The Gangs of Zion is an interesting read. Sadly it isn’t so much about the gang activity in Utah but more about the culture of bring a black cop in the 80’s and early 90’s in Utah. Fascinating for sure and a good read. Just not exactly what I thought it would be about. Yes I did expect to see a great deal about the future of the times and the difficulties being a policeman in that era. However, I did expect more in-depth information on the actual gang activities and how it started was prosecuted and the like.

They lack of information did not deter my finishing the book because as I stated it’s still a fascinating read with good information about the time. I think anyone interested in the rap era of the .80’s and 90’s would definitely enjoy it m.

When I think of Utah, I have the image of a very heterogeneous, middle to upper middle class white community full of devout Mormons. Something along the first 2 - 3 minutes of the musical The Book of Mormon. Ron Stallworth brings to light a different Utah, one where things are not so shiny and bright. As a Black police officer, he stood out on the police force. As an officer determined to shed light on the gang problems of Utah, he became an inconvenient expert. Stallworth explains how he came to be a police officer in Utah, and how he ended up becoming an expert on gang intervention strategies and gangsta rap in the 90s.

Stallworth is clear and forthright when it comes to stating his opinions and recounting his experiences. Some of those opinions might surprise you. The refusal of politicians and community leaders to acknowledge the existence of a systemic gang issue and deliberate attempts to stop Stallworth’s progress is unlikely to surprise you. Stallworth had allies and supporters, but his (many) detractors are one of the things that left a lasting impression on me when I consider the tone of the book.

I definitely recommend this book, I found it a propulsive read that it was hard to walk away from. Stallworth’s writing style is conversational and down to earth.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher for an honest review.

Hmmm, well there wasn’t much in this book about The Gangs of Zion, other than that they exist. Instead this is a rather pompous autobiography about a black cop in a gang unit in Salt Lake City, Utah in the 1990s.

In Utah, being black was unusual and being a black cop was unbelievable for the white males in charge of the state. That cop, who is also the book’s author, tried to tell his superiors, seemingly alone, that gangs were settling into Utah. No, crips and bloods couldn’t infiltrate our nice homogeneous LDS community, they thought. They were wrong.

In the book, the author describes how he used gangsta rap lyrics to see how gangs operate. He needed to use lyrics rather than personal experience because he has never been associated with gangs IRL previously either—just like the white guys running his department. He is their gang expert solely based on the color of his skin, which is just blatantly racist.

Ultimately, The Gangs of Zion is a fair autobiography of a black male cop who had to fight the patriarchy of both a white male government and an omnipresent religion in a state where black people are looked down upon. Could he make his voice heard? However, the book basically uses gangs more as a setting rather than as a major plot arc so the title is definitely a misnomer. 3 stars.

Thanks to NetGalley and Legacy Lit for providing me with an advanced review copy.

The Gangs of Zion was a fascinating read, I had no clue about this area of crime! Writing was propulsive.

I was happy to read this book when I saw it on NetGalley . I have watched the movie BlacKkKlansman and I really enjoyed it.
This was pretty interesting to read!

The Gangs of Zion is an interesting story but it is no BlackkKlansman and Ron Stallworth creates an interesting story that never really stayed with me after I was finished with it.

This is a hard book to review. On one hand I learned a lot about gangs in Utah. Not a lot of knowledge, just that there were gangs in Mormon country.
I learned about the Jobs Corps and how that seemed to bring the gangs into Utah.
I learned about gansta' rap and why the police needed to learn about it.

However, I didn't learn what efforts the author really did to combat the gangs.

I read a ton of personal bravado from the author to the gangs and to his superiors, but none of that was to combat gangs.

I felt that this was a disjointed book that dealt with a ton of different issues from gangs, the Mormon Church, gansta' rap, gangsters, political fighting and fighting amongst police brass.

I wish that the author had stayed on topic and would have talked about how to combat gangs, how to recognize gangs, etc.
This was a meandering book, while entertaining did NOT enlighten me on the actual gangs of zion.

I was excited to read this book. I saw the movie BlacKkKlansman, but had not read the book, and so I went into this without knowing Ron Stallworth’s writing style.

I found the premise to be interesting, and I enjoyed learning about the link between the gang activity in Utah and the Job Corps program. I think it’s interesting how Stallworth was able to learn more about gangs through studying rap lyrics/music. However, I do feel like this book could have been significantly shorter and maybe needed some edits. A majority of this book discussed various speaking engagements that Stallworth was invited to in great detail, many of them being very similar in nature. It felt like every other chapter was a recap of Mr. Stallworth’s accolades, or a list of how many people respected him. He often did this when writing about someone who he clashed with, almost as if to justify his position.

As someone who is from a police family, I understand Mr. Stallworth’s frustration with knowing what needs to be done and wanting to make a difference, but being constantly shut down due to politics and agendas. That being said, there would be whole chapters dedicated to someone who the author felt slighted by, and I didn’t feel like it was always needed.

There were some accounts that were put in that seemed to be included just to give the reader a sense of how intimidating the author was/is. Some of it was difficult to picture how this could have happened in real life (walking into a bar full of sk*nheads and fully taunting them to their face, but walking out without anyone fighting him, for example).

Overall, I think a lot of my personal difficulties with the book boiled down to writing style/author’s voice, but I think anyone who is interested in the culture of the time (80s/90s), especially the rap music of that era, would enjoy this.

In this book, Ron Stallworth (of Black Klansman fame) shares more about his career. Stallworth moves to Utah and begins to work with gangs among the members of the LDS faith.

I was really excited to read this book, but I felt we didn’t really get any conclusive thoughts about Stallworth’s time in these roles. I would have loved to hear more about the Mormon gang members and how their extracurricular activities affected their temple recommendations, etc. but the focus remained wide and vague.