Joey, like many have suggested I'd try shooting it if you can before buying. The recoil when I tested it with an open backstrap and solid wood grips was tame for me with +p, (could shoot it very accurately all day) but silly painful with .357.
Changing the grips to larger ones with room for the pinkie and that covered the backstrap made all the difference in the world. Now .357 is no problem at all, not exactly something id want to shoot all day, but certainly controllable and not painful. If S&W sold this gun with slightly different grips, you would find that a lot more people hold onto them. (literally!
)
That being said, recoil is different for all people, and I wonder when people say that +p is a handful out of this gun... it's really not, for me. Muzzle rise is no more than an inch, followup shots are fast, and there is no pain anywhere. Short of like shooting 9mm, to me. I'm a normal sized guy, with skinny hands, I don't work out at all, am not particularly strong, etc. but with recoil, YMMV quite a bit.
With proper grips on the gun, .357 feels like .44mag out of a steel 6" ful lug barrel, like a S&W 629 (the only thing I can really compare it to). Big bang, muzzle rise of a few inches, but easy enough to bring back on target quickly to unleash more .357 goodness.
I love it, it's light weight and overall carryability is amazing.