I Ain't Jacked My Lumber Baby, Since My Chain Saw You AKA a review of CHAINSAW by John Bender



Have you ever wondered to yourself,  "What if those lowlife dudes that every small rural town seems to have decided to rob a bank with a chainsaw so they could buy the Smokey and The Bandit car?" John Bender has, and it's the most fun you can have with chainsaw wielding trailer trash, a demented cult leading farmer, and a bank teller that takes his job * very* seriously.

Randy Lee and J.T. are *those* guys. They don't have jobs, but they always have a case of beer, they have a truck that's just one pothole away from falling apart, but no gas money, and they are our heroes. One fateful day they see an ad for a 77 Pontiac Trans Am for sale, just like The Bandit's!! And a grand scheme is set in motion. They steal a local farmer's brand new chainsaw, and with it and a heavy duty flashlight, and head to the local bank to make a withdrawal.

This story is fast, furious, and fucking funny. The characters are strange and bizarre, yet as someone from small town Wyoming, I can't help but feel like I have actually met these people before (the movie Gummo have me a similarly uncomfortable feeling of familiarity) and I couldn't help but find myself rooting for the guys I'd cross the street to avoid in real life. Part of what makes the story so outrageously fun is how much it feels like Bender just had to have had a blast writing this. If there's an opportunity for a joke it was taken, if there's violence it's ridiculous (without stretching your disbelief too thin). This is a story that adamantly does NOT want to be highbrow in the slightest, and does  it in the funnest,  goriest way possible.

You want a read that's pure enjoyment through and through? CHAINSAW. by John Bender is your ticket, and only the beginning of what I hope becomes an epic saga of redneck debauchery.

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