NEIL O'BOYLE CONNELLY - BUDDY COOPER FINDS A WAY

First, let me start off by saying that I’m not a big wrestling fan, so I wasn’t really sure what to expect when I started reading Neil O’Boyle Connelly’s first novel, Buddy Cooper Finds A Way. What I found, wrapped inside of a story of a professional wrestler, was a man who was a loser in so many ways. First and foremost, he was an anonymous wrestler, who every few weeks changed his identity and lost match after choreographed match with wrestlers like The All-American Hero and Hardy Appleseed. He’d lost at marriage, divorced from the love of his life, Alix. And although he wasn’t quite as much of a loser in the eyes of his teenage daughter, he still felt like one in his own eyes. Throw in the alcoholism, the strange homeless friends (one of whom thinks he’s been contacted by aliens), and an asteroid that may or may not come into contact with Earth, and you have a very complex, albeit unusual story.

I think this book was meant to be a comedy, and I did find it amusing. I’m not sure if it was meant to be a tragedy, but I found it achingly sad sometimes, too. All in all, I thought that Buddy was just getting on with getting on like we all try to do. Just when he thinks he’s finally going to win, something happens to knock him back down. He always seems to climb back up, however, until he finally comes to realize that maybe these experiences over the last four years were meant to bring him to right where he is today.

If you like wrestling, I think you will like this book. If you don’t care about wrestling, I think you will probably still like this book, because deep down inside, we all are a little bit like Buddy Cooper.