A review by shane_the_reading_rat
Amateur: A True Story About What Makes a Man by Thomas Page McBee

4.5

this will never be a story about fathers. I am, and always will be, my mother’s son.

it’s really interesting reading both this and Man Alive back-to-back, and i definitely recommend taking that approach if you have access to both books (go with Man Alive first).
im so conflicted between a 4 and a 5 for this, so 4.5 it is. i think this book is amazing, thomas page mcbee has such a strong writing style, in particular in writing memoirs. i found the sections of the book that were more about masculinity in general to be a tad weaker than the rest, but the memoir sections and how he writes fighting are easily strong enough to make up for it.
a small selection of my favorite quotes:

I was the sweat dripping off my arms, the goose bumps on my legs, the hardening of the muscles in my jaw, the light on my face, the swelling of my lip, the force of my will, the fact that I was not yet dead.

I’d face the mirror or weave between orange cones on the floor, imagining another version of myself, the man I thought I was supposed to be, the man I was fighting, the man I was. I wasn’t trying to beat him. I was trying to save him.

and finally, the final sentence (the ending that made me tear up):

I unbuttoned my shirt and faced whatever was to come, with my invented chest and arms wide-open.