Book Review: "Black Buck" by Mateo Askaripour
“Black Buck” by Mateo Askaripour
Bookshop | Kindle
Publisher Synopsis: For fans of Sorry to Bother You and The Wolf of Wall Street--a crackling, satirical debut novel about a young man given a shot at stardom as the lone Black salesman at a mysterious, cult-like, and wildly successful startup where nothing is as it seems.
There's nothing like a Black salesman on a mission.
An unambitious twenty-two-year-old, Darren lives in a Bed-Stuy brownstone with his mother, who wants nothing more than to see him live up to his potential as the valedictorian of Bronx Science. But Darren is content working at Starbucks in the lobby of a Midtown office building, hanging out with his girlfriend, Soraya, and eating his mother's home-cooked meals. All that changes when a chance encounter with Rhett Daniels, the silver-tongued CEO of Sumwun, NYC's hottest tech startup, results in an exclusive invitation for Darren to join an elite sales team on the thirty-sixth floor.
After enduring a "hell week" of training, Darren, the only Black person in the company, reimagines himself as "Buck," a ruthless salesman unrecognizable to his friends and family. But when things turn tragic at home and Buck feels he's hit rock bottom, he begins to hatch a plan to help young people of color infiltrate America's sales force, setting off a chain of events that forever changes the game.
Black Buck is a hilarious, razor-sharp skewering of America's workforce; it is a propulsive, crackling debut that explores ambition and race, and makes way for a necessary new vision of the American dream.
Rating (out of 5): 4.5
Trigger Warnings: racism (both micro- and macro-aggresions)
Review: This book has been getting a lot of buzz, and deservedly so. It skewers start-up culture and examines the role race plays in corporate/start-up culture. It’s also an interesting commentary about the type of work that we as a society value.
When we first meet Darren, he’s writing from “his penthouse overlooking Central Park,” and instructs the reader to follow along as he teaches us how to sell anything. There are interstitials throughout directly addressing the reader that share well-known “rules” of sales, and a twist at the end that I won’t spoil, but I didn’t see coming.
Darren’s story begins as he is the shift lead at a Starbucks in Midtown, and he’s great at his job. Plus, it gives him plenty of time to hang out with his girlfriend and his mom. After a chance encounter with start-up CEO Rhett Daniels, he winds up in an entry-level sales position at Sumwun (the start-up name slayed me).
While this book could seem satirical, it does a disservice to call everything Darren (quickly nicknamed “Buck” in the office) goes through during his first week at Sumwun mere fiction or satire. As the only Black person in the office, the micro- and straight-up macro-aggressions he experienced were horrifying. Buck is constantly being told he resembles different Black male celebrities, and his new team even douses him with white paint “to help him fit in.” His boss in particular really has it out for him.
Darren winds up getting totally swept up in his job, being used as the token Black man to do damage control after an incident shakes up Sunwun, and winds up closing his dream client (a not-at-all thinly veiled satire of Gary Vee named Barry Dee), moving out of his mom’s brownstone, and basically starts living large and passing along his acquired sales knowledge in an incredibly organized fashion.
There is also a great commentary on white backlash, and how white people often feel threatened at the mere suggestion of racism or when Black or Brown people band together to help one another gain parity.
While the novel may seem heavy-handed at times, Darren is an excellent protagonist—he comes across as incredibly genuine and joyful, even when he begins alienating the people closest to him. I was struck by how much he genuinely loved his life during the novel’s opening chapters, when he was working at Starbucks, and I enjoyed the commentary on how a capitalist society really only values a certain kind of work. But Darren was great at his job, contributed to society, and enjoyed the time it allowed him to spend with his friends.
I highly recommend this book; it’s a quick read and incredibly thought-provoking.
TL;DR: An excellent commentary on the role of race in corporate America, with some unexpected twists and turns.
If you liked this, try:
“Luster” by Raven Leilani (Bookshop | Kindle) (my review here)
“Followers” by Megan Angelo (Bookshop | Kindle) (Elizabeth’s review here)
“Such a Fun Age” by Kiley Reid (Bookshop | Kindle) (our book club discussion)
If you click on one of the links in this article and make a purchase, She’s Full of Lit may receive a small commission. It doesn’t add anything to your price — we promise! Thanks so much for your support.
