In April, I read Bad Chili (1997), another Hap and Leonard by
Joe Lansdale. I enjoyed it, but the excitement of the new
find was beginning to pall, so I switched gears before
getting to the fourth one I had borrowed from the library.
I'll get back to it eventually.
I raced through two more by Sallis, The Eye of the Cricket
(1997) and Moth (1993). I read them out of order, as I got
them on ILL, but I'm not convinced it really matters with
regard to the overall storyline. In each book, the narrative
jumps repeatedly forward and backward. Perhaps it would be
worthwhile in terms of character development. This is another
author I learned about here whom I am now recommending to all
my crime/mystery-reading friends. The excitement is not
beginning to pall.
I've always liked Thomas Perry and was pleased to find a
"new" title, Death Benefits (2001). It's kind of an update on
The Wreckers, with a hint of Harvest Home. The "detectives"
are a consultant hired by an insurance company to find the
agent suspected of being behind a major fraud, her sort-of
ex-boyfriend (an accountant) conscripted to help, and an
expert in illegal computer searches. I don't believe they are
series characters, but I can see the potential.
Next I read my first by Max Allan Collins, who is often
mentioned here. I hadn't realized that the Nate Heller series
is historical fiction. Majic Men (1999) is set in the
Washington of the late forties. Private detective Nate is
hired by a paranoid government official who thinks people are
out to get him. At first Nate decides that he's just crazy,
but eventually comes to the conclusion that his fears are
founded. One of the main elements of the story is the Roswell
flying-saucer crash. As Nate investigates, he starts to
believe it might really have occurred. At the end, he comes
up with what seems like a fairly plausible explanation. Many
of the characters, even the main ones, are actual historical
figures, and historical records are cited. Collins discusses
his sources in an afterword. Very interesting.
I've just finished Denise Mina's second novel, Exile (2000).
I really liked Garnethill and was a little let down by this
follow-up. It is very bleak and though it seems to end on a
hopeful note, I wasn't convinced. Maureen O'Donnell is
persuaded by her best friend, Leslie, to go looking for a
woman who has disappeared from a battered women's shelter.
When she turns up dead, and it starts to look like her
husband never beat her, the plot thickens. About half the
book is set in Glasgow and the other half in London. In
Garnethill, Maureen was recovering from a nervous breakdown
related to the sexual abuse she suffered as a child at the
hands of her father. Now the long-absent father is back in
town and she seems to be slipping into a depression. She
makes many terrible decisions. For instance, she gets really
drunk by herself in a really rough bar, then tells everyone
her name and flashes around a photograph she has been advised
to destroy. Bad idea. One thing that bothered me ! was that
Leslie, whom I remembered as a tough cookie in motorcycle
leathers, is now in love, kind of wishy-washy and wearing
low-cut sweaters. It kind of bothers Maureen, too. I am still
on the lookout for the next Mina book, though.
Even more recently, I whipped through Elmore Leonard's Riding
the Rap (1995), a fairly typical one of his in which a U.S.
marshall outwits some none-too-swift miscreants. He's a good
character, and so is the psychic who helps the bad guys, but
it wasn't spectacular.
Right now I'm getting to the end of a Kate Martinelli
mystery, the first, by Laurie R. King: A Grave Talent (1993).
Kate is a detective in the San Jose police department trying
to track down a serial killer of six-year-old girls. She's a
lesbian who thinks coming out of the closet will damage her
career, so her private life, while closely guarded from other
officers, is another story element. This isn't strictly
speaking a police procedural--a lot of technical details are
glossed over--but the case is being solved by good solid
police work: lots of interviews, timing tests and logic. I
have to force myself to put it down after lunch and get back
to work. I've got another Martinelli waiting. I read a much
more recent one last year, Night Work, that was very good.
King also writes a series featuring Mary Russell and her
mentor, Sherlock Holmes, which I have been avoiding, but
which get good reviews from those who like that sort of
thing.
Well, that's a couple of month's worth.
Karin
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