Just based off the tags of the book, I was interested to get myself in some sort of thriller novel that to according to different people was either loose fiction or way to open truth. The idea of truth comes to the forefront here on wether or not it is acceptable to construe the truth for a better story. In my opinion I only read thrillers, mysteries, action books, etc. for the pieces of life in between that hold the smaller tales hidden within the novel. In this novel playing with fiction allowed for the stories of the working class/ gang members were able to be told, and brings out details such as their masculinity. For instance their masculinity is almost shaped by the fact they are in their position, Brignone had to face his past and seek to re-enforce his masculinity through his present life decisions of being a robber. As well for Borda we see that even as he shows lack of remorse for killing, he still holds a soft soft for the kid. I also find the concept of money interesting in this book, in that by burning the money the robbers are reducing the worth of the cash to nothing. It makes us question where us the worth really placed, especially as the audience who watches them is outraged. Weird to see they were essentially mad at them for not having a good enough motive and were more so mad at them for this then the lives lost during this situation. I think this action perhaps shifted readers standpoint on crimes, even knowing what we know and after humanizing the criminals, how do we place ourselves in our opinions about them burning the money after all the work to obtain it. One thing I will give to the author is that it was real in the sense that I wasn’t rooting for a particular entity. While the robbers were humanized and the cops were also dipicted, I could not really find myself gravitating to either side. I think this gives credit to the author in that it is a book based off of true events, in the real world, people are complex and is difficult to glamourize a person because there are so many layers to their glamour.

My question for the class is do you think it is appropriate to adjust the level of glamour in a character and to what extent should they be seen as complex entities rather then perfect beings we would always root for? Or does not having someone to root for ruin the book for you?