Island of Vice: Theodore Roosevelt's Doomed Quest to Clean up Sin-Loving New York

Provided a very good understanding of turn of the century (19th to 20th) NY and national politics, morals, and how Theodore Roosevelt tried to put NYC on a better path against overwhelming odds.

Anecdotes captured from letters, journals, etc. detailing Roosevelt's hands on approach to changing the cutlure in the NYPD.

Excellent book that is very readable/listenable. I have read several TR books and thoroughly enjoyed the detailed material focusing on TR's time as a Police Commissioner and the insight it provided into big city machine politics. While this book is entertaining, it is not a historical fiction nor is it intended to read like a novel. Bottom line, this book kept me entertained during 15hrs of commute and exercise time and I was smarter at the end; it was worth my credit and I have recommended to others.

This one is in the middle. I enjoyed it, but it isn't the best I have listened to. Great story, great narrator.

The character of Theodore Roosevelt. I believe he must have been OC/D. Everything to him was either black or white. He could never do anything half way. A remarkable man.

The scene when the policeman arrested everyone at this one bar, and then the judge releasing everyone (about 200 men and women) except the owner. Craziness!

Theodore Roosevelt really wanted to do what was right. He wanted to obey all the laws. Unfortunately, no one else in New York City wanted him to enforce the Sunday laws of no liquor. It was a poor man's only day they could drink and relax and he just couldn't understand why they wanted that. A case of a rich man being way out of touch with regular working people.

If only the Temperance movement had taken to heart the lesson from New York City trying to regulate morality maybe the Prohibition era would have never happened. What if???

TR, at age 35. left a comfortable job in Civil Service in 1895 to become the chief commissioner of New York's police department. He was ill-prepared for the bureaucratic tangles that faced him. He set out to inforce ALL laws and clean up a corrupt police department. The city was one of the countries most violent, crooked, crime-ridden place. Other biographers has skipped this two year period of TR's life but Zack covers it completely. The book bogs down in too much statistics of crime therefore is an overkill trying to prove that the corruption and crime was rampant. The book does point out the crucial period in the evolution of TR. The job did much for TR in that he learned the impracticality of bitter feuds, the dangers of impulsive crusades and toughened his skin and established him as a reformer. If you can get through the repetition of data the book provides an interesting look at New York City in the 1890's and the making of TR. Joe Ochman did a good job with the narration.

I had high hopes for this book, but it didn't really deliver for me. It comes across as a rather dry, stale retelling of the events that took place - like a history textbook - when it could have been so much more.
It's an interesting slice of American history, and the narrator does a good job, but I wasn't that engaged with the story, and never really cared about any of the characters.

Quite a detailed view of how Teddy Roosevelt spent a couple of years trying to "clean up" the Big Apple. The politics of the day are tightly woven-in throughout the story. No doubt about it, the guy was on a mission.

I've always been fascinated with the life of T.R. But this book, although deep in facts, is a little boring. Not the author's fault. It's just a very boring period in the life of Teddy.
He comes off sounding more like Rudolph Guilliani in his pre-9-11 years, then he does when he took on the big corporations and the Anti-trust battles at the turn of the century.
Overall, kind of blah.

It read like a history book that was poorly written.

Somewhat

Voice wasn't bad but no inflection

no didn't get through it