billy bathgate

A detailed Summary of billy bathgate

Billy Bathgate, is a book of a young boy's transition into manhood. It is an amazingly well-written book that intrigued me the entire way through. It starts out in Billy's hometown, the Bronx of New York in the twenties; a time of social unrest and prohibition.

The apartment building Billy lives in is not the epitome of cleanliness. The streets are littered with papers and loud noises of the trains that go by every hour. Rundown little bungalows and an occasional three-story fake brick building separate the boatyards and factories in Billy's neighborhood. Across the street from Billy's apartement building is an orphanage which he visits often because of a girl, Rebecca who he screws two times for a dollar.

His mother works at a laundromat, washing clothes for a company and has been driven insane by the poverty she lives in. She doesn't really take care of Billy and in essence he learns how to survive in the Bronx with the street smarts he has taught himself. He knows that he has something special; a desire to work and be prosperous that many of the other younger boys do not. He acts older than his age and maybe that is why he catches the eye of Dutch who also lived in the neighborhood and is now rich.

As time goes on, Billy becomes more involved with the gang. Bo Weinberg, a member of the gang has been found out to be selling information to others outside the gang. Dutch was furious and they picked Bo and his girlfriend up on the street. They drove to the docks and get on a boat, Dutch planning out his evil deed, which Billy has no idea of. He watches them tie up Bo and cast his legs in a bucket full of concrete. Then they push him off into the ocean. On the way back in the car, Dutch asks Billy to watch Bo's girlfriend, Miss Drew pack her things in her hotel room. Billy is excited with the prospect, yet is afraid that if anything goes wrong, that he too will be meeting Bo again.

Dutch, is in a lot of trouble with the law for tax evasion and so he decides that he wants to go to the country and be seen by the court up there. The whole gang travels up there, Billy with the excitement of adventure and responsibility in his head for he is assigned to watch over Miss Drew. Billy is in awe of the flourishings of the hotel, a room to himself and a sink and basin in the room as well. Miss Drew and Billy passed the days getting to know each other and Billy found out how to treat a lady like how she should be treated.

Weeks passed by and finally Dutch's trial comes up and he is found not guilty. The boys and Dutch drive out to a place twelve miles out of the way of Ontagada. This will be their new hideout while the Feds try and set Dutch up for another trial by gaining more evidence that he is guilty. In the end, Dutch figures to get rid of Miss Drew that he will have to have her assassinated. Billy, though with a kind heart, sends her husband to come and get her making it impossible to kill her without a big ordeal.

Mr. Berman, is a genius who has a talent with numbers. He teaches Billy how to manage money and not to always be so sure of himself. In a way, Mr. Berman was a mentor to Billy, teaching him the important basics in life. He made sure that Billy needed to understand not to ask so many questions because it would get him into trouble. In essence, Mr. Berman taught Billy the things he didn't know because he had never had a father or male figure in his life before. Berman takes into account the evil in the world and how you can't always outsmart it. Dutch thinks that once the trial is over that he is off scotch-free. Berman on the other hand knows something is going on, that Dutch was too lucky to get off without even a fine. He always keeps one eye over his shoulder, but the rest of the gang doesn't and that is what leads them to their demise in the end.

Miss Drew was a sweet and confused girl, not knowing where she was going in life. She ran around with mobsters, while at home she had a husband sitting reading the newspaper, knowing full well what was going on. From the drift I got he was gay, but why wouldn't he still care about her to not let her get into the all the trouble she was playing with? She liked to flirt with danger and didn't really know how to be treated by someone that had true

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Approximate Word count = 2057
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: Novels