Felony Juggler

Jillette follows up Random with this skillful story of a gifted entertainer who gets caught up in violent crime. Poe grew up in Massachusetts with no interest in attending college, despite his impressive intellect. Instead, he makes good money as a street performer in 1970s Philadelphia, thanks to his loud and charismatic patter and knife-juggling skills. With the show on pause while Poe recovers from vocal chord damage, a street colleague threatens to kill him unless he serves as a distraction during a bank robbery. The caper turns fatal after a bystander is killed by a ricocheting bullet, and Poe’s guilt and fear of retribution leads him to start a new life in Hibbing, Minn., where his respite from danger proves only temporary. In an amusing literary analogue to Jillette’s own winking at the audience during his magic act, Poe directly addresses the reader at several points in the narrative, as when he imagines his response to someone he might meet on his book tour (should his tale ever be published) who’s ready to point out geographical errors: “I will be very kind, but I won’t give the slightest Windsor-strip-club fuck.” It’s a hoot. (May)