Redlined: A Novel of Boston by Richard W. Wise {Book Review}

Redlined is an intriguing read that keeps you turning pages trying to figure out what is going on and who is behind it all?

Disclosure: I received this book to review through iRead Book Tours, I have volunteered to share my review and all the opinions are 100% my own.

The year is 1974. Boston’s Jamaica Plain is a neighborhood under siege, a community skating along the razor’s edge of decline. The banks have REDLINED Jamaica Plain, causing the housing market to crash, wiping out local homeowner’s lifetime investments and opening the neighborhood to blockbusters and slumlords. Now, someone has begun systematically torching those abandoned buildings and the charred body of Sandy Morgan, a dedicated young neighborhood organizer, has been found among the ashes. Why? Who stands to gain?

Community organizer and Marine combat veteran, Jedidiah Flynt and Alex Jordan, his beautiful Harvard educated researcher together with a group of local property owners are determined to stop the redlining and and bring the arsonists responsible for Sandy Morgan’s death to justice. Their search will lead them through a labyrinth of corrupt politicians, Asian gangsters and bent churchmen.

Two interwoven plots work their way through the narrative, one is absolutely true, the other never happened, but very well might have.

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I was worried what this book would be like. It was written… differently. (Not bad. I found the written language and terminology to be different than the norm.” I found it slightly difficult to read because of this and found myself re-reading parts to ensure I understood it, but the storyline itself is what grabbed me from the start and did not let go.

Initially, I really was wondering where this book would lead. I was worried it was going to be political and educational and boring, but then I found myself engrossed in the story, turning pages, trying to read faster (which did not work!) and did not want to put the book down! I had to read more; I had to know who and what!

In addition to the engrossing story; I was educated. I bonus, in my opinion. Who doesn’t like to read a good suspense read while learning something new at the same time!?

Redlined is the first book I have read by Richard Wise, and I hope he writes more suspense and thrill because this was an excellent read. I highly recommend picking up Redlined and giving it a read!

About the Author

Richard Wise is the author of three books. His latest novel, REDLINED, A NOVEL OF BOSTON, was nominated for the National Book Award and the Benjamin Franklin Award in fiction. His first book: SECRETS OF THE GEM TRADE, THE CONNOISSEUR’S GUIDE TO PRECIOUS GEMSTONES was serialized in two magazines and became a critically acclaimed best seller.

Wise has enjoyed a diverse career. He is a veteran of the U. S. Coast Guard. After receiving his B.A., teaching and doing graduate work at the University of Rhode Island, he spent most of the decade of the 70s as a professional community organizer, heading organizing projects in Massachusetts and Rhode island. In the late 1970s he left organizing to pursue other interests. He apprenticed as a goldsmith, studied gemology at the Gemological Institute of American and received his Graduate Gemologist diploma in 1985. He founded his retail company R. W. Wise, Goldsmiths, Inc. in the early 1980s and began traveling internationally, buying gems and writing about them in 1986. In 2012 he retired from business to pursue his writing. He lives with his wife and two cats in Charlottesville, Virginia.

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