By Collin Johnson

0.5/5 ⭐️

Look, I got this book for free from Reedsy Discovery wayyy back in 2021 or 2022 in an exchange for my honest review. I don’t think I would have made it past the second chapter if I hadn’t made the commitment. I wrote most of this review way back when I first read it and saved it because I felt bad, like I was being too mean. But frankly, I don’t care because it was so annoying to me. If you choose to read it, I hope you enjoy it, but I certainly did not.

Tarron’s life is not going as planned. His estranged best friend, Jack, took his own life, his ex-girlfriend and baby mama is in and out of his life, he works a crappy job, and he’s an alcoholic. Then he meets Darian, Jack’s estranged younger brother, who shows up at Tarron’s bar and they form a weird friendship that includes tripping on mushrooms.

I got “I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell” vibes from this book. Except I liked “I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell.” (2025 Holly here, editing this review: I wish I could elaborate on this, but I cannot remember enough about the book to do so. But I really liked this line so I left it in.)

I think the story idea was great. The execution left something to be desired. First of all, the story is written in third person. I love books written in any POV, but the narration seems really detached. At first I thought this was on purpose. Tarron’s kind of detached from his own life so maybe the reader is supposed to feel nothing as well.

I did like that the author brought us through stages of grief but recognized that they don’t necessarily happen in order. For example, we have periods of anger, then bargaining, depression, back to anger, etc…

Then there’s Darian who is supposed to be some Air Force vet at 22 years old that has done a lot of drugs, been overseas… but acts like the kind of person who has zero life experience. That’s probably because he’s only 22, but with a backstory like that, this guy has lived and seems to have garnered no insight into any of his past experiences. Darian is also a philosopher of sorts and a nursing student (also I think the author needs to fact-check some of the medical protocols). There is a scene in the book where Tarron is in the hospital and Darian runs in and starts telling the staff what to do and what medications to give. I’m sorry, sir, but you are a nursing student (and not currently being supervised by a preceptor at a hospital that doesn’t know who in the world you are. Sit down and shut up.) And for being a military man, at the end clearly doesn’t have respect for firearms because he waives a toy pistol around and bystanders think it’s real. Then he’s like “oh it’s not real” and continues to wave it some more, scaring the bystanders which leads to police arriving at the scene and taking them into custody.

The third person narration is omnipresent and will switch from one character’s thoughts and feelings to another without much notice. It got confusing and I had to reread the passage to find out who was thinking or feeling at the moment.

Tarron get stabbed at some point and that’s never really resolved. Also the suspicions surrounding Jack’s death aren’t really resolved very well either. Are we gearing up for a sequel?

I think Tarron as a main character is pretty solid, but Darian needs to be split in to two seperate characters. Either that or he needs a healthy outlet to deal with his issues. He was clearly falling apart and I felt like he had no business being this crazy – even if he was on drugs.

For a book called “Psychedelic Turnpikes” I think I expected a little more tripping. They did mushrooms like, once or twice the entire book and there was nothing to lead me to believe that the events that followed were part of the trip. Just bad decisions being made. Overall, I did not enjoy this book and I could not stand Darian. If he were a real life person, I’d probably avoid him at all costs.

Sometimes when it comes to books, even bad reviews are still good – I bet some of you are interested in picking this one up just to see if I’m wrong which will drive sales and more reviews for the author (which is still a good thing, even if I hated it). Or maybe you’ve already read it and felt differently than I did.

Either way, let me know what you think! Leave a comment so we can talk about the books we loved or hate together ❤️