Dark Heart: Images of a City

Travis Berketa

An unnamed vigilante roams the city, trying to reverse the damage done to a city by people who say ‘so what?’ His decent into madness is inevitable – and in a way, this novella reminds me of Batman!

This is a novella – it took me around an hour to read it. It was fast paced, although there were a couple of sections where I felt the language was awkward. The present tense really drew me into the character.

I liked the way the narrator felt the need to explain himself, but still things went downhill. The journal form that this is written in is ideal for showing the mental deterioration. This is a stream of consciousness book that others might enjoy more than me.

I find it hard to comment on such short books as this one. This novella highlights the shortcomings of the police force, but also reveals what can go wrong when taking the law into your own hands. I can at least say it was thought provoking, although I don’t see myself wielding an iron bar like that any time soon.

Oh the irony. The protagonist just doesn’t seem to notice that sometimes people do care – and he ends up damaging them as well! His mentions of God are equally ironic – something that fits in with my own viewpoint.

The RRP for this novella is $24.95, which to me is way too much for such a slim book. If it was on Amazon for $0.99 I would be far more likely to recommend it to you. For that much, I can recommend a whole other set of books that would no doubt further the same ideas.

There is explicit violence and rape in this book, so I would recommend it only for adults.

I received this book as part of the Goodreads: First Reads program, but this did not influence my review in any way. All opinions are my own.