I initially found its dated tone a bit tedious, and wondered what kind of story it would end up being, with some concern that I was wasting my time on something trite. Its themes gradually grew in complexity, however. I began to wonder if some anachronistic cultural paranoia or simplistic "classist" critique might eventually emerge as well. What I found in the end, however, was an interesting depth to the characterizations involved.

A too rigidly jaded view of the novel might yield some confusion over what side the author was taking, when in truth the end result was that he seemed to be taking no particular side at all, at least as delineated by the characters themselves. He simply clarified facts as they emerged where the characters could see them, and let the characters sort themselves according to their own biases. Mistaking the black-and-white sides imposed on events by the all too human flaws of the tale's characters for the author's representation of reality is, I believe, a mistake that can easily ruin the experience of reading Savage Streets. Recognizing that events are not intended to be seen by the reader in "us vs. them" terms, and that those terms are merely imposed on the narrative by the filter of the perspectives of characters in the book, is key to enjoying it -- and I did enjoy it, quite a bit, by the time I was done.

If there is any real flaw to it, that is the fact that some of the finish was a bit too clean the way characters obviously at odds with each other parted ways. Even so, there was clear growth amongst characters in a believable and interesting way right up to the last few pages, and I am not entirely sure how it could have been improved. I found it an excellent book, well worth the read. I may be biased, though, given that hidden within the course of events portrayed in this novel were several demonstrations of Blackstone's ratio, what I consider an inviolable precept of justice, though it is never mentioned in the narrative: "It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer."
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