The Dog Fighter

by Marc Bojanowski

In this remarkable debut novel set in 1940s Mexico, Marc Bojanowski has crafted a work of startling originality -- a poetic, mesmerizing tale of loyalty, violence, love, and redemption.

Written in the searing voice of its unnamed narrator, this is the story of a young man drifting through the badlands of California and Mexico after the death of his mother. He eventually settles in Canción, a sleepy Baja city on the verge of transformation. Lured by money and fame, he enters into an underground world where men fight against trained dogs before a raucous crowd of the town's elite businessmen and those who work for them. With an uncommon display of strength, skill, and sheer fearlessness, he becomes an overnight success.

Before long he catches the eye of a powerful businessman, whose grand vision is to turn Canción into a lucrative resort destination. But when the dog fighter finds friendship with a revolutionary old poet and is drawn toward a mysterious young woman, he becomes ensnared in an intricate web of promise and deceit. Caught between the ways of his past and the dreams of his future, he is forced to make a devastating choice that ignites a mixture of jealousy, greed, lust, and betrayal, culminating in a fight both for his life and the fate of the city.

Haunting, lyrical, imaginative, and immensely powerful, The Dog Fighter is a stunning novel of beauty and brutality that announces the arrival of an extraordinary new talent in American fiction.

Genres: Fiction, Novels, Crime

304 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2004

Reviews

[Richard · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a forgotten gem, the tale of a lonely, violent man who fights dogs in a small Baja California town in the 1940s. Style-wise, it's a melange of Hemingway and Cormac McCarthy, stilted diction, odd punctuation and all. I read it when it first came out, and enjoyed it just as much this second time. Romantic and violent in equal parts (the dog fights are rough stuff) with some beautiful descriptive passages. Also put me in mind of Robert Stone at times, Graham Green at others. It's definitely "manly" material, which is out of fashion in certain circles, but, you know, fuck that.

[Will Byrnes · Rating 3 out of 5]

The narrator of this tale is a young man whose mother has just died. He is violent, urged on by the voice of his grandfather, a primitive. He is a murderer, a harsh uncaring soul eager to prove his strength at any cost. He is used by a woman to kill her lover, then flees to a remote part of Baja Mexico. It is there that the action of the tale ensues. Cancion is a sleepy place, but one in which the future is the prize in a war between a mafia-like developer and the anarcho-literary types who want to keep the place the way it is. He finds solace in his own company, but one day catches a glimpse of the don’s niece and is smitten. He becomes a dog fighter while there, putting his brutality to the test in a spectator sport in which men do battle with canines, sometimes animals that have been trained for viciousness. This is a role that matters in Cancion, where a dog-fighter is considered a sort of matador, a respected one. The novel is brutal. There is violence aplenty, and it is difficult to conjure too much empathy for this near-sociopath. But the harshness of the narrator’s life provides the dark background against which the rays of emerging humanity shine. He lives in a complex near a homosexual dentist, forms friendships with the town’s famous writer, teaches young men and begins to care about the town. He also falls in love. There is lyricism in the writing that enhances this journey. I would not recommend this to anyone of tender sensibility. But for those with a strong stomach, it was a worthwhile journey.

[Hal Long · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you like Cormac McCarthy, particularly the beauty of All the Pretty Horses and the violence of Blood Meridien, then this might be a good book for you. Simple, clean writing that invokes Hemingway, McCarthy and Faulkner. The style captivates and the characters are compelling. The violence runs high and it's definitely cruelty to animals (and humans). So, be prepared. But, once you get past that this is one of my favorites.

[Jeff · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bojanowski is an excellent writer and there is some poetic, beautiful language throughout! This is definitely a writer's story that thrives on poetic, concrete imagery and minimalistic prose. I honestly read this book for Bojanowski's writing style, and I'm happy to say that his style is consistent and effective until the very end!

Is it captivating to read? Yes! But the plot moves slowly and feels underwhelming in the end. It took me close to a year to finish reading this book because I lost interest; however, by the novel's close, the loose threads all tie together to sketch themes on generational sins, The American Dream, the absence of God, and misguided masculinity.

Overall, The Dog Fighter is an interesting story about a man's search for love, meaning, and permanence that moves at a slow, plodding pace. Ultimately, I liked where the narrative took me, but it took a long time to get there. And then, once I was there, it ended abruptly.

[Justin Freeman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked this one up because many of the reviews mentioned that Bojanowski writes similarly to Cormac McCarthy with characters reminiscent of Hemingway’s. I couldn’t agree more and I loved every bit of it. Following the life of a Mexican boy through adolescence and into adulthood, The Dog Fighter delivers as a coming of age story and a tribute to the foolishness of young love with plenty of violence to spare.

[Sam Dennison · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Dog Fighter was an exceptional book. A great first novel. The secrecy of the narrator and leaves you begging for more information. Id fully recommend this book to anyone interested in a story with violence, but also self realization, and questioning.

[Véra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hemingway and McCarthy meets Palahniuk. It's been 20 years since I read this but I still think about it sometimes. Uniquely violent and abhorrent, this type of "manly" fiction never really sat well with me.

[RGS · Rating 5 out of 5]

I liked it a lot...intense with a main character to care about...not for the faint of heart...Like other readers...I'd compare it to a Cormac McCarthy border novel...

[Kelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Broke my heart. Loved the language. Amazing imagery.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though this book can be stylistically mannered, eschewing commas for example, it was entertaining and pleasurable to read. I enjoyed being fully immersed in the author's macho, emphatic language and living in the scarred and caloused skin of the main character. I chose to interpret the storytelling and setting as mythic rather than documentary. As far as realism goes, my more Latin culture-savy friends felt that The Dog Fighter misrepresented Mexico, even to the point of racism. It certainly is a brutal, bloody life in the small town on the Sea of Cortes which is in fact the setting of this noirish tale about a little Cesar who excels in the eponymous passtime. Highly recommended, but not for everyone; content warning: extreme animal violence.
I met Mr. Bojanowski at Cody's Books (god rest its soul) at the time this was first published. He was a very serious and intelligent fellow, but he seemed beset by the work of publicizing his novel, and would've clearly rather been 'round the corner with a pint than standing reading excerpts in front of 15 complete strangers seated on folding chairs.
Don't know what Marc is up to now, we all wish him the best of luck developing his talent.

[Martin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I put this book down several times to gather dust before I finally willed my way through it. I'm not a person put off by violence and love books and movies that drip with it. Blood and gore in copious amounts is surely my forte and this book is jam packed with it; think Fight Club with dogs.

To be honest I can't really nail down one reason I didn't love this book. The main character never really gets any where. He doesn't seem to learn anything. His internal struggles stay in park and the story outside of the actual dog fighting seemed to leave me wanting. I couldn't tell if I was going to end up feeling sorry for the main character, loving him, hating him and before I knew it the book ended.

Shrugging off my need to feel fullfilled at the end of every book I read, the story is ok, the setting is kind of cool and the blood splattering seems to step in just in time to drag the story along for a few more pages.

Maybe Michael Vick can help me understand exactly what it is I am missing from this book?

[Frank · Rating 3 out of 5]

I generally feel that, in a work of fiction, messing with things like structure and getting creative with punctuation are a waste of a good writer's craft. It doesn't matter how clever you get with these, what matters is solid things like story, character, perspective, and the general arc of the story. I felt this way when I started reading this book. It wasn't until I was nearly done with it that it struck me how much of the chosen grammatical structure of the work contributed to it. It certainly adds to the voice of the narrator, which is the main drive of the book--the narrator and his voice. It has good character, plot, and a very unique perspective. It's all a kind of poetry, really. One of those books you don't know how much you will enjoy when you start reading it, but you find you never put it down for long. It's a good book.

[Jason Jordan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Dog Fighter (Perennial, 2004) takes some getting used to. In a counterintuitive move, Marc Bojanowski’s debut novel contains the bare minimum as far as punctuation is concerned. You will find no quotation marks, commas, dashes, colons, semicolons, ellipsis, or any other helpful forms of punctuation. Instead, aside from marks native to the Spanish language (accents, etc.), you will only be given words, periods, and question marks. Does that make for a clunky, awkward reading experience at first? You bet....

Read the rest in the December 2006 issue of decomP .

[Tara B · Rating 4 out of 5]

First off, there isn't really war in the political sense, but there is war in this book, so the shelf classification stands.

For a first novel, this is brilliant. The story takes a lot of interesting turns. A lot of people have griped that the protagonist doesn't really evolve, doesn't "go anywhere," and for those people I have one word: Hemingway. This book is way Hemingway-esque. If you don't like the guy, why did you open a book that has his name on the cover? (It's a quote from a critic.)

I don't like writing reviews much, so in summary: If you like Hemingway, you'll probably like this. If you like books that have a lot of violence, or books that have a lot of imagery of Mexico, give this book a try.

[Johnfx750 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Shocking tale that doesn't apologize for its disposition and lays it out flat. Grabs you from the first chapter til the last with no holds barred...if you are a dog lover do not read this book !

This is just a precursor to what you are going to encounter with this book... as it bares your own account and how you will digest it. The dogfighter tries to find his manhood in bravery and wrestles with newfound love as only a dogfighter can... Its a wretched story with a painful love song playing in the background..

On the flip side it is culturally beautiful and the pictures are painted vividly ...the bright flowers along with the smell of the splattered blood in this roller coaster of a read.

[Garrett Mcgeein · Rating 5 out of 5]

Seldom have I read a book where the all the characters were so likeable. Through all the betrayals, friendships, and story developments, all the personalities in the novel won my favor; till the last page, I even enjoyed what I suppose would be called 'the villain...' though, those classical distinctions were anything but clear - all the characters were at times villainous or heroic, respectively.

The book's stylistic grammar was also a fresh change of pace; though, admittedly, at times confusing. Instead of using traditional punctuation, the author opted to use - from what I can tell - nothing more that periods throughout the entire short book.

I could barely put this book down.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book surprised me. I'm not sure what exactly I was expecting, but this was a really good book. I'm not sure if it was the relatively sparse dialogue or the way the author describes everything, but more than any book I've read in a while every time I opened it it was like taking a little vacation. Spending some time in a quiet little town in Baja. The protagonist is intentionally despicable throughout the beginning of the book, but he grows on you. The ending was unexpected and perfect, with no apologies. I liked this one quite a bit.

[Jess Genevieve · Rating 3 out of 5]

From the very beginning the dark tones and violence made me question whether I'd put the book down and never pick it back up. The characters and the landscape of Cancion were what kept me captivated. The protagonist's journey takes the reader through friendship, love, greed, lust and betrayal. The ending was not at all what I expected and I have to admit I'm pretending things happened differently.

[Travis · Rating 4 out of 5]

brutal, raw, visceral (literally and figuratively),graceful in its violence, somehow nostalgic. hemingwayesque in structure and device. debut novel, always an attractive quality- interesting to glimpse and speculate on a young writer's motivations. wish i had the onions to live as the anonymous narrator.

[Cormac Mccarthy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is both beautiful and brutal. Surreal and terrifyingly real. Only a writer with the rarest of gifts could create a main character and give him no name, set the story in 1940's Mexico, and have the reader completely invested from page one.

[Patrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bojanowski effectively transports the reader to another time and place, and into the mind of a character most people are never likely to encounter. This book is as much about change as it is about violence, and sometimes change is violent.

[Christopher]

Once I caught the flow (punctuation irregularities), I was enamored with this tale.

[Angie · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of those great finds where I thought the cover looked interesting at the library so i picked it up. An amazing story.

[Tony Stumbaugh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad, picked it up on a whim. Funny how books can turn into a love story of sorts. So it goes.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautifully written book even though it is difficult to read at times because of the subject matter it's absolutely worth it.

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

An epic poem about desire and violence. Heady and rich.

[Eric · Rating 5 out of 5]

Man this is a hard charger for fans of Cormac McCarthy and the likes. Violent, passionate, poetic...good. I did not want to have to put this book down.

[Rose · Rating 5 out of 5]

I didn't like this book until I was about 50 pages in. I think it;s a good book for a book club, plenty to discuss and leaves you with a few things to think about.

[Bill · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an interesting story and worth the read but I don't know if it's something I would want to read again.

[Jerry Rocha · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well written violent downer, but it's really good.