Wiley's Refrain

October 17, 2005
In Waiwaiole's uneven third novel to feature poker player Wiley (after 2004's Wiley's Shuffle
), the murder of Ronnie, a promising young jazz musician, takes Wiley to the big island of Hawaii, the land of his ancestors. Much of this hard-boiled noir thriller, however, is set in Portland, Ore., where Wiley and his brutally competent partner, Leon, search for the motive behind the murder—and for vengeance. Fans of the series will get their fill of tough-guy talk and lurid violence, along with some pretty strange sex, but new readers may be baffled by the intricacies of Wiley's backstory. Three different narrators can make an already opaque plot (why, exactly, are Wiley and Leon so eager to avenge Ronnie's murder?) hard to follow. A few well-drawn characters—notably Danny, a young thug with a too healthy ego—and some powerful scenes only partly compensate for the story's lack of momentum.