Rivers of Gold: A Novel (original 2010; edition 2010)

When reading a novel, it can be hard to say if misogyny shown by a character is a conscious choice by the author, to show us that the character is a misogynist, or is the author just didn't realize he's casually being a misogynist. In the case of Rivers of Gold, I started wondering about this on the second page. Luckily we are given two POV characters, so I decided to wait and see if the second character, Santiago, treated women any better than Renny, our first narrator.

One of the first things Dunn wants us to know about Santiago is that, after finally standing up to his older brother's teasing and hitting him, Santiago got a blow job from an anonymous girl for the first time.

Awesome, women-and-sex as prizes. Just great. And since the author didn't bother to add any identifying characteristics, like "the girl Santiago had been trying to flirt with" or anything, we're led to believe just any blow job is what was really the point. Who *gives* it could never possibly matter.

This is reprised when Santiago buys his apartment and picks up a girl from the old neighborhood who "fucked him so hard he had bruises and friction burns... for three days afterwards." Because... she was also really excited he bought his apartment? At least this time she got a name (Anilda)!

And that's just the start of the casual misogyny (other good examples: count how many times women are called whiny; note how only men are allowed to be drug clientele in the Le Yef scene). I won't start with the racism, the lesbians who have sex with men, the way gay men are described, etc.

I was fed up with this by - well, much earlier, but enough to start writing this by page 94.

I also don't understand why this is set in 2013. Maybe it's supposed to give an immediacy to the economic collapse, but really it just seems unfeasible given that this was published in 2010.

I am also unimpressed with the lady who was described as a pest and is named Yersinia, the first half of the Latin name for the causative agent of the plague, Yersinia pestis. Is that supposed to be clever? It just screams of more misogyny to me. A lady is literally named after a killer disease. I searched and searched to see if this could be a name that is actually used and I'm just not familiar with it but Google just turns up the plague.
(Later a female state Representative is given the surname Anopheles, which is of course the Latin name for a mosquito, which spreads malaria, and another female Representative is surnamed Trichinella, a parasitic roundworm. Male politicians include Baumgarten, which means orchard in German, and Davidson. And, yes, at the end a spokeswoman for City Hall is straight-up named Tsetse Fly. Gross. So gross.)

Also, Urbank? Really? Subtle.

Nurses don't wear starched uniforms anymore, and hospital staff are not even close to the ones who are in charge of checking blood for HIV (that would be done before blood gets to the hospital) and I don't even know where to begin with what's wrong with "double-checking the time clocks on the donor organs."

Oh my god instead of the "traditional" magical negro character, there is a magical transgender woman of color. You have to be kidding me.

There is also no way an experienced sniper would be using a scope and a rifle to shoot from 46 yards, which I'm pretty sure is more of a pistol range. Plus, if a sniper IS going to be using a rifle and bring a traditional sniper, he would have a spotter with him.

Besides those areas of failure, I didn't empathize with either of the POV characters, the plot/mystery wasn't compelling, and I found the idea of a city/country in economic collapse interesting but not well-treated. I really wouldn't recommend this book to anyone. ( )

By 2013 a new Great Depression has hit the United States, and New York City has been hit hard. A network of illegal underground clubs has sprung up across the city, hotbeds of sex and drugs moving from abandoned restaurant to abandoned restaurant. Deeply immersed in the world of these "speaks" is Renny, a young photographer and drug dealer whose supply network operates out of a covert network of taxicabs.

On the other side of the law, NYPD Detective Santiago is part of an experimental police unit using taxis as undercover police cars. When cabbies start to turn up murdered, the investigation indicates a possible connection with illegal drugs and underground nightclubs. As Santiago investigates, he is equally disturbed by his mysterious new partner, who may not be who he claims.

Rivers of Goldis a mixed bag, full of many good ideas that never seem to go anywhere. Dunn has obviously done his research and his setting is fully realized; unfortunately, his new depression era is never explored in depth, with only passing mentions of Hoovervilles and abandoned buildings. Consequently, the novel starts out extremely slow, with tons of scene setting but no real plot pickup until about halfway through the novel.

Renny, one of the major characters, is also thoroughly unlikeable, coming off as a know-it-all, rude misogynist who views women simply as sex-objects with letters instead of names. He's not so much a villain as (noted even by other characters) an annoyance.

Santiago is much more sympathetic, and his story is also much more interesting. Again, Dunn wastes his opportunity, and provides little detail into Santiago's investigations into both the murders and his partner. There seems to be too much revelation and too little actual "detection;" one wishes Dunn focused more on this side of the story rather than wasting time on Renny's antics.

The story is very well written, and has great one-liners, but there's too many problems to recommend. Dunn has an interesting concept, and explores some real issues facing modern cab drivers, but all the ideas seem to get lost amongst themselves.

A finished copy was provided through the LibraryThing Early Reviewers program.

http://lisally.wordpress.com

I had expected to find an interesting speculative element in Rivers of Gold, but never did. The Great-Depression-2.0 New York City and its citizenry seem exactly like plain old normal New York City, except for the occasional vague hand motions by the author about failed restaurants.

Other reviewers have mentioned the stereotyped secondary characters. This was especially the case when it came to the gay/lesbian characters. The gay men are fops or fluttering socialistas. The lesbians are man-hating ice-queens or lesbians-just-waiting-for-the-right-man-for-a-threesome. Eyes were rolled often.

One decision that I found particularly jarring--and I will admit that this may be totally idiosyncratic--was the change in quoting style between Renny and Santiago chapters. When the POV is Renny's, speech is marked with British/European dashes; when it's Santiago, North American inverted commas are used. I'm not entirely sure what effect they were trying to achieve, but I didn't care for it. ( )

Rivers of Gold is a tale of an extremely near future (2013) where the world has gone to hell in a handbasket. The economic recession has devastated the country and now the seedy underbelly of New York City's drug and speakeasy scene rules the city. The cash-strapped NYPD is trying to fight back with a program putting undercover cops in cabs.

Dunn's worst-case scenario strikes a chord of plausibility for those of us living in the current economic recession; his realistic portrayal of hell seems like it could come true. The parallel stories of his two main characters, Renny and Santiago, are equally captivating, and it is hard to pick which character to root for. Although the story is not life changing, the best book about New York City, nor clever, it's fun read, particularly for people who love books set in New York. ( )

There is no doubt the setting of New York City plays such a large part in this novel it can almost be considered a main character. However, this character exists mostly through the naming of intersections and buildings that its true nature is never fully conveyed. Unless one is from New York City, these geographical references are lost on the reader. Reading this book felt like being a tourist or an imposter at some secret club. Instead of working to build up the character draw me in, the setting pushed me out.

I found the main character brash and arrogant, especially the way he viewed women. However, I can see that the novel may be appealing to men. Women are to (Insert Harlequin Novel Title Here) as Men are to Rivers of Gold.

The supporting characters were riddled with cliche.

Despite a few sparse (yet fabulously beautiful) one liners, this novel left me wanting . . . well . . . another book. ( )