Final - Literary Heroes

The main character, Victor Mancini, is the perfect example of an anti-hero. An anti-hero is described as being someone who doesn't display any heroic qualities like being good, noble, and courageous. Mancini doesn't display any of those qualities, in fact he's seen as being bad and cowardly. Victor has a strange habit of choking himself at restaurants to make extra money and to make other people feel like a hero. This, however, makes him seem like a jerk and makes you not want to like him. Many things he does, he does purely for himself, and he doesn't take into consideration other people's feelings. The only time he begins to think about other people is when he goes to visit his mom in the nursing home and he runs into another senile old lady there. When she starts to accuse him of being her brother, the one who raped her, he takes the blame and apologizes for "his" actions. Some could say that he was doing this to be selfless and help an old woman get past something she's been hanging on to for years, but in reality he was probably just saying it to get her to leave him alone. When other people from the same nursing home begin coming up to him for the same reasons, he takes blame for everything and just apologizes for it all and helps all these older people get over things from their past, but it seems like he is just doing it so that they won't bug him anymore. The only reason he keeps his mom in this expensive extended care facility is so that she will stay alive long enough to tell him about his childhood, but her mind is going and she can't even remember who she is at most points.
He is a sex addict, so naturally he puts down women and treats them like objects. He is very focused on his next sexual endeavor and when it will be. One quote that truly describes how he feels is when he says "Painting a picture, composing an opera, that's just something you do until you find the next willing piece of ass." This really shows that he doesn't believe women are anything more than objects to be used for his sexual desires, and that all of what he does is just something to fill his time until he finds another woman. This really makes him easy to not like, and sets him up to be the antihero he is.
Victor is very unapologetic of his actions and that really sets him up to be an antihero. He doesn't seem to feel bad for any of the horrible things he does and never even tries to right any of the wrongs he does. Although he is in a group for sex addicts, he never seems to go to the meetings. He's stuck on the fourth step which is where he is supposed to write out a personal history. At the end, however, he seems to get over whatever it was that kept him from attending the meetings and getting help. The book is actually the story for his fourth step.
Victor Mancini is the perfect example of an antihero because he is very unlikable and he doesn't really do anything that would define him as being a hero, in fact he does the opposite and does things that would make you not enjoy him.
As I was reading this book, even though it was very difficult to like the main character, I really enjoyed this novel. Over all I would give it a B for being exciting and appealing to read, but only that because it is slightly difficult to understand and doesn't really focus on a main message.