I chaired the Shamus committee this year for Best First
Novel. Truluck's book is wonderfully hard-boiled and full of
what is becoming a Florida tradition: whacky oddballs. He
uses the smart aleck P. I. without creating an anachronism or
a caricature. When I reviewed it, I thought folks who like
the early Crais novels and Vachss would like this.
I can also recommend the other nominees to this group. The
self-published Resurrection Angel by William Mize is a
hard-boiled P. I. delight. The Chris Larsgaard book, The Heir
Hunter, is more of a cross country P. I. adventure novel. The
two lawyer novels are quite different. This group would love
the big city drug addicted lawyer in Lost Girls by Andrew
Pyper when he gets trapped in a small town and a very spooky
old murder case. Brigham's Day by John Gates is reminiscent
of James Lee Burke, and showed great power.
It was a great year to be a judge.
Best, GWN Gary Warren Niebuhr P. O. Box 341218 Milwaukee, WI
53234
piesbook@execpc.com http://www.execpc.com/~piesbook/piescatalog.html
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