petty, he obsesses over material things like fancy food, clothing and expensive knives, not too different from those he hates who focus on different material goods.

This to me, means he knows he's not better than the people he hates. At the end, he has the ability to change his life completely and escape his downward spiral, but in the end decides to say screw it and get drunk again because he's afraid of changing his life. It's fear. Fear of cutting the umbilical cord of the city he knows. He's not building himself up through this book. He's providing the delusional view most of us have of ourself thanks to our fear of loneliness. In this tale, self-doubt wins and that's a hard pill to swallow for people who haven't lived a long life and become bitter yet.

I think he does a great job of addressing and conveying the fear we all feel in our lives from his unique perspective.

Also, just as a devil's advocate, perhaps the reason all the quotes of adulation that decorate the book from famous people is because they're all aging, successful creative types that suffer from the same fears as Tosches? And that's why they enjoyed the book so much. Just a thought. Im sure if I read this 30 years from now I would find new things to focus on and that alone makes it a book worth reading. Thanks for reading my piece of self-indulgent literature!

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

Aging writer Nick is witnessing the decline of civilisation. One night he meets a provocative young woman in a bar that surprisingly offers to go home with him. This one night unleashed an unholy desire within him. Unable to control his primitive desires, Nick finds his thirst getting strong. His desire for blood quickly becomes the driving force in his life. However, has he just found the key to mortality or has he just unknowingly made a deal with the devil?

Reading Me and the Devil, I notice right away that Nick Tosches is playing with the vampire genre; the idea of old men drinking the blood of young women to gain extended morality. Turning it into a sexual perversion, blood play works really well as a device to explore the vampire mythology. The story basically follows a young nineteen year old in an unhealthy relationship with an older man. It is basically Twilight, exposing many of the problems with the relationship of Edward and Belle.

Although Nick Tosches does a much better job with the relationship, exploring a darker and more brutal nature of an unhealthy relationship. His writing is beautiful and is often compared to William S. Burroughs and Charles Bukowski. I love that gritty nature of the novel and surprising beauty in the language. When it comes to talking about food, Tosches is very detailed and I found myself getting hungry at the food imagery.

Besides the vampire angle, Me and the Devil is a story of a grumpy old man that is angry with the changing world. Interestingly enough that the main character is named Nick Tosches, making this anger autobiographical. If you look at Nick’s website, the ‘about the author’ section simply says “Nick Tosches lives in what used to be New York.” This is a representation of how the character viewed New York, always talking about the old days. When you had little deli’s and mum and pop stores. The quality of the food was so much better back in the old days.

I feel like there is a lot to say about this novel but it would require spoiling the plot and I really think this is a book that deserves to be experience blind. Since Nick is a writer in the novel there are heaps of literary references to obscure and cult classics, which I appreciated. I loved Nick Tosches writing style and need to read more of his books. He is mostly known for his dark and gritty music biographies Hellfire: The Jerry Lee Lewis Story and Dino: Living High in the Dirty Business of Dreams (Dean Martin) and I am interested in reading those books. Tosches also explores a lot of religious themes so I am excited to experience more of his novels. This is the type of author that you will either love or hate, luckily for me, I have found a new favourite.

This review originally appeared on my blog; http://www.knowledgelost.org/book-rev...

[Cecily - MillennialBookGal · Rating 1 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book and when it first started getting into it and what not I thought the dude was going to become a Vampire or something with all the blood desire. However, the whole book just feels like some drunk writer's rambling who has a thing for some strange kinks. I was waiting and waiting for this book to get better, unfortunately I am left disappointed and I hope I forget about it.
Blah!

[Sarah Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ever wondered what happens when you mix a dash of old-school rock 'n' roll with a sprinkle of existential dread? Look no further than Nick Tosches' "Me and the Devil." This book isn't your average bedtime read—it's like a dark, delicious cocktail that leaves you slightly woozy and craving more.

With his devilish charm, Tosches takes us on a ride through the gritty streets of New York City, blurring the lines between reality and the surreal. Our protagonist, Nick (coincidence? I think not), is a burnt-out writer battling the demons of age, love, and the ever-looming shadow of mortality. And just when you think you've got a grip on the plot, in walks the Devil—because why not?

The narrative is as raw and edgy as a punk rock anthem, filled with philosophical musings that make you ponder life's biggest questions while sipping your morning coffee. It's darkly humorous and unabashedly honest, capturing the essence of a man on the brink, desperately seeking meaning.

If you're in the mood for a book that feels like a late-night conversation with an old friend who's seen it all, "Me and the Devil" is your perfect pick.

[Christina McLain · Rating 1 out of 5]

Worst book ever. Piece of garbage. The author pretends to be too cool for school thinks he is Camus but really he is Crap. I say author because you are never sure how thinly veiled the fiction is...wow when I think that he got published.They say he wrote definitive biographies of rock and roll figures like Jerry Lee Lewis well the drugs must have been better then..ugh..and again the fantasy of the younger woman..

[Erin]

Bailed at 25%

[Donovan Richards · Rating 4 out of 5]

That Uniquely Human Trait

Addiction—a uniquely human trait. It arrives in many forms; it burrows deeply into our psyche and takes control of our actions like a parasite. No matter how much we intellectually react against our addicted nature, we live at the whims of another. It’s alcohol; it’s sex; it’s tobacco; it’s food; it’s a video game. These pleasure-filled actions can take hold and run our lives.

Interestingly, it seems as if addictions transfer from one medium to another. An alcoholic channels his tendencies toward sex; a glutton switches to the cigarette.

No matter the addiction, the question remains: what good can come of it? Is there a way to channel ones desires toward better ends? Or does addiction eat at the soul like a leprous disease?

This question is the focus of Nick Tosches’ Me and the Devil.

The Life of an Addict

Following the salacious life of a writer, incidentally named Nick Tosches, Me and the Devil explores addiction in its many forms. Nick is an alcoholic, a sexual deviant, a glutton, a pill-popper, and a cigarette-chomper.

In particular, Nick’s sexual appetite develops some oddities. You see, he lusts for blood. In encounters with women, he mandates for the life force of his virginal mistresses in a vampiric trance. For Nick, love is no longer made; it is acquired through violence.

“It was not sex that I sought, not as it was commonly conceived. I sought communion, sacrament, transubstantiation, the blood that brought redemption” (22).

What began as simple bites and scratches blossoms into full-fledged access to large arteries. Nick’s odd sexual addiction to blood gives him an altered blood type, strange pigments in his eyes, and a newfound belief in himself as a dark, panther-like deity.

In addition to Nick’s sexual appetite, a large focus surrounds the writer’s physical appetite. Our protagonist is a man of finer things, whether women, clothes, vintage bottles of alcohol, or food.

Food, in fact, often plays a role alongside Nick’s sexual addictions. The appetite for women and for sustenance seems to emerge from the same spot in Nick’s psyche.

“The sun the next morning was bright in a clear blue sky, but the cold could be felt through the walls and closed windows, and it was not hunger but a desire to generate and linger by heat from the stove that moved me to make a breakfast of sunny-side-up duck eggs, good fat greasy duck sausage, and toast, made of the last of that pumpernickel that was going stale the night before, smeared thick with dark apple butter” (94).

The Pros and Cons of Addiction

In its many forms, Nick’s addictive tendencies are leading him toward a path of destruction. Whether relationally, professionally, or bodily, Nick’s unwavering belief in his godlike ascendancy and his disregard for the outcomes of such overindulgence leave him facing death and the devil himself.

For me, the foundational pieces of Me and the Devil which interest me surround the idea off addiction in its pros and cons. For many, the assumption of addiction is negative; it is excessiveness, a process which can only bring pain and potential death.

Yet the objects over which we indulge are, in and of themselves, not objects of moral consideration. Drink can be a good thing, food a necessity, sex the process by which we populate our world. But in excess, the very good things we extol become an evil. They pollute our minds and contribute to an unbalance which influences our lives and the lives of others.

So we try to solve it. But, boy the remedy for addiction is tricky. Tosches, in fact, writes to this idea:

“Old habits die hard. And—an uncomfortable thought—all too often they die only when we do” (182).

Nick’s eponymous character is stuck in a myriad of addictions. He faces a conundrum. Slave away to remove himself of addiction, or embrace his tendencies and ride a roller coaster to hell. Isn’t death the endpoint in either circumstance?

Even though Me and the Devil causes deep rumination, I found its final section rather disappointing. After setting up such an intriguing premise, the ending of the novel fizzles, much like a film airing 30 minutes too long. While graphic, Me and the Devil offers much to consider. Tosches dives into addiction with powerful prose and a keen eye. There are, in truth, many facets to addiction. I just wish Me and the Devil was a little shorter.

Originally published at http://www.wherepenmeetspaper.com

[Michelle]

In Me and the Devil Nick Tosches may have been attempting to push the envelope with his utterly unlikable main character – an alcoholic, pedantic snob with brutish sexual proclivities. He instead succeeds in disturbing and isolating readers with the aging author’s obsessions and navel-gazing. With its exacting descriptions of food, alcoholic benders, sidebars about Greek and Latin grammar, diatribes against societal milieus that do not fit his standards, and most importantly its questionable main character who may or may not be fantasizing the entire plot, Me and the Devil novel feels like a wannabe Bret Easton Ellis plot (see American Psycho). Unlike Mr. Ellis’ novels though, there is a rage within the main character that antagonizes a reader more than it intrigues.

Too much about the novel leaves the reader wondering why Nick acts the way he does. The questions get to the heart of Nick’s character, and answers would go far in creating someone that readers could at least understand. Instead, readers are left with a shell of a main character with no clear understanding of his goals, drive, or motivations that cause him to act in such a grossly offensive manner. Yes, suave and psycho Patrick Batemen is more sympathetic than this old man.

There are many authors out there today who specialize in the shock and awe factor with their novels, who actively write about characters who buck societal norms – Dennis Cooper is the first one that comes to mind. Me and the Devil is an attempt at the same but one that falls short. Yes, everyone has their own penchants, but Nick’s turn towards blood play is so sudden and so unexplained that it remains all but inexplicable. Compounding the problem is his unreliability as a narrator due to his drinking. The entire novel has a tired, repetitive quality to it that fails to shock and awe readers as much as it annoys and drives one to put down the book.

Acknowledgments: Thank you to NetGalley and to Little, Brown and Company for my review copy!

[May Bunda · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book felt a little bit like meeting a homeless man on the street and engaging in a conversation; you don't know how you managed to get into this, but he's just so lonely and he just needs someone to talk to, so you bite your tongue and miss your appointment to give him an ear. It was more out of empathy for the narrator's (conveniently named Nick?) state than any real interest in the plot itself (or, you know, lack thereof) that held my interest.

A little bit Lolita, a little bit Elizabeth Báthory and a little bit of a rambling drunkard, this book is not for those who squirm easily. I've glanced about the other reviews on this book and I understand both the good and the bad. On the one hand, it really isn't nearly as scandalous as it is sad, regardless of what the technical description might imply. And anyway, the book is well-written in a very poetic, lyrical sense, as well as it captures the voice of the character in a very consistent manner. On the other hand, this feels more like an obscene look into an old man's journal than a novel, and not even a wholly accurate journal- one that stretches truths until minors are inexplicably interested in 60-year-old men. In the end, it almost felt like an uncomfortable, guilty invasion of privacy.

I wouldn't call this my favourite book by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm hesitant to rip it to shreds. A decent, if depressing read, and I might recommend it to a friend or two who would have interest in Tosches' style of writing.

[Ken · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a deliciously dark(very dark!)faux-autobiography of a NYC writer in his sixties (Nick Tosches) who finds that sex with young women can become a supernaturally salubrious experience if he can sip on their blood. The sex is consensual, and the book is not an attempt to present a new slant on vampirism, yet it is more accurately a vivid and intriguing portrait of a man facing his mortality while simultaneously experiencing inexplicable youthful or godlike powers.

The book is set in the hippest areas of Manhattan, and offers a wide range of colorful characters, yet the reader never knows exactly what is real and what is not, and the tone of the book presents an intricate dance between sobriety and intoxication, or insanity and inspiration. What happens in the novel is clearly secondary to the pensive nature of the exploration. MUST READ.

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

I couldn't put this book down. And yet I'm rounding down from 3 1/2 to 3 stars. This was my first Tosches experience, and found the "wise, sage, drunkard" type of narrator to be interesting enough to capture my attention, with echoes of Miller, Bukowski, Burroughs, and Selby. The first 1/3 was fascinating, although rather hard to believe as actually happening, the middle 1/3 got really interesting as the action became even more unrealistic, but the final 1/3 of the novel seemed to meander without much point or action. Such hopeless despair was interesting when the character was actually doing something about it. When it turned to page after page of "what should I do?" I was okay with it to end, even if I would have preferred a more dramatic ending.

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

In the beginning this book pulled me in with its cryptic words, but as I continued deeper into its verbose and meandering plot, I felt as if it was unfocused and rambling. I wasn't so much appalled by the sexual fetish in the novel as displeased by it. I'm not a prude but bloodletting and sex just don't mesh well in my mind. I guess that explains why I've never been a fan of S&M. I understand that the narrator is losing it in his final days and just such a case would call for such rambling prose, but I found its ruminations exhausting and hard to follow at some points along the way. Tosches is obviously a talented and knowledgeable writer, but this book simply wasn't for me.

[Bob · Rating 4 out of 5]

OK. This book has pages of brilliance, and also a lot of terrible writing about vampiric sex (Time for a moritorium on this theme). I think if you're an over-50 male, you'll love it - but if an under-40 male, you'll find it laughable. (And no, I can't see any women liking this). It's Tosches's meditations on the general rot of American culture, and his bracing description of the decrepitude that is aging that make the book, um, relevant. A very weird read - I can't really defend it, but it will stick with me, I'm sure.

[William · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful, Dangerous, Sick, Depraved. A good read, but you'd better have an Oxford with you while you journey, and muster up courage and intestinal fortitude, because it's NOT for the faint of heart. There will be things in here with which you'll disagree and often be repulsed, but still, laugh out loud to, slam your palm on your knees repeatedly, and want to try. I thoroughly enjoyed this novel, and look forward to many more from this authentic human being.

[Neddal · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ah Nick Tosches, a vampire novel? Really? I like vampries and Tosches could have pulled it off had he not decided to be relentlessly self-indulgent. Celebrity cameos, ranting, his fucking poetry...about half way through it becomes a slog. A real slog, and I say this as someone who thinks Tosches is one of the top American writers going. When an author feels the need to write his friendship w/Johnny Depp into the book, you know things are going to go wrong. Real real wrong.

[Tyler · Rating 1 out of 5]

This author tries so hard to make himself "cool". Really obnoxious voice and writing style - telling stories about hanging out with his buddy "Johnny" (Johnny Depp) or "Keith" (Keith Richards), trying to make himself seem real relevant.

[Jay Johnston · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hmmmm. This is the first Tosches book I've read, and I think I could have picked a better place to start. I expected this to be a bit of stylized rock/blues history with a focus on Robert Johnson (thus the title). I quickly learned that it's semi-fiction based on some version of himself, or an alter-ego. There was just enough good stuff here that I stuck with it. I found some of his passages about sobriety/addiction extremely compelling. I felt the same way about his musings on aging, mortality, and watching the new regime take over your old stomping grounds. No doubt about it, the dude can write, is well read, and is accustomed to being the smartest guy in the room more often than not. But the jist of the book is centered around a highly sexualized vampire-based quest for the fountain of youth. I'm far from a prudish reader, but I found all of the "conquest" material to be self-indulgent at best and straight-up offensive at worst. The same can be said for his lengthy, detailed descriptions of the finer things in life that he enjoys - from duck bacon, to Oval cigarettes, to "real" opium, to hand sewn socks, to Bach cello suites, etc. etc. Just reeked a bit too much of an old guy desperately trying to show just how cool and worldly he is . Which is both interesting and ironic as those are some of the key themes/ideas explored throughout the novel. Really had me wondering how much of it was intentional vs. inadvertent. May be some "if you spot it, you got it" at play here since I'm a 46 year old male recently facing some of these same struggles in my own existence. I.e. How vain am I being when I go to such great lengths to show people just how little I care about things. A train-wreck of a book with more flaws than a-ha's....but I'm intrigued enough with what I read to give some of his work another try sometime down the road - maybe the non-fiction on Jerry Lee Lewis or Dean Martin (Dino) which I've heard GREAT things about, or possibly one of the compilations I've seen of his shorter works. Bottom line - if I discovered that a friend of mine had also read this, I would look forward to having a long conversation with them about their experience with it and thoughts on the content/ideas - but if the same friend HADN'T read it and asked me if they should, I would most likely tell them to pass on 'Me and the Devil'.

[M Larsen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm going to skip ahead: just put this book down and read Hubert Selby Jr.'s The Demon instead. Honestly, I think Nick Tosches would tell you to do the same.

I was still riding the high of reading Tosches' beautifully-crafted In the Hand of Dante when I picked up Me and the Devil. One of the things I found brilliant about Dante is Tosches' "trick" of creating a narrator who is, like him, a writer, a hardboiled Italian-American New Yorker, and who is also named Nick Tosches. In Dante it makes a lot of sense: Tosches draws comparisons between his struggle as a writer and thinker and Dante's which are truly poignant. The same tactic in Me and the Devil doesn't serve the story nearly as well.

Me and the Devil includes some truly sublime moments of poetry, but it's blemished by a deluge of racial slurs and casual misogyny that the story fails to justify even within the context of this character-who-just-happens-to-resemble-his-author conceit. Dante includes a memorable rant about editors: Tosches clearly prefers that his editors stay away from actually editing his words - and the man is a poet, no question. But there are huge passages of this book that would have benefited greatly from an editor sitting the author down and asking him to either earn it or cut it.

One personal sidebar: while I was reading this book - actually, just when I considered giving up on it - I discovered Norwegian musician Jenny Hval's album Blood Bitch. Listening to a woman's perspective on gender identity, sociopolitical construction, and... um, vampires, made a perfect soundtrack for some of the more difficult-to-stomach passages of this novel. If you've read this and other reviews and, like me, want to read this book & decide for yourself, I highly recommend putting on this album while you read.

Just to be clear: I didn't entirely hate this book. But I did hate large portions of it. I'd like to think (generously, hopefully) that the project Tosches is engaged with is a critique of the character he called Nick Tosches - a curmudgeonly misogynistic man-child who gets off on saying the n-word and hates pretentious literary snobs while somehow also demonstrating all the characteristics of the worst pretentious snobs himself. The character is rife with contradiction and self-loathing, and this story brings him beyond the brink of death and face to face with the devil himself: but it still feels like Tosches isn't fully committed to picking apart the leathery facade of the character who wears his face. I read the entire book hoping for a definitive moment of actual self-awareness... and instead got several extended "self-awareness" scenes that still left me with... doubts.

Maybe the ambiguity is what he's going for. Certainly, the question of "wait, how much of this is really you" adds to the thrill of In the Hand of Dante, and the ambiguity there serves the story. Coming right up against that edge is something Tosches admires writers like Selby for - which is why, ultimately, if you haven't read Hubert Selby Jr.'s The Demon, just read that one instead. I think that's the book Tosches wishes he would have written here. The vampire shit is almost interesting, the sex is almost kinky, and the author's confrontation of his own mortality is almost not overplayed, but ultimately Me and the Devil raises the knife and fails to break the skin.

[Brandon Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm a huge fan of Tosches, and this wasn't his best, but I think the overarching reviews on here that state it's a self-indulgent "cool guy" trip really missed the point of the entire story.

It IS a self-indulgent piece meant to make the main character (also named Nick Tosches) seem like a self-obsessed jerk (I found the celebrity name-drops to be one of my favorite seasonings in the story). The whole thing, in my opinion, is an experiment in depravity and self-obsession that is supposed to come off as meandering and sad, which it accomplishes very well. The blood and kink stuff just seems like ghoulish, garish overkill for the sake of pushing the story into even further ridiculousness.

Under Tiberius was better, but I still think Me And The Devil deserves a lot more praise than what it gets. I believe a lot of readers are mad because they wanted a serious path down into depravity and madness but what they got was a flimsy jerk who wanted to believe he was empowered by his evil impulses.

I can appreciate a lot of the hate Tosches received for this one, but I just couldn't help but enjoy the story for what it looked it versus what it actually was.

[Wade Oberlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have the book of this, buuuut I found out that this is the one Nick Tosches audiobook that is available via Spotify, so I went ahead and listened to it on my trips to work, home, and my recent weekend trip to Indiana and back. It’s good- Nick pontificates about the usual stuff you’d associate with him (Heraclitus, Ezra Pound, Italian food) and creates a fun enough fiction about an author reinvigorated by drinking the blood of young women- and yeah The Devil makes an appearance.

The other piece of overt fiction I read by him was In The Hand of Dante, which to me was like Tosches doing his own take on a Dan Brown plot- going for a best seller? Both ITHAD and Me And The Devil take serious digs at the declining publishing world (AOL, Barnes & Nobel, Et al) which was ballsy. Next up: Save The Last Dance For Satan or Trinities, after which I’ll finally read Hellfire or King Of The Jews, which await me on my shelf.

[Katie Feik · Rating 1 out of 5]

I did not finish this book. I got about 60 pages in and stopped because I don’t want to torture myself. And I’m surprised I made it that far but I always want to give books a fair chance. This book is basically the ramblings of an old drunk writer who likes to judge everyone around him, have sex with young girls, and …bite their thighs and drink their blood? 🤨 It’s a bizarre and boring book. I picked this up at the thrift store for .50 cents, skimming the summary thinking it would be a dark and interesting book but absolutely not. I can see why it was donated. I’m glad I didn’t spend more money on it. Save yourselves.