I found this to be a very good book.
The did such a great job with Shotgun Love Songs, that I was afraid this book would be a letdown. It most definitely wasn't. There are essentially 3 parts to the book
1. The book begins in 1962 with a boy named Nelson, who has no friends except on occasion an older boy named Jonathan, who Nelson looks up to.
Nelson is subjected to bullying the likes of which would get kids arrested for today.
Nelson's home life isn't much better.
The only thing good in Nelson's life is being a massive overachiever in the Boy Scouts.
A number of events take place inNelson's life and he winds up gaining friends and later graduating from West Point.
2. Next we jump ahead 34 years. Nelson now runs the summer camp all of the Boy Scouts attend and Jonathan is married with a 16 year old son named Trevor and they are headed to the summer camp. Jonathan as a not so great father tries to teach is son how cold and cruel life can be.
3. The 3rd part takes place in the summer and fall of 2019, and Trevor and his mom are headed to the same summer camp.
A number of things take place which I don't want to reveal, but this is an excellent story.
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I bought The Hearts of Men this book from Nickolas Butler at the Lakefly Writers Conference in Oshkosh. He is a Wisconsin writer and I loved Shotgun Love Songs. Mr. Butler’s books are quality and quite frankly, so is he.

Butler read the opening paragraph of this novel and yet I was not prepared for the originality of this story. It follows logical sequences and yet it has twists and turns. I could not have predicted where the story was going to end up.

Butler’s writing kept me turning pages. He made me care about the characters and they have lived on in my mind. To me that is all you require in a book. Yet, Butler’s description of Wisconsin is vivid in details. He goes into literary detail about the characters.

The story as a whole centers on a boy scout summer camp in Northern Wisconsin. This unique character Nelson strives to be the best Boy Scout at the cost of popularity. I believe Butler uses Nelson and the other men in the story (don’t worry it has women too) to explore what it is to be a man. As with all good literary work, it leaves the final decision up to you, the reader. I’m still thinking about it. ( )

The hearts of average conservative american men. ( )

So enjoyed this story on many levels. Butler takes the male heart and examines in depth for this novel. And in doing so, he created a truly complex, unforgettable character in Nelson Doughty. ( )

Nope. Nope. Nope nope nope.

Men: Stop. Using. Rape. As. A. Plot. Device.

I don't mind stories about men. Stories about Straight White Men though are in a different realm. I'm not saying that all fiction revolving around Straight White Men is bad. Some of it can be good! But I had some other issues with this novel, especially its treatment of women as objects to be heroically saved or used as a sad plot device to give the men in this book personalities.

Nelson's mother: a woman who Nelson is supposed to save but can't.
The Stripper/Jonathan's Girlfriend: Women whose purpose is to teach Trevor empathy and subjective nature of morality.
Brittany: a woman who needs Trevor to save her and by doing so, makes himself a more interesting person.

And then there's Rachel. For the first two thirds of the novel I guess I just accepted that women wouldn't be a part of this novel in any significant way. A novel can still be okay even taking that into account as a flaw. But the moment that Nickolas Butler planted the fear of rape, I was emotionally done with this book.

Men: Stop. Using. Rape. As. A. Plot. Device. It bears repeating. It's abusive to the readers of the book and disrespectful of the characters, in my opinion. Men seem to find sexual violence against women a great way to show all sorts of things: Fortitude, defenselessness, fear. Even worse, this rape has no ties to the theme of this novel, but it haunts the reader from the beginning of Rachel's narrative. As soon as she gets to camp, you know where the story is going. The fact that it happens in the last 8% of the novel is reprehensible. It happens to her, and is brushed off, the aftermath is not dealt with at all, and it's brushed aside for Nelson's funeral.

It all felt like a giant letdown to me as a woman and as a reader. But mostly, it made me angry. OBVIOUSLY it made me angry, look at the length of this review. This is a rant dude. This novel has reduced me to rant status. ( )