Tag: crime

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T is for Trespass

A little different style of book for Grafton this time around, but it was great. Her standard beginning is to introduce a specific mystery and rehash Kinsey’s life story for people reading things out of order. Not so this time. Grafton actually starts the book with some third person narrative about one of the antagonists and returns to it frequently. All this, while Kinsey is working a few non-mystery type of projects.

There are three distinct story lines, but one dominates. I don’t recall Grafton juggling that many big stories. The main story includes one of the most sinister villains that I recall from any of Grafton’s books and she ups the ante with a graphic action scene near the end. The villain is a thieving, malicious home care nurse who lands the job of taking care of Kinsey’s 90 year old neighbor Gus (not Henry, who lives on the other side of Kinsey’s place). No other villain has had quite that proximity to Kinsey and this one really hits close to home.

Listen to me, I’m on a first name basis with these characters and I’m talking about them like I know them. It feels kind of weird, but I’m really engrossed in this series. They just keep getting better.

** PLOT KILLERS FOLLOW **

I’m not sure I’m all that enamored with how Grafton ended this one. After a very exciting double climax, there were still a lot of loose ends. Oh, she cleaned them up, but she did it on more of a retrospective basis, which at times seem kind of hurried and contrived. It could have ended with some loose ends for all I care.

But listen to me, I couldn’t put it down. Once she got rolling late in the book I just blasted through it. I’m not sure I’m going to be able to wait to read “U.”

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The Chicago Way

I wish I could remember the route I’ve taken to each book in my life. Something led me to find this book on my Kindle, but I can’t recall what. Harvey writes crime novels based in Chicago, so any number of reasons could have been involved. And for some reason it was only $1.59, which plants this squarely in the “no-brainer” category.

I enjoyed it. It was funny and full of detailed Chicago stuff. The mystery was solid also. It’s the story of an ex-cop, Michael Kelly, who’s now in business for himself. He’s in his office one day and a former partner walks in and asks him for some help on an old case that was never fully resolved. Then the former partner ends up dead shortly thereafter.

We have crooked cops and lawyers. We have two strong women, one of whom is a love interest and the other a close childhood friend. And we have a serial killer on death row in southern Illinois with some secrets. We also get a solid twist in the end that I didn’t see coming (probably my own fault).

Kelly is a Cubs fan and at times Harvey tries to make it a little too wry and gritty. But it’s endearing, here’s a scene:

I found my way over to the concession stand, stepped inside, and ordered a red-hot drug through the garden. The Packer fans stood nearby, eating a double of order of cheese fries. Each.

I liked it.

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S is for Silence

This is another edition of Grafton’s alphabet mystery series. I enjoy these books on so many different levels. First of all, each book stands alone as a solid mystery novel. Second, I like the main character a lot, mostly because she is so different from the characters in other stories I read. And finally, I really anticipate a fervor as we near the last few books.

I’m missing out on the Lost fervor (and any final episode fervor for that matter) because I don’t watch any “shows.” This series of books, for me at least, replaces that type of fun. Oh, it’s a little different I guess. I mean, the last episode in the life of Kinsey Millhone is still probably 5 years away. A year between episodes would probably blunt a lot of the fervor for most people. Which is probably why I don’t have anybody to discuss this with.

What do you do? I sort through it internally, better know as entertaining myself. But this anticipation stuff is only one aspect of the fun. Besides that, the mysteries are great. For this one, I’m making notes at the 60% point so I can document that I figured it out.

** PLOT KILLERS FOLLOW **

I’m writing this just past half-way through the book. Here’s my prediction: I think the murder was a plot, amongst no less than four characters, to rid the world of the victim because she had dirt on everybody. I make this prediction because of the retrospective scene in the bar where at least two of them sparred with the soon-to-be victim and others involved were watching.

So there you have it. That ends the real-time aspect of this post.

But alas, I was wrong! However, my prediction added another dimension to the fun of this mystery and it really had me jamming through it this weekend.

Part of me wants to go out right now and buy “T” and “U” and blast through them. But what’s the rush? I’m betting that “V” won’t come out until end of year or early next so that’s the bottleneck. Hmmm…if I did press on right now, it would allow me to read the Amazon reviews and discussions in real time, which would be cool.

I’m not sure what my plan is. I’m not caught up in any of my series so maybe I need to get there with one of them at least. It’s quite a quandary, but I got bigger fish to fry right now. Plus, I have some good biographies and business books that I’m looking forward to cracking through. Maybe a break from fiction will do me good.

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A Morning for Flamingos

This is book four in the Dave Robicheaux series. Robicheaux is fifty plus and it’s early in the series, yet he’s already quit two police departments: New Orleans and New Iberia (where his home is). Now, early in this novel, he takes a leave from the New Iberia sheriff’s department after getting shot transporting a prisoner. There are still like 15 books left in this series but I’m not sure if there are enough law enforcement offices left for him to quit.

I’m joking a little. I love Burke’s writing, his main character, and this series – and going over the top is part of the deal. He puts the reader on the edge early and keeps them there throughout. His main character gets shot and punched a lot, and the love interests seem to come out of the woodwork (this time it’s Robicheaux’s high school sweetheart, whom we haven’t been introduced too yet). Throw in some really bizarre descriptions of drunk demons and sprinkle in an adopted daughter who the reader has good reason to fear for, and you have an all-out assault on your senses.

Here is a classic example of Robicheaux confronting his demons:

But to be honest, the real purpose in my physical regimen was to induce as much fatigue in my body as possible. Morpheus’ gifts used to come to me in bottles, Beam and black Jack Daniel’s, straight up with a frosted schooner of Jax on the side, while I watched the rain pour down in the neon glow outside the window of an all-night bar not far from the Huey Long Bridge. In a half hour I could kick open a furnace door and fling into the flames all the snakes and squeaking bats that lived inside of me. Except the next morning they would writhe with new life in the ashes and come back home, stinking and hungry. (page 55, paperback)

That should give you good feel of the darkness in these books. It’s clear that Robicheaux will be exorcising a lot of demons over the next 15 or so books. I’m looking forward to it.

** PLOT KILLERS FOLLOW **

Things were wrapped up a little too tidy this time around, which surprised me a little. His old partner Clete makes an appearance and I think they are going to be seeing each other a little more because Clete is now set up as a private detective in New Orleans. And, as I mentioned, his high school sweetheart also makes an appearance and ends up marrying Robicheaux. My guess is that some tragedy will befall her over the next few books because she’s already set up with lupus (although it’s under control).

He also saves a “gangster with a heart” by making it appear that he died so he could run off with his sick kid to Mexico. In the last few pages, Robicheaux receives a letter from the gangster who is safely set up and living the good life. Sure, it’s kind of formulaic, that’s fine. We’ll certainly see this guy again.

This book had a ton of New Orleans in it. Plenty of trips to Cafe Du Monde and even a side trip to a LSU vs Ole Miss football game. He even mentions the Irish Channel neighborhood in New Orleans, which is also mentioned by Anne Rice in a book I was reading at the same time. What a coincidence!

I made a note to buy the next one in the series, A Stained White Radiance. Looking forward to it.

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R is for Ricochet

Grafton is not having any problems keeping me interested in the continuing adventures of her private investigator Kinsey Millhone. There are a few new developments this time around. First of all, Grafton throws in a lot of material about Kinsey’s landlord/neighbor Henry and his quirky family. But that’s not all.

I’m noticing a straying from the grittiness. Kinsey is wearing more makeup, gettin’ mo’ lovin’, and buying more clothes than ever before. It could just be the nature of this book, in which there isn’t a mystery that she’s engaged to resolve, per se.

Grafton is 69 and still appears to be going strong. I have three books to get caught up then I’ll finish them up as she writes them. That should be fun. She writes one about every year or two, so she’s gotta live to be about mid-70’s. Here’s a great interview at Powell’s where Grafton says that she is going to name the z book “Z” is for Zero.

I’m anticipating the run-up to the last book, that should be fun. She is noncommittal on continuing the series after that.

It’s so relaxing reading her books. I don’t really think about what I want her books to be like. I don’t say, “oh, I want to learn more about her family,” or “damn, I wish the villains were more sinister.” I just let these books happen and enjoy them. I have other interests/leisure activities that aren’t quite so relaxing, like college football and golf. Those have a different type of fulfillment.

Keep it up Sue.

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Black Cherry Blues

I’m starting to get it. I didn’t get it at first when I read The Neon Rain about two years ago. I said, “It’s quite dramatic and over the top. A little too much so, that’s why I say the jury is still out on this series.” But now I’m hooked on Burke and the jury is in; I will continue to hammer through Burke’s crime series and I’m becoming a big fan of the main character, Dave Robicheaux.

I wonder where Burke gets all the character traits for the dark and tormented Robicheaux. According to his bio, Burke lives in Missoula, MT and New Iberia, LA, which are the very locations that this novel takes place. So I’m guessing that he has melded together some local characters and himself. Grafton does this I think, but her style and main character are a lot different (but there are similarities). I like reading the the author biographies and sorting through these things. I just found out that Burke has a daughter named Alafair, which is the name of the child Robicheaux adopted in his second book. This, coupled with the setting, means that there’s a lot of Burke in Robicheaux.

That’s cool. Things like that bring me closer to the characters, the books, and the authors, making it an extended reading experience, so to speak. It just makes the pursuit more fun.

Burke’s novels throw some variety into my crime reading. So many crime novels have a single, childless, independent, often smart-alecky protagonist (at least the ones I read do). Robicheaux kind of conforms to this caricature. He’s a widower now and his daughter is adopted. But he’s not a smart alec. And he’s not very independent; leaning mostly on his therapist, AA group, housekeeper, bait shop employee, and adopted daughter for support. But in return, he helps these people out a lot and shows them much kindness. They are often the reason why he has to unleash some brutal attacks on the bad guys of the world.

This good and evil in the extreme is very interesting. It’s almost unnerving because the people he loves are often in harm’s way. Especially his daughter. In this book she needs constant protection because he hauls her along while he is tracking the bad guys. But he needs to do so because she’s a target. The tension is always there.

** SPOILER ALERT **

Luckily his daughter doesn’t get killed like his wife did in the last book (she was a one-book wife). This is only book three so I’m really anxious to watch the development of these two. It just seems that he has a lot of crimes to solve with kid in tow. It would be overly formulaic if she was threatened in book after book. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I have the next one in paperback queued up, but I probably won’t get to it until later this year.

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P is for Peril

I’m getting close to catching up with Grafton’s alphabet mystery things. They’re just frickin’ reliable and I can bank on some great fun. I would love to know how Grafton feels about her predecessors like Raymond Chandler. In certain ways she pays homage by creating a hard-boiled, lonesome, private detective embroiled in smartly woven crime novels that highlight greed, corruption, and other human frailties. But she also pokes fun a little and makes things lighter. This book made me think of some similarities and differences.

One method to deepen the persona of said private detective is to build a relationship with coffee, cigarettes, or some other sort of vice. For example, in The Long Goodbye Chandler often had Marlowe making coffee. Real good coffee. I seem to recall rich descriptions of a simple cup and it was easy for me to picture Marlowe hunched over a cup of coffee, reading the LA Times, sorting through the next steps in solving whatever mystery was unfolding.

In much the same way, Grafton has Millhone eating McDonald’s all the time. Junk food, it’s another vice. But it allows Grafton to throw in some humor. Early on, Millhone has this run-in with breakfast.

I stopped off at McDonald’s and ordered coffee and a couple of Egg McMuffins. I needed the comfort of junk food as well as the nourishment, if that’s what you want to call it. I munched while I drove, eating with such eagerness I bit my own index finger.

It’s easy to picture a Millhone eating in her car while she’s ruminating on the details of the case. Grafton’s methods always keep it a little lighter, but I think it’s just as effective for character development and it strikes the right chords with me for the most part. I don’t think Millhone is supposed to be as dark as Marlowe, and she isn’t.

But both Millhone and Marlowe are alike in that both of them shun the societal norms of marriage, kids, and settling down. Recall that passage I talked about where Marlowe goes on a tirade against any other life but the one he is living. Take a read, I excerpted it in The Long Goodbye post. Millhone has a moment kind of like that when she goes to interview someone for her case. She’s interviewing a woman at the woman’s home, where there’s a handful of screaming, rambunctious kids. The screaming is so loud that Millhone can’t concentrate on the conversation. She thinks:

I tried to concentrate on what Blanche was saying, but all I could think about was that even at my age, a tubal ligation probably wasn’t out of the question.

So, much like Chandler, Grafton crafts Millhone in a manner that you never have to worry about her giving up this detective thing. Maybe we’re wrong though, who knows, maybe at “Z,” Millhone will have a husband and a kid and just ride off into the sunset. Something to look forward to I guess. That would certainly close out Millhone.

Hillerman died a few months ago and I feel like he never closed out his characters. But I may be wrong because I didn’t read the last few with that thought in mind because I didn’t realize how close to death he was. I’ll reread them all when I retire.

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The Long Goodbye

We’ve already talked about One Book, One Chicago. My wife just checked it out from the library, unbeknownst to me. She let me read it first. Thanks honey.

The Long Goodbye is private investigator Philip Marlowe’s first person account of his run-in with cops and gangsters after he assists a down-on-his-luck acquaintance, Terry Lennox. Marlowe just gives Lennox a ride to Tijuana, that’s all. But shortly thereafter Marlowe finds out that Lennox’s millionaire wife has been bludgeoned to death with a bronze statue in their guest house. Marlowe suspected nothing less anyhow, oh well.

This is gritty. It’s like sleeping on sandpaper. It makes L.A. Confidential feel like a romantic comedy; makes the City of Angels feel cold and rainy all the time. It’s full of dark jail cells, cops that slug you, and dry, humorless commentary on the state of the justice system in Los Angeles. And paragraphs like this (page 249, chapter 35):

The other part of me wanted to get out and stay out, but this was the part I never listened to. Because if I ever had I would have stayed in the town where I was born and worked in the hardware store and married the boss’s daughter and had five kids and read them the funny paper on Sunday morning and smacked their heads when they got out of line and squabbled with the wife about how much spending money they were to get and what programs they could have on the radio or TV set. I might even have got rich – small-town rich, an eight room house, two cars in the garage, chicken every Sunday and the Reader’s Digest on the living room table, the wife with a cast-iron permanent and me with a brain like a sack of Portland cement. You take it, friend. I’ll take the big sordid dirty crooked city.

Just look at that second sentence in the cited passage. It’s huge, but it feels the same now as it did when I first read it. Marlowe could not survive outside of the LA trenches. But in the trenches, he rises above the greed, corruption, lies, and ugliness associated with the city.

Chandler certainly got a load off his chest with this rant. It’s a glimpse into the psyche of Philip Marlowe and probably Chandler also. When I read it Gail was a few feet away and I couldn’t wait to have her to take a look. She was impressed. I really hope she reads it so we can talk about it.

This is such a cool book. The ending rocked. The title makes perfect sense. If you have any affinity for the crime novel, give this one a whirl.

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Heaven’s Prisoners

This is book two of Burke’s crime novel series. I wasn’t so sure that I was completely sold on Burke when I read The Neon Rain last year, but when I reflected on it at the end of the year it was clear that I was going to press forward with the series.

This is more crime noir than just crime. The main character, Dave Robicheaux, is a dark and self-destructive alcoholic ex-cop. But he doesn’t sit in a dark room and brood, he actually has someone who loves him and a relatively stress free life (he runs a bait shop about an hour away from New Orleans). Stress gets added though in short order when he and his wife see a plane go down in the bayou while they’re out relaxing. They are lake people so they slap on the diving gear and manage to save a young girl from certain death. But the other stuff they see in the submerged plane leads Robicheaux back into the world of law enforcement, and puts him and his family in grave danger.

**PLOT KILLERS FOLLOW**

Burke throws tension into his writing more than any of the crime writers I read. Every time Robicheaux leaves his house I think someone is going to come in and kill his family. And that’s what happens. About a quarter of the way through the book, Robicheaux steps out in the middle of the night to clear his head and two hoods break down his front door and blow his wife away. This sends him on another bender, described by Burke in searing detail. I was shocked by the alcoholic binge in the first book, and this one was just as bone jarring.

So Robicheaux seeks vengeance. While doing so, he reforms a drugged-out hooker and takes care of the young girl he rescued from the plane. The violence carried out between Robicheaux and the bad guys is strongly in contrast with the loving relationship between Robicheaux and the women in his life. It’s a vengeance story and a love story. Burke plays both almost to the extreme. Sometimes it’s an absurd extreme and it’s almost too much to cover in 274 pages.

I can’t wait to read the next one, mostly to see if they pick the storyline up with the ex-hooker and the young girl. Plus, how does Burke weave this guy’s life into crime dramas? He was a cop in book one, then quit. In book two he was an ex-cop that got deputized then quit again, so what’s next? Does he go private?

Like I said, pretty extreme. But good stuff.

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O is for Outlaw

Grafton just has the mystery/crime novel wired in at this point (this point being 1999, when the book was published). Just trust me. Start at “A” and bang through ’em. You may have to give them time, but once you get into them, they never disappoint.

The enjoyment level disparity between a mystery/crime thriller and an international intrigue/espionage thriller has never been greater for me. It seems like so long ago when I used to buy the new Tom Clancy in hardcover the day it came out. Those days are long gone and I’ve really turned my attention the last few years to the crime novel.

I noticed a few newish things happening with main character Kinsey Millhone. First of all, Kinsey’s love for McDonald’s is bordering on an obsession. I think there were three occasions in this book where Kinsey had a QP (Quarter Pounder) with cheese, fries, and a Coke. This is somewhat odd to me because I would think the Santa Theresa (Santa Barbara) dweller would have more of a love for In-n-Out Burger. But keep in mind that this book is set in 1986, so maybe they didn’t have those back then.

Also newish is Kinsey’s interest in weight training. I’m betting that Grafton herself just discovered weights and probably decided to write it into this book. If you look on Grafton’s website you can see from the office photo tour that she has a serious weight room with plenty of machines specifically sized for women. This dynamic of author and main character mimicking one another is really fascinating to me.

Finally, each novel appears to be showing a more profane Kinsey and slightly more graphic violence. Kinsey is freer with the f-bomb and really getting in touch with her edgy side. And (PLOT KILLER) in the end the villain actually gets decapitated in a bizarre incident with front-loader.

This novel has Kinsey working on her own behalf by following up on the shooting of her ex-husband. The mystery is solid and the action is tight. The woman is a master of her craft. A master I tell you.