very subtle

The Gold Coast by Nelson DeMille

Rating: 4 stars (out of 5)

Genre: fiction

Review: This is a very subtle book. Told in the first person, DeMille's protagonist draws conclusions from what looks at first like very little evidence, but explanations later in the book always had me nodding my head and agreeing that it all makes perfect sense when you put it that way. In the hands of a less-skilled author, I would have found this very technique very annoying, but DeMille made it all work very well. I was very impressed.

Add to that overall good writing, including a narrator who tells his story in a very likable chatty voice (even if said narrator isn't himself always a likable character), a really interesting take on the Mafia, and a story that has some interesting twists and turns, and it all comes out to quite a good book.