Ryan Gattis - All Involved

Rating: 4/5

Review:
Thrilling and insightful

I thought this was a very good book, and for a good deal of its length it was really excellent. It is readable, insightful and both thrilling and repellent at the same time.

The story is set during the six days of the Los Angeles riots of 1992 which followed the acquittal of three police officers for the beating of Rodney King. It is the story of a large and diverse group of characters, all linked in some way, in a gang-dominated district of South Central LA. It is narrated by their different internal voices as they respond in their various ways to the rioting and the consequent lack of policing as the authorities are stretched beyond their capacity. We get the story of those who join in the mayhem, those who settle old gang scores, some who are innocently caught up in the violence, a nurse, a firefighter, an anonymous Dark Ops agent whose team is sent in for some "extra-legal" enforcement activity, and so on.

It is generally extremely well done - the voices, period and sense of place seem excellently done to me and the narrative is repellently exciting. It put me in mind of writers like Hunter S. Thompson, Tom Wolfe or Irvine Welsh, which is high praise. We get a genuine insight into the minds of the various gang members, their motivations and attitudes, and into those of the others caught up in the destruction and killing. The tension and narrative drive are electric almost throughout, although I did think it flagged a little in the later stages, especially with a long section about a graffiti tagger, which sapped the pace rather.

This is not a book for you if you want likeable characters to identify with, and do be warned that if this were on TV it would carry warnings for violence, strong language, drug use, scenes of a sexual nature...and just about anything else you can think of. It's all absolutely necessary in a description of the time, though, and forms a very good, intelligent and exciting read. Warmly recommended.