Week 1 / 2016 - Rumble Fish Review

Welcome to the very first book review of my 2016 52 Books in 52 Weeks challenge.

"Rumble fish" is another classic fiction (albiet kind of short) tale from S.E. Hinton. It stars Steve and his best friend Rusty "Russell" James, and a slew of other interesting side characters. I think I described it best when I called it the "Red Headed Stepchild" of "The Outsiders" (Also written by S.E. Hinton). The book is not exactly like The Outsiders because the story is completely different, but the setting and overall atmosphere is exactly the same. The story I assume is set somewhere during the 60's - 70's due to the fact that Rust-James and his older brother the Motorcycle Boy are said to be wearing white T-shirts, leather jackets, and jeans. The author is S.E. Hinton so I pretty much assumed that the book would feel inspired by her other works.

 I am a picky reader and have been my entire life, so there are always a few things that writers do that really piss me off. First, I hate when writers feel the need to come up with a title that doesnt even come into play with the book until the end of the story. For instance, in "Rumble Fish" we dont even hear the term, or in my case understand the term, until the end of the story (last chapter). One of the other things that I dislike is some of the motivation of the main characters. Rusty-James just does things or simply does not seem to understand the simplest of concepts, now I do understand that he is supposed to be stupid, but sometimes he really baffled me.

I will say that I really enjoyed the fast pace of the book, it never ceased to have something interesting going on. There never seemed to be a dull moment. The main characters (Steve and Rusty-James) were always doing something whether it be them staying out late going to Skinimax, or getting wasted and going to parties they seemed to be very active.

The biggest shocker comes at the end of the story. SPOILER ALERT** The Motorcycle Boy (Rusty-James' older brother) decides to let all the animals go in the local pet store. When Rusty-James hears sirens coming he tries to run for it, but when he is running away he hears gunshots. He is captured by the police, but from what he described he kind of lost his mind so to speak.

When it comes to recommending this book to other people it is really hard not to. The book itself inst very long and the story is geared towards high school students, and come to think of it this was one of the books we could have read in high school, so I would recommend that anyone who is a fan of either S.E. Hinton or "The Outsiders" gives this a read.