Would you believe there existed a crew of young NYPD cops who were cocky, flouted the law when it suited them, treated each other like family, and "walked the streets like Gods"? They called themselves the "Wild Geese" and had been given "a ticket to ride in one of the worst precincts of the East Bronx". Fortunately, the novel is set years after the scene this eye-rolling set-up describes; unfortunately, these characters are involved in an insufficiently convincing or interesting conspiracy to murder the one (only one?) criminal scumbag who got away from each of them during their ass-kicking days: their "white", of course referencing Moby-Dick.

But fortunately again (yea!) there's a much better second plot featuring another cop, Milton Ramos, who is introduced as everyone's nightmare of a violent, sociopathic cop, but who becomes surprisingly sympathetic and tragic throughout the story as a long-dormant campaign for vengeance for his murdered brother unfolds. Not entirely un-Ahab-like here either, you might say.

I'm not familiar with Richard Price's other work, which apparently is more literary and why he created the pen name Harry Brandt, the idea being that Brandt would get credited when Price went "slumming it" for mass market genre popularity. I have no context in which to judge a work in this genre, it being one I never touch; in general, I'd say okay, it's fine, and credit the Tournament of Books with again getting me to read something I'd never pick up otherwise.

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This one kept my interest, for sure. Finished the last half in one sitting.

Had a hard time with so many characters that had nothing to do with the story. Also found this to be gritty and a tad bit gruesome in some ways. Not that it makes this a bad novel ... merely a warning. This definitely isn't a deep, feel good, life enhancing story.

I liked the character development of the main character, Billy. The others didn't quite develop as much. At times I had a hard time remembering who the character was we were interacting with. More than once, I had to go back in the book to read again who the person was to Billy.

Overall enjoyed the read, yet not one I'd recommend and definitely don't need to own. ( )

A good crime novel. I know the author from Clockers and the episodes of the Wire that he wrote. One of his strengths is his street-smart dialogue and a certain willingness to embrace crudity. I found this novel a little confusing with all of the different police officers and their different "Whites" and their Whites' families etc. It did show the value of the "X-ray" function on the Kindle. ( )

Not all books make good audio books, and “The Whites” is one example of that. To me, books with multiple characters or similarly sounding names are harder to follow when you’ve only got audio input. I found myself confused at times while listening to “The Whites”, trying to remember which of the multiple characters was which, whether the new character would be an important one or was simply a fill-in character who I could quickly forget.

That said, to me the book seemed to be rambling and to contain stories with a story, more distracting to the central theme than adding to it. The basic story line involves a NYPD detective, Billy Graves, who over time suspects that members of his old police squad may have been involved in the deaths of former suspects in previous crimes. Each of those who were killed had been prime suspects in previous unsolved crimes. Also, each had been investigated by members of Graves’ former squad.

In addition, as a sub-plot, members of Billy Graves family are being threatened by an unknown person. It all comes together in the end, but the journey to get there became a struggle for me.
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I became a fan of Price's crime novels after enjoying his writing for The Wire, and he hasn't truly let me down since. Clockers remains Price's masterpiece for many reasons, and I feel that he's never surpassed its psychological detail and sense of overwhelming pressure. The Whites (as in unjailed "white whale" perpetrators that have escaped justice but not the obsessed attention of the protagonists, not persons of Caucasian ancestry) sacrificed a bit too much of that depth of characterization in favor of an atmosphere of relentless motion (rarely have I read such a rapidly-paced novel, where each character has a decision to make or obstacle to confront on seemingly every page), and a much larger cast, to the point where you almost need a memory for names/faces as acute as those of the detectives in order to keep track of everyone. You can still expect the sharp dialogue and vivid world-building that's his trademark, but I felt that the revenge plot that's slowly revealed about a third of the way in relied too much on coincidence, side-plots, and an almost cartoonish motivation on the part of the villain. Enjoyable and even gripping on a page-by-page level but oddly unsatisfying at the end, even if no Price novel is truly unmissable for fans. ( )