I finished SHADOW OF THE DAHLIA by Jack Bludis yesterday. It's a workmanlike mystery set around the Black Dahlia murder. Bludis's Rick Page is a practical P.I. who sometimes sticks his nose where other P.I.s won't. That's why he always has a job.
Once upon a time reading Ross Macdonald, I found Lew Archer didn't have enough personality. I'd heard Macdonald intended him as a lens through which to look at the world. I liked Macdonald's writing fine. I just wished his P.I. would stand out more. Since that time, I've seen many mystery protagonists with overly complicated backgrounds (e.g. Harlan Coben's Myron Bolitar, former college basketball standout turned law student who did some work for the FBI, then opened a sports agency) many of which have made me yearn for simpler times.
Jack Bludis delivers that atmosphere and a solid story minus the hype.
I'm currently 30 pages into OPEN AND SHUT by David Rosenfelt. I'd been avoiding this series, having heard it was a lot like Coben's Bolitar series. (I actually find the Bolitar books compulsively readable. I just didn't want to read more of the same from a different author if I could help it.) Rosenfelt's lawyer protag, Andy Carpenter, has Bolitar's love of hometown and family, but Carpenter's humor is less offbeat, which, so far, has been a plus.
4 comments:
I haven't read Rosenfelt, but know someone who works in the same area that Rosenfelt's character does. He tore the book apart.
What was the someone's beef, location accuracy? I can't speak to that, but the protag has a natural, flowing voice that makes me want to read more. Similar to Coben and Parker in that way.
The only potential trip-up so far is that the book is written partially in the present tense (e.g. "The next morning, I oversleep. I take an eight-second shower, throw on the same clothes I wore yesterday, and make it to court three minutes late.").
I don't know about location differences, but actually I think it was more he gets NJ laws wrong. There is no District Attorney in NJ, I forget what they call them... prosecuting attorney, I think... But little details like that.
Ah. I may be able to suspend disbelief in the legal innacuracies, but I understand how they upset professionals. Rosenfelt is a film guy, not a lawyer himself.
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