d_s_t_e's Wattpad Reviews

White Collar Outlaws by MzJo3008 [Mystery/Thriller/Humor]

White Collar Outlaws is an ongoing mystery/thriller/humor book about a group of criminals known as the White Collar Outlaws, who have their own particular style of robbing banks, casinos, and museums, among other establishments. Everyone is wondering who they are, but the police haven't been able to gain any solid leads. That is, until Julian Seyfried, college-age detective in training, decides to take on the case for herself. Along the way, there will be twists and turns, bursts of humor, and even a little romance.

I haven't read many humor books on Wattpad, but I thought that this book handled it pretty well. There were a few jokes that fell flat for me, but there were lots of others that made me smile or even laugh. It definitely keeps the mood of the book light, and I found myself not really taking anything too seriously for most of it.

There were some aspects of the story that weren't completely realistic, but I found myself easily letting them go because I felt that the book was creating this sort of modified worldview that the humor plays into and is an integral part of. I think that the story is meant to be more fun and light than serious and realistic, and many of the great things about it simply wouldn't work as well if this were any different.

There was one place that really disappointed me, though. I think it was supposed to be humorous, but it really just went way too far. There are some things that just aren't funny and really need to be handled seriously, and this part really wasn't. I really wish it hadn't been in the book at all; it would have made me feel a lot better.

Another thing that I did find a bit problematic in this respect was the relationships between the characters. Really, I only found this to be a point of concern as particular relationships began evolving. Everything was great at first; I especially enjoyed the preliminary interactions between Julian's best friend Kasey and a guy named Jake. In the first scene that they are present in together, the dialogue is crisp and funny at the same time, and the characters' thoughts about and reactions to each other are spot-on. In some of the later chapters, though, it feels as though the author is pushing the characters rather than letting them shine through as they did before. In terms of how certain characters eventually felt about each other, I felt that things were a bit off somewhere around the middle.

I think the ending of the book helps resolve some of that through a variety of elements including insights into character's moralities, personalities, and, well, I suppose the best term for it would be sociopathic tendencies. One of the romances that I initially thought was really weird ended up developing in a way that was really unique and interesting that ultimately became one of the things that I liked best about the book in a strange way. I definitely didn't expect that, but that really made me enjoy it all the more.

Another thing to note about this story is that, while at first I wondered whether it should be so easy for the reader to pick out members of the White Collar Outlaws, I soon found myself having a lot of fun with it. As the plot unfolded chapter by chapter, I had my list of guesses for characters that matched up with the criminal aliases I had come to know and was always on the lookout for a bit of confirmation or the next piece of the puzzle. It was one more way that the story kept my interest, and doing it in this way also prevented me from getting confused by the presence of too many characters all at once. Having the White Collar Outlaws referred to as "the Head Honcho", "the Roadster", "the Techie", etc. both granted them a sense of mysterious anonymity and helped me to easily keep them all straight as I began to sink my teeth into the story. I think that this was nicely done.

As always, I must make a report on the errors and typos, of which I found quite a few. As the types of errors were fairly consistent throughout (for example, the same formatting issues with dialogue, the same misspelled words again and again), it actually became fairly easy to skip over most of them as I got used to the story, although I did still notice them. It was interesting to note how this affected some of the jokes in the story, though, particularly in the first chapter. When it comes to humor, having the pauses in the proper place can be essential to the delivery of a good punch line, so proper punctuation is especially important. I did notice at least one sentence where a well-placed comma would have made all the difference. Luckily, this is something that can be easily fixed with just a bit of editing.

Overall, I would say that this book is worth a shot if this seems to be the type of book that interests you: a book that looks to blur the lines between right and wrong, explore unique characters and relationships, and include a balance of mystery, action, and humor.

** Published in June 2014 **