Rogue Island

By Bruce DeSilva

Summary:

Someone is methodically burning a working class neighborhood to the ground.
The cops suspect a pyromaniac. Liam Mulligan suspects something more sinister. And people he knows and loves are perishing in the flames.

Mulligan, an investigative reporter at a dying newspaper, is as old school as a newspaperman gets. His beat is Providence, R.I., and he knows every street and alley. He knows the priests and the prostitutes. The cops and the street thugs. He knows the mobsters and the politicians–who are pretty much one and the same.
To solve the mystery, he sifts through an array of characters including incompetent arson investigators, baseball bat-wielding vigilantes, sleazy politicians, and the last vestiges of a Mafia that has degenerated into a brotherhood of bumbling thugs.

But his probing soon endangers is career, his friends, and his life.[summary from http://www.brucedesilva.com/rogueisland.html]

Group Reviews/Comments:

Thumbs up:  8 (although many qualified this as a “mild” thumbs up)

Made me laugh.

Reminded me of the 1950s Dragnet.

Enjoyed the world he painted even if it wasn’t completely accurate.

Didn’t notice the sexism [that other’s mentioned] because it felt accurate as a non-evolved male character!

Mulligan and Rosie’s characters’ relationship was enjoyable.

There was some good humor.

Loved the relationship with his car.

Interesting to see what was happening in newspaper journalism at the time.

The corruption of RI interesting to read about.

Liked the investigative reporter part.

Audio version was really good according to 3 people. Accent was great, portrayal of characters and sarcasm really well done.

The best part was the setting, which was “vividly decrepit.”

Thumbs down: 5

Felt like it was written by a dumb, college frat boy. No heart in it.

Did not like the main character, and the female characters were awful and stereotypical.

Very slow, didn’t capture my interest.

The constant sarcasm was irritating. The lack of emotion felt off, when his neighborhood and friends were dying.

All the descriptions of the woman in the story made my skin crawl.
“I never rolled my eyes so hard.”

Didn’t like the main character. Got that it was stylistically noir, but so over the top.

Enough about the Boston Red sox. The constant amount of baseball took away from the mystery.

Hard to get a sense of time. Was written originally as a short story in 1995 and then many years later expanded as a full-length novel in 2010. Much of it anachronistic.

The mystery was drawn out and boring. And unsurprising.

Just wasn’t interesting.

Lots of inconsistency in the writing about character and plot.

Really no mystery, no investigative reporting despite the promise of him being a newspaperman.

The ending felt abrupt and out of character.

Had to get far into it before anything substantial happens.