fff

The Turnaround is the story of an incident of violence and the effects it has on the lives of those present. The relatively brief exposition introduces the characters when they are teenagers, and three white kids drive into a black neighborhood high on beer, pot, and bravado. The situation escalates, and spins out of control. Pelecanos (a writer and producer on The Wire) tells a good story, putting the suspense and forward momentum of a good crime novel together with empathetic but flawed characters.

Those who were there at the incident react in different ways; one character lashes out because he thinks the world owes him, another reaches out to try and find some reconciliation and understanding. Pelecanos knows his characters, and conveys a full picture of even minor characters - even when you don’t agree with a characters’ actions or decisions, you understand why they chose that path.

My only criticism of the book was the ending. After a fairly realistic, character-driven story, it ends in a way that feels incredibly unrealistic - it’s like if, at the end of the fourth season of The Wire, not only did Namond go to live with Colvin, but Dukie moved in with Prez, Randy went to live with Carver, and Michael with Cutty. And then they all got unicorns as birthday presents. I exaggerate, but after a fairly gritty, realistic novel that doesn’t shy away from any of the character’s flaws or blink when describing acts of hate and violence, the ending seemed out of place.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 9th, 2009 at 6:16 pm and is filed under Cannonball Read. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.