Review: The Pool Boy's Beatitude by D.J. Swykert

My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Standalone
Release - July 23, 2013
Genre - Contemporary Fiction
Male POV - 1st person
Heat - 1.5 out of 5
Length - 239 pages
Publisher - Rebel Epublishers

In space, the expansion of the universe exceeds the speed of light. In a jail cell the speed of light slows, time ages and deteriorates slowly to a crawl.

Jack Joseph understands physics. He understands the nature of quarks, leptons, dark matter and the desire to find the God particle. What Jack doesn’t understand is Jack.

He has a Masters degree in particle physics, an ex-wife, a sugar mama, a passion for cooking and chronic dependencies he needs to feed. He cleans pools to maintain this chaotic lifestyle.

Spinning about in a Large Hadron Collider of his own making, the particle known as Jack is about to collide with a particle known as Sarah.

Find it here:
Goodreads | Amazon

MY REVIEW

Jack Joseph understands physics, but he doesn't understand himself. He knows he's an alcoholic. He knows he's self-destructing. He just can't help himself. He's got a Masters degree in Particle Physics but he works as a pool boy. He's married to Elle, but his drinking messed that up. He's having an affair with one of his married clients, but he won't stop because she keeps bailing him out (more like enabling his addiction). He's also in love with his new girlfriend Sarah, whom he keeps cheating on! He's a phenomenal cook, quite decent in bed, and charmer. Yet, he's failing at life.

The way I see it, he's tending so many pots that one's bound to boil over!!

As bad as Jack seemed on paper, there was so much depth to him that I couldn't help but like. He kept finding himself in stupid situations and made decisions that made each situation worse. While knowing that he was making it worse. He was utterly frustrating. Yet I understood it was all a part of this character's growth. We had to watch as he steadily fell to rock bottom. To me, this story was really about addiction and how it can terrorize the life of the addict and those around them.