Citizen Vince

Walter is an engrossing, entertaining writer. Didn't love this one as much as "Beautiful Ruins," but he's such a talented writer that he makes the reader root for his antihero. A funny, thoughtful story.

In Citizen Vince, Jess Walter guides you through the lives of his characters, through the places they live, makes you taste the food they eat, the pain they feel, and the emotional conflicts they carry inside. He makes you feel the fear and regret they have for their past actions, and the desire to have that one elusive chance at turning things around and doing something good with their lives.

Despite winning and Edgar in 2006, it's hard to describe Citizen Vince as a mystery novel. It's a novel of redemption, penance, and duty. It's also a novel that you should read.

Citizen Vince is has a unique plot lot -- with the back story being an American's chance to take part in the democratic system. This is set against set a whodunit story that works most of the time. The thing I enjoyed most about the book was the "voice." The author has the ability to engage the reader in a clever manner -- without going past that invisible boundary in which lousy humor overshadows the story.

Worth a read, and I donated it to my local library so others can enjoy.

Interesting, highly readable, but ultimately pretty inconsequential, "Citizen Vince" attempts to tell the story of crime and redemption as personified by the title character, a man in the FBI's witness protection program. He's sort of half trying to go straight, but is still involved with stealing credit card numbers. Fans of such crime novelists like Elmore Leonard might find this of more than a passing interest, but if you are looking for tales of redemption surrounding morally ambiguous characters you'd be a lot better off checking out the masterworks of Graham Greene who did this stuff much more compelling and more convincingly. Not bad, but not exceptional either.

This certainly is not a "classic", but rather a compelling read with plot twists and turns and characters you don't see in the run of the mill book. Finished it in three nights, was so enthralled with how it would end. The ending isn't perfect, but this is just a good reading book.

Enjoyable reading, not much of a crime/mystery novel in a pure sense of the meaning, there are other issues mixed into the plot (e.g. redemption, politics). Nevertheless it is pretty good book to read, even though one might not exactly agree with the author's line of thinking (as expressed in the novel).

[***** = breathtaking, **** = excellent, *** = good, ** = flawed, * = bad]

In 1980, Vince is a former con-man now in the Witness Protection Program in Spokane WA, and he fears his past may be catching up to him. Absorbing and often hilarious. Longer review at ImpatientReader-dot-com.

Citizen Vince has absolutely the best ending of any book I've read in recent years. It's a family-favorite book, one my daughter and I have discussed often. A recent conversation about the book brought to mind that it would be the perfect Christmas gift for our four highschool/college-aged grandchildres.

The characters in this book were extraordinarily well developed. I have to wonder about the background of the author to have portrayed mob life
in what I assume to be accurate detail yet with a wry sense of humor.

This book was an Edgar winning novel. It should have been a good book. Even though I hate to review books I haven't read at least half way through, I couldn't make it past the first few chapters. It was darkly written and totally uninteresting to me. Most books I can at least plod through. This was not one of them.

Jess infuses his off kilter characters with realistic behaviors and thought patterns and his underlining themes don't preach, they develop as the story unfolds. Very entertaining, well written and quirky. Highly recommend Citizen Vince. And even better, his later books are even better.