Me and the Devil

A Novel

By: Nick Tosches

Narrated by: Rick Zieff

An aging New Yorker, a writer named Nick, feels life ebbing out of him. The world has gone to hell and Nick is so sick of it all that he can't even have a glass of champagne. Then one night he meets a tantalizing young woman who agrees to come back to his apartment. Their encounter is the most strangely extraordinary of his life. Propelled by uncontrollable, primordial desires, he enters a new and unimagined dimension of the forbidden and is filled with a sexual and spiritual ecstasy that is as intense as it is unholy.

Suddenly Nick's senses are alive. He feels strong, unconquerable, beyond all inhibition and earthly morality. He indulges in life's pleasures, pure and perverse, sublime and dangerous, from the delicate flavors of the perfect tomato to the fleshy beauty of a woman's thigh. But Nick's desire to sustain his rapture leads him to a madness and a darkness far greater and dreadful than have ever ridden the demon mares of night. Writing in a lineage that includes Dante, William S. Burroughs, Charles Bukowski, Hubert Selby, Jr., and Hunter S. Thompson, Nick Tosches may be America's last real literary outlaw -- a fearless, uncensorable seeker of our deepest secret truths and desires, from the basest to the most beautiful.

Me and the Devil is outrageous, disturbing, and brilliant, a raw and blazing novel truly unlike any other. Like the man said: Read him at your peril.

"A raw and blazing novel by "the single, most brain-searingly dangerous man of letters. Read him at your peril." -- Anthony Bourdain

Critic reviews

ACCLAIM FOR IN THE HAND OF DANTE:

"An incendiary novel....A blindingly brilliant and joltingly weird work of art."—Entertainment Weekly

"Astounding...A staggering work of genius"—Chauncey Mabe, South Florida Sun-Sentinel

"It's more than a book. It's a living thing. Unbelievable. I read everything by Nick Tosches.... A modern masterpiece. Utterly superior to almost everything published within the last 50 years. I won't bother trying to describe it. Just go get it."—Johnny Depp

"Tosches writes like a dark angel."—Steve Murray, Atlanta Journal-Constitution

"Splendid, passionate....A strange, wild hybrid of a novel...with a moral fervor far exceeding most novels of better grooming."—Will Blythe, New York Times Book Review

"Part hard-boiled crime story, part medieval tale of transcendence.... Tosches's powerful, unruly writing is often beautiful."—Elizabeth Bukowski, Wall Street Journal

"A novel that happily breaks every rule it can....The sheer audaciousness of Tosches's writing makes most other fiction seem phony by comparison."—David Wiegand, San Francisco Chronicle

Brilliantly bizarre

A surreal story composed of uncompromising insights and fantastic madness; at once disconcerting and gripping.

Had a Devil of a Time Reading This

I read this novel via Whisper Synch. The Rick Zieff narration was very good. The book itself is a mixed bag. As a portrait of an aging alcoholic writer, who has the same name as the author, it is intriguing. The vampire sex fantasies were believable as the imaginings of a sixtysomething drunk but you have to keep in mind this is a work of fiction. The author's take on the pluses and minuses of 12-Step culture seemed grounded in reality as did his jaundiced take on the publishing business. The main character's gourmet eating habits were idiosyncratic, to say the least. He goes to an awful lot of trouble just to have a cup of coffee. Getting something to eat, seemed like an ordeal. His philosophical and literary references and musings were the strongest part of the book. His best character was the Devil himself when he finally arrived for a brief stay. The Devil takes ownership of a quote often attributed to Henry James: "I've always been interested in people, but I've never liked them." That seems to sum up the author's point of view. This reader kept reading expecting the author to reach some epiphany but in the end, he just seemed to run out of anecdotes.

Say what you will…

You probably won’t read another book like this one. The plot is a bit murky, though the protagonist is fascinating. The naughty scenes are very naughty, the digressions help define our main character, and are also full of historical and philosophical insights.
Also, very funny in parts, suspenseful too.

Probably not for your mom, but you might dig it…

Horrible

I have no clue what this book was suppose to be about, it was the worst audio book I have ever listened to.

13 Hours of my life I will never get back.

If you enjoy listening to the dry drunk ramblings of an old man, then you will like this book. I'm sure the author thinks he is being philosophical but it is painfully boring and tedious. Do not waste your time.