ALL THE SINNERS BLEED by S. A. Cosby

True madness is like an aura around someone. It glows blue like the flame from a gas fire. That madness can spread. Become like a religion for the lost.

With this new novel, Cosby is 4 for 4. He continues to kick down the doors with guns blazing as he releases banger after banger in the crime fiction genre. 

Being an investigative cop drama, I was a bit worried that it would feel a bit stale as the detective mystery has gotten a little worn out to me. But I should have know better. This feels very fresh as it follows Titus Crown, the first black sheriff of the small Virginia county of Charon, as he not only tries to get a lid on the racial unrest in his town but also hunts a terrifying serial killer on a rampage.

Cosby does everything right here, starting with the portrayal and build-up of the serial killer. The killer and their actions here are seriously bone-chilling and serves to maintain a potent layer of tension throughout the whole book. I was also impressed by how well-developed the community was, and loved how present Titus's deputies were, showing how this investigation is not a one-man show and how much he can't do his job without them. There's a romantic figure from Titus's past that pops up halfway through the book and I was really worried that this would turn into a silly love triangle, but I loved the mature way it was handled, without resorting to soap opera antics. One of the author's strengths is a tendency to never oversell, never hit the reader over the head, but efficiently present just the right amount of emotional development and social commentary to keep the reader truly engaged. He's like a storytelling gymnast, finding the right balance. 

GRADE: A-

MY DARKEST PRAYER by S.A. Cosby

For a while, I've been staying away from most "detective" novels because I began to find them repetitive and not fulfilling anymore. I longed for something more than just solving a mystery over and over. But every now and then, a standard mystery comes along and impresses me! I read Blacktop Wasteland by S.A. Cosby recently and I really enjoyed it and sought out his previous debut novel. I enjoyed this one just as much and I can confidently say that he truly is a rising star to watch. 

This book is armed with a cool, collected protagonist, who's pretty badass but not ridiculously so, tortured but not in a forced, clichéd way. Nate Waymaker works as an undertaker in his small Virginia town, but has been hired by the local church ladies to look into the mysterious death of a clergyman with a shaky past. The strange thing is that Cosby falls into many tropes here, with a structure lifted right out of Devil In a Blue Dress and with a hero who seems to be able to get every woman in the world drop their panties for him. But at the same time there was something that felt genuine about the novel, as if I was reading these clichés for the first time. The characters jump off the page, the dialogue is rich and grounded, and I enjoyed witnessing this author crafting a good story while finding his voice.

GRADE: B-

THE DAMAGE DONE by Hilary Davidson

I was really impressed by Hilary Davidson's work after reading her suspenseful and surprising novel, Blood Always Tells, and her short story collection, The Black Widow Club. She's got a real knack for crafting twisty thrillers and her work is objectively entertaining. But this debut novel, the one that put her on the map, was a bit of a disappointment. And not because of her lack of talent. Some of it is because of my recent aversion to the repetitiveness inherent in standard mystery/detective novels. But much of it is also because it just got so damned boring. The stakes seem very low through most of this book, as we follow travel writer and expatriate Lily Moore as she returns to New York City to find out who murdered her sister. 

I normally gravitate toward elevated tension and high stakes, so reading about Lily wandering around asking people questions about her sister didn't really do it for me. For most of the book there's not much danger or even much intrigue, and I kept questioning why I was even reading it, unlike the other work that I've read from her, which was much more engaging. But this award-winning work was a relative hit so it might just be my taste at the moment. Davidson is still one of the better thriller writers around right now, so I'll chalk this one up to taste and possible freshman quality.

GRADE: C-

STUMPTOWN VOL. 1 by Greg Rucka

Greg Rucka crafts a really commendable hard-boiled mystery that checks off all of the right boxes. It's got twists, turns, reveals, fist-fights, a missing girl, good dialogue, and most importantly, a memorable protagonist. That detective here is Dexedrine "Dex" Parios, a private dick with a gambling problem, who agrees to find the missing daughter of the local casino owner in order to get out of mounting craps debt. Thus begins "The Case of the Girl who Took Her Shampoo But Left Her Mini."

Rucka is well-known for creating memorable female characters, and Dex is definitely someone that I would rush out to read more about. She's smart and tough but she's constantly unlucky and prone making bad decisions, and is always getting her ass beat down for some reason or another. And with her, there's no need for much backstory. We learn all we need to know from her determination to find answers, her bravery in the face of danger, the way she interacts with her brother Ansel with Down Syndrome or the way that she interacts with the police chief she had an affair with. Rucka shows how much info you can get across with a few well-placed bits of dialogue. And Matthew Southworth's art could've been a little more refined but definitely fits. This was a good one, buying the next!

GRADE: A-

GOTHAM CENTRAL OMNIBUS by Ed Brubaker and Greg Rucka

You know that Gotham City is a pretty screwed up place when a story focusing solely on the city's cops is just as compelling as the ones focusing on it's cape-wearing, billionaire vigilante. That's the case in this multiple award winning series by now superstar writers Brubaker and Rucka (splitting the writing duties between the day shift and night shift, and rotating story arcs). The detectives of the GCPD Major Crimes Unit are the stars here, in a constant struggle to navigate the dangerous criminal world of Gotham, all while dealing with sometimes playing second fiddle to a crazy person that runs around in a bat costume, overshadows their efforts, and undermines their authority, leaving them to constantly clean up his damn mess.

I loved seeing the Bat-world from this point of view of regular Joe's just trying to make a living: whether it's seeing the lasting effects that a super-weapon like Mr. Freeze's gun would have on a person, the day-to-day bureaucracy behind who will turn the switch on the Bat-Signal, or seeing how the mad chaos caused by The Joker could put the fear of god in a whole town.

Although I wish all of them got equal attention, all of the characters are enjoyable and well-drawn, lending to further ground the comic book atmosphere. Most of the story arcs were great but the standouts to me were:

"Soft Targets," about the unit trying to hunt down the Joker as he holds Gotham hostage during Christmas.

"Dead Robin," about the investigation of a serial killer dressing up his victims as the Boy Wonder.

"Corrigan," where Det. Renee Montoya must clear her partner's name after evidence is removed from the scene of an officer involved shooting by a corrupt forensics officer

And of course, the award-winning "Half a Life," in which Montoya's life gets turned upside down after being targeted by an unknown stalker.

This series is a must-read, and you don't need to be a Batman fan or reader to really enjoy this. The character is barely in this and only once in a while makes an appearance. It's less of a Batman book and something closer to NYPD Blue or Homicide: Life on the Street. So get on this quickly, especially if you love police procedurals!

GRADE: A-

SONGS OF INNOCENCE by Richard Aleas

If Songs of Innocence was simply another John Blake mystery, a sequel to Aleas's serviceable first novel, Little Girl Lost, it would still be a pretty good read. But it's much more than a simple sequel, outshining the first book in every conceivable way. It begins as just another detective story, with the retired Blake putting his detective hat back on to investigate the death of his classmate and lover, Dorrie Burke.

But things get darker as the book progresses, pushing Blake further and further into the abyss as he begins to discover the kind of collateral damage that his actions, his mistakes, as well as his discoveries ultimately lead to. It really is better than it has any right to be, crushing its mystery genre expectations and ascending into tragic crime opera territory. And like the best mysteries, the conclusion isn't as cut-and-dry as many would expect. 

It's hard to pinpoint exactly how the book achieves the effect that it has, but at some point I became completely engrossed! I've been tired of standard mysteries lately but this is one of the best detective stories I've read in a while, right up there with the best of Lehane, Mosley, or Lawrence Block. If you have any interest in crime or mysteries, put this one on your list.

I hadn't meant to end up this way, counting the dead, apologizing to the ghosts of the dead women I'd loved. 

But here I was, with apologies to make and so little time to make them.

GRADE: A-

BATMAN: THE COURT OF OWLS by Scott Snyder

With his first volume in the New 52 Batman rebranding, Scott Snyder brings the Caped Crusader back to the basics! I'm normally not a fan of the Batman stories that feature him going up against monsters, aliens, or other super fantasy bad guys. I gravitate towards the stories that are more grounded. So I really enjoyed Snyder's take here. In this story, Batman goes up against a secret society that has ruled Gotham from the shadows all the way throughout history. It's an organization that exists with the citizens as a myth, especially with Bruce Wayne, who seems to refuse to believe that there is a villain that has eluded him all these years, and still manages to rule his city.

I love that the story really focuses on Batman being what he started out as, a detective, going into deep investigation mode to track down the people responsible for a series of mysterious deaths in the city. I really enjoyed the focus on Gotham's history, the legacy of the Waynes, and their relationship with the Court, building more levels on the Gotham City mythology. The fact that the shadowy Court is, for the most part, grounded in reality but still feels like they could be a major threat to Batman, really sets a level of tension that really works. There are some cool ideas here and let's see what happens in the sequel!

GRADE: B+

LITTLE GIRL LOST by Richard Aleas

Richard Aleas's debut novel is a hard-boiled NY detective tale in the vein of Block's Scudder series but featuring one of the worst detectives out there. Seriously, it was kind of hilarious how this guy just couldn't get it together! He seemed to fail at even simple detective decision-making. But ultimately I think that was part of the point.

Our hero, John Blake is one half of a tiny detective agency and he is obsessed with solving the murder of his old high school sweetheart, a girl who went from pre-med studies to shaking her ass in a grimy titty bar called the Sin Factory. The story and its turns kept me fairly engaged throughout and Aleas keeps it all going at a smooth pace. But as a whole, the book never lived up to its potential, mostly due to the weak presentation of Blake's motivations. Despite a few flashbacks, I never really felt the connection between Blake and his deceased ex, a connection that's supposed to fuel Blake's dogged determination. If I really felt his emotional connection to Miranda, it could've made the events through the book and its ending much more affecting. But I still enjoyed it and it's another solid Hard Case Crime book!

GRADE: B-

COCO BUTTERNUT by Joe R. Lansdale

Wow. When did Hap and Leonard books become cozy mysteries? In this new novella, Hap, Leonard, and Brett, are hired to deliver a ransom to the kidnappers of the prized mummified remains of a dead weenie dog named Coco Butternut.

I was hoping that this might be a quick, humorous but engaging story with our heroes but it was pretty forgettable and disheartening. It's sad that the quality of the Hap and Leonard books haven't really held up in the later ones. I loved the earlier books but I think it was a big mistake to make them private investigators. The decline happened sometime after the sixth book. Now the stories have a safe, comfortable feeling, which is the complete OPPOSITE of what I look for when reading. I don't want a cozy mystery.

I miss the danger, irreverent humor, hi-jinks, and heart of books like Savage Season and The Two-Bear Mambo, back when the characters acted in the gray area of the law, struggled for work and love, fighting rabid squirrels and getting themselves into other dangerous situations. But now that they work as boring-ass detectives and Hap has found love and a daughter, I'm just not interested anymore. Why should I care? They have everything they want so the story is over.

Hap and Leonard are obviously still lovable and I love Lansdale's work but right after reading this, I immediately forgot about what happened. And this is one of four or five Hap and Leonard books that Lansdale is coming out with this year, I'm sure to capitalize off the popularity of the Sundance show. I MIGHT read the Rusty Puppy novel because I'm intigued by the police brutality concept, but I fear that these books that are being churned out will just be more of the same mediocrity.

*Recieved an advance copy from Netgalley and Subterranean Press in exchange for an honest review*

GRADE: D

BLACKSAD by Juan Díaz Canales

This volume collects the first three graphic novels in the award-winning Blacksad series, which follows the adventures of cool cat private detective John Blacksad as he navigates the 1950's, fighting crime, righting wrongs, and bedding down some sexy pussycats while he's at it. It reads like the classic hard-boiled tales of Chandler, Hammet, and Spillane, with many familiar genre conventions on display.



In the debut story, Somewhere Within The Shadows, John investigates the violent death of a beautiful actress, who also happens to be an old flame of his. It's a decent intro to the character and the world, even if it's a little too simple and pretty derivative by design.

The next story, Arctic Nation, is an overall improvement with higher stakes and deeper themes, as Blacksad searches for a missing child in a town brimming with racial tension. It's the best story in the collection.

And the final story, Red Soul, finds our hero in the middle of a conspiracy involving Communist witch-hunts and the nuclear fear that was everywhere during that time period. I like that Canales tries to expand his stories beyond just detective tales and tackle bigger issues.

Although storywise there really isn't much that's new and original here, the real star is the drop-dead gorgeous, Eisner-Award-winning artwork by Juanjo Guarnido, who laces every page with lovingly detailed watercolors. The whole thing is a real pleasure to look at.

GRADE: B+

FOUR DAYS by Iain Ryan

This rugged, hard-boiled noir is a solid debut for Australian author Iain Ryan. It's a short, moody crime novel about a broken and self-destructive Brisbane detective with one foot forcefully out the door to retirement, who decides to go all the way out on his own terms and not only solve a haunting murder case, but also confront his demons and the corruption that he's been a part of for years.

It's a gloomy, fatalist story and I really enjoyed Ryan's use of language to illuminate it's flawed hero in Jim Harris. I only wish that less time was spent on the murder mystery element and more time on Jim himself, his backstory, and his struggle for redemption. Because when Ryan does focus on Jim's internal, personal struggle, that's when the book really shines!

The late night phone calls kept coming.
Harris knew this was it this time. It didn't matter who was on the other line or what the world thought of him. He was home now and all the ghosts were interconnected. They all knew where to find him. They were all calling. And they all had the same body.
He waited.
And she eventually came.

GRADE: B-

NOWHERE by Roger Smith

A recurring theme in Roger Smith's work is the residue of Apartheid and how the South African people are still affected by those ghosts of the past. That theme is something that you can't avoid when you write in the unflinching way that Smith does about race and class conflict in modern South Africa. The ghosts of Apartheid are always lurking in the background of all of his books, but in this one, his latest, they are brought front and center.

It follows two separate investigations that ultimately connect and collide: in the first, a cop on the outs travels to Nêrens ("nowhere" in Afrikaans) to arrest a racist, white-power Afrikaaner who's created a white-only outpost in the middle of the Kalahari Desert, and in the second, after the South African President murders his #1 wife with a tribal spear, a decorated, retired cop is blackmailed into conducting a sham-investigation to cover up the murder. These two stories come together in violence and reckoning, in grand Roger Smith fashion.

The characters here are some of his best, including a fascinating and complex "villain" in the fixer Steve Bungu, who is also one of my favorite characters I've read about this year. Former cop Joe Louw is also great, a man tortured by the fact that his unavoidable past has put him in a position where he has to go against his usually unwavering ethics.

The book is also a pleasure to read from a story standpoint as I loved the way Smith meticulously laid all of the groundwork and then revealed layer after layer as the story went on until I realized that there was much more to all of it than I expected, a tale of conspiracy and revenge, of a coming to terms with past legacy in a similar way to Brian Panowich's Bull Mountain from last year.

Smith is such a great storyteller that too many readers are missing out on.

GRADE: A-

THE RIB FROM WHICH I REMAKE THE WORLD by Ed Kurtz

"All I ever wanted was a mad, mad world."

It feels like Ed Kurtz borrows a lot of this book's structure from much of Stephen King's small town work, especially 'Salem's Lot and Needful Things, where the story moves at a slow pace for the first half, introducing us to the various characters around town and getting you invested in their stories and their fate until all hell breaks loose. And that's just what happens here. Just not as effectively.

The everyday laid-back ambience in the small Arkansas town of Litchfield is shaken up with the arrival of a traveling movie roadshow. It's an educational "hygiene picture" meant to teach the kiddies and their parents about the horrors of sex but the locals discover that the roadshow's purpose is much more horrifying. We first learn about the people of Litchfield and not a whole lot happens initially, but then the story devolves into all kinds of scary shit like voodoo, werewolves, old silent films, circuses, creepy nurses, calliope music and even Hell itself.

And although Kurtz gives it a good try at first, the final half just doesn't work and all the pieces of Kurtz's story puzzle kept falling apart all the way to the end. The characters ultimately fell flat and their relationships never rang true, with some dying throwaway deaths that should have been more impactful. Attempts at a little levity and witty one-liners here and there just rang silly. There are also several good ideas in this book that should work well in any good horror tale, but they never came together as a cohesive whole for me. It felt like Kurtz had a bunch of ideas that he found interesting and tried to stitch together for this book but just couldn't get the threads to stick right. Some story points even felt forgotten about, or maybe they just weren't all that important to begin with.

also...

!!!!MINOR SPOILERS BELOW!!!!

*The hunt for Margie seemed really important at first but then everyone, including the author, seemed to just stop caring.

*What was the point of spending all that time on the hygeine picture when it's really not all that important? If the hygiene picture didn't exist at all in the book, and we just stuck with the midnight show as the roadshow, we wouldn't lose anything at all in the story.

*What was so special about Margie and Theodora, that they were spared of going crazy after watching the midnight show? And although Jojo and the priest didn't watch it, they were still under the same Barker magic, so what the hell is so special about them that they don't go crazy? And I don't buy the "a god just toyng with everyone" reason because that's cheap. There should be something to why this small group of special people that we are following are not affected.

GRADE: D

FREEDOM OF THE MASK by Robert McCammon

*Book 6 of the Matthew Corbett series*

Will Matthew Corbett ever make it back to his beloved home in the New York colony? It seems like it's been forever since he's walked along the Broad Way! And this time, Matthew has been kidnapped by an old nemesis and is transported across the sea to London to be handed over to the evil Professor Fell. Although his partner Hudson Greathouse and his scorned paramour Berry Grisby have embarked on a mission to rescue him, Matthew must rely only on his wits and cunning to navigate the dangerous city.

It's gotten to the point now that a new book in McCammon's Matthew Corbett series is guaranteed exciting entertainment and Freedom of the Mask is no different. And in this installment the danger to Matthew and his friends are greater than they've ever been! Throughout the novel I was constantly wondering how Matthew would get out of this one! As usual, McCammon's talent for plotting is one of the things that makes the book shine. Where other authors writing a new episode in a book series treat exposition from earlier books as "previously on" plot-dump summaries (one of my biggest pet peeves), McCammon always skillfully incorporates this exposition into the story in ways that never distract.And the way that he brings the many subplots together into one big web of intrigue is really cool. And the way that London is portrayed here and the atmosphere it creates is gothic and dangerous. McCammon is prone to being a little long-winded at times in his writing but because I expect that I prepare myself for it whenever I read his books.

And the heart of these books is still Matthew Corbett himself. Here, he's more world-weary than he's ever been, more adept to dealing with violence but just as smart and courageous as ever. Throughout all of his ordeals and the dire straits that he's in, he still can't control his curiosity and his desire to solve problems. Whether it's discovering the identity of the person writing the local tabloid rag, the whereabouts of a kidnapped opera singer, or who is the face behind the masked vigilante stalking London, he just can't resist a good mystery. That is the biggest strength in McCammon's character and what makes him so likable.

So if you are already a reader of the Matthew Corbett books, be prepared for another great tale where the stakes are even higher than ever by the end of the book. And if you're new to the series, don't start here, but hopefully this review piques your interest in what is possibly my favorite book series. Pure entertainment! Can't wait for the next one.

*Advanced Copy from Subterranean Press through NetGalley in exchange for honest review*

GRADE: A-

HONKY TONK SAMURAI by Joe R. Lansdale

*Book 11 of the Hap and Leonard series*

I'm disappointed. It might be my book series fatigue but the Hap and Leonard series seems like it's turned into an epic talk-fest. Because this novel was just released, I decided to jump ahead a couple books in the series and read it. The first four books in the series were exciting reads, with compelling plots, a great balance of both light-hearted humor and palpable danger, and tender bits sprinkled throughout. But as the series went on, it seemed like Lansdale started to depend solely on the humor and witty dialogue over developing a memorable story, losing the great balance that he started out with. Here, Hap and Leonard, and especially Jim Bob Luke, blabber on and on throughout the book, trying to make us laugh, which they succeed at for the most part. But while it's hard to resist the unending charm of Hap and Leonard as characters and Lansdale's talent with words, I immediately forgot what the plot was once I finished. I remember it had something to do with a mystery involving a tranny car salesman and redneck assassins that take their victims severed nutsacks as trophies...so it has that going for it!

GRADE: C+

A DANCE AT THE SLAUGHTERHOUSE by Lawrence Block

*Book 9 of the Matthew Scudder series* 

"Sometimes it's a dog-eat-dog world and the rest of the time it's the other way around."

This year I've realized that I'm not that big of a fan of standard detective series. They get too repetitive and frankly boring after a while. It nearly broke my heart when I realized that I was starting to feel the same way about this book in Lawrence Block's Scudder series, arguably the top of the detective pack. As I read, I started to notice the formula and the trends. Once again, Scudder has to explain that he's not an official private detective, once again Scudder "struggles" with what to charge people for his services, even though he always seems to settle on the same price (somewhere between $2-3K), and once again Scudder has a moment where he's unsatisfied with his work and considers giving the client a refund, even though he's never actually gone through with it yet. I guess it's designed for the casual reader that might jump into the series at anytime, but for me it becomes a slog reading the same shit over and over. At least in this book we were spared him having to explain why he's not a cop anymore; I'm a little tired of hearing that story too.

This time around Scudder takes on two cases that somehow end up connected, determining whether or not a TV producer was responsible for the rape and murder of his wife, as well as tracking down the masked sex killers in a grisly smut film he stumbles onto in the middle of watching a VHS rental of The Dirty Dozen. This novel's plot developments were based on so many coincidences that the plotting seemed a bit lazy this time around. But even with these issues that I personally had and the fact that this book lacks the emotional weight of Eight Million Ways to Die, the freshness of When The Sacred Ginmill Closes, or the urgent danger of A Ticket to the Boneyard, it's still as thoughtful, readable, and well-written as any of the other novels in Block's Scudder series, with some cool characters and nasty villains.

"We are closer than close, you and I. We are brothers in blood and semen."

So although it suffers from the usual stale repetitiveness as other later novels in most mystery series, it's still a Block novel so it's still one of the better detective books out there. If you're going to read a repetitive detective series, this should be the one you read.

"Well it's a hell of a story," he said. "And I guess you could say it has a happy ending, because you didn't drink and you aren't going to jail."

GRADE: B-

THE GIRL WITH THE DEEP BLUE EYES by Lawrence Block

Lawrence Block is a pretty popular crime author, but many readers aren't fully familiar with the beginning of his career when he wrote a bunch of softcore smut and lesbian erotica novels under various pen names. In recent years, many of those books have become more popular due to reprints and he even resurrected one of his more popular alter egos, Jill Emerson, for an original novel for Hard Case Crime called Getting Off. Now with The Girl With The Deep Blue Eyes, his new original Hard Case novel, with it's healthy doses of erotica mixed with classic noir stylings, it feels like he unofficially resurrected the Andrew Shaw alter ego, who worked with the same booty-noir mix back in the day. And it seems like Andrew is super pumped  about being unleashed onto our post-50 Shades society, because he definitely holds nothing back on the smut-tip with this book!

An ex-NYC cop turned Florida private eye named Doak Miller gets an assignment to act as a hitman and entrap a trophy wife looking to knock off her husband. But once he meets her, he sees the girl of his dreams and he concocts a plan to keep her.

At first, I got a bit frustrated because the plot didn't really move at the pace I wanted it to. It didn't really seem like much was happening for the first half of the book, and then I realized that the book is less about the crime and the hot sex and more about the character of Doak Miller, which I didn't expect. And the way Block slowly and skillfully reveals more and more about Doak's character is pretty compelling. One really stand-out aspect that I enjoyed is that it takes place in 2014 and Doak is a film noir fan. Because of this, he recognizes that his situation is the same as the characters in classic noirs like The Postman Always Rings Twice and Double Indemnity. He knows this convention and knows that those characters never get away in the end. But what makes this even more noir is that although he already knows this, he thinks his situation just might be different, and begins to set everything in motion anyway. He's a great pulp character and Block really illustrates the inevitability of noir. Recommended to crime fans, it's a cool read that might give you a thrill! And just maybe give you a tingle in your underpants!!

GRADE: B

GHOST OF THE FLEA by James Sallis

* Book 6 of the Lew Griffin series *

And finally we get to the grand finale of James Sallis's atypical, challenging, and elusive Lew Griffin

series. This novel has solidified the feeling that all six books are just part of one large story, a singular investigation into Lew Griffin's own life and purpose. No single book in the series can stand on its own without the others surrounding it. These novels probably shouldn't even be considered crime fiction, but if they are, they should definitely be seen collectively as one of the bravest pieces of crime fiction out there. I believe that not only was Sallis painting us a portrait of a complex man named Lew Griffin, but he was also painting a portrait of himself as a writer, with details for us to discover, or as he puts it many times in his books: he was sending us messages in code. Sallis is a superb writer, and this book is possibly the most impressive in the series in regards to pure prose. Sallis also provides a wonderful conclusion to the series, with a tone that fits perfectly in with the rest of the novels. But I want this review and the 5-star rating to not refer to this book alone, but to show big love to the series as a whole. These six novels might not be for everyone, and can be demanding and at times frustrating, but by its end, you'll know you experienced something special.

Out there in the window-world where a moth beat against glass, a man I knew both too well and not at all stood watching. A man dark and ill-defined, with the mark of lateness, of the autumnal, upon him too.

GRADE: A

SOLOMON'S VINEYARD by Jonathan Latimer

From the way her buttocks looked under the black silk dress, I knew she'd be good in bed. The silk was tight and 

under it the muscles worked slow and easy. I saw weight there, and control, and, brother, those were things I like in a woman.

Yea, from that first line, we know that this book puts the "hard" in hard-boiled. This one might just be the "hardest" of them all. I can see now why it's publication was delayed for NINE(!) years due to content. It follows private detective Karl Craven, who's hired to travel to a small town to convince a young woman to leave a religious sex cult that has wild orgies every year in the woods, worships a rotting corpse they keep in a temple, and chooses a girl to go marry the dead dude and have sex with it. Like Craven says about his story in the prologue: "It's got everything but an abortion and a tornado."

I thought it was pretty cool that Craven's true nature was kept vague throughout the story, causing the reader to never fully know where he stood on certain things and never be able to predict what he would do. We know he's supposed to be a detective, but is he disguising himself as one? Is that a lie? Is he a con man? Or maybe he's just the worst private eye in the world and is just using the job to bed down as many ladies as possible? This added an interesting dynamic on top of the craziness. But at the the same time, it was a thin line to walk for a writer because I also felt like I was distanced from him as well. He also sometimes seemed like a real dick in the way he treated women, minorities, or for that matter, every other human being he came in contact with...

I also thought the book was unexpectedly funny because Craven seemed like he didn't really give a damn about solving the case for most of the story. He spends a good amount of the book either napping, eating, taking multiple showers, reading Black Mask magazines, or having rough sex with the cult's princess, who likes to get punched around while in bed instead of getting kissed. I just got a kick out of how laid back he was, as if he thought that the pleasures in life were the priority and everything else would work itself out in the end. And who knows, maybe it will. You'll have to read to find out.

I took a peek into the grave. Flowers had almost covered the coffin. I thought: there goes $135. It was the first time I'd ever spent that much on a doll without getting something in return.

GRADE: B

WHITE JAZZ by James Ellroy

* Book 4 of the L.A. Quartet *

Every time I've finished an Ellroy book, I've had to sit back and process everything, climb up out of

his world, shake my brain free of his expert grasp. With White Jazz, he concludes his epic "L.A. Quartet," by narrowing his focus even more so than in The Black Dahlia, and miles away from the gargantuan L.A. Confidential. Returning to first-person narration and a single protagonist, Ellroy presents a portrait of racist and corrupt police lieutenant Dave Klein, who finds himself a pawn in a law enforcement political war when a Federal attorney mounts an investigation into LAPD malfeasance and its involvement in Southland vice.

Klein is a fascinating character, because he's not some hero or your everyday good guy caught up in a conspiracy and must be the one to bring it all to light. Instead he's a full-time criminal/part-time cop who finds himself in over his head, involved with individuals and systems that are even more corrupt than he is, and must fight through the whole book just to keep his head above water. And it was cool to witness as some semblance of justice (maybe goodness) starts to seep in to his motivations, once he gets a little love in his life and is forced to confront his actions in the past.

Style-wise, Ellroy takes the trimmed and slashed prose style he adopted for L.A. Confidential (by cutting out unnecessary words to cut the manuscript down by 100 pages per his editor) and ratchets it up to a thousand here! Paired with yet another complex plot, the clipped style makes White Jazz a very challenging read, as it's hard at times to follow, as major plot developments and twists can occur in just several well-chosen words, and if you blink (or skim), you miss it. It's not a casual read. But once I got settled in and used to it, I was along for the ride. And I began to realize how much this jazzy, bebop prose fits the confessional, stream-of-consciousness style that's used in the book. It's Dave Klein truly telling his story in his own words. And at times, it can be really poetic in it's own way. Here's what Ellroy himself had to say about his choice to continue the use of this technique for Klein in a Paris Review interview:
"I saw that if I eliminated words from his speech, I would develop a more convincing cadence for him: paranoid, jagged, enervated..."

This book, it's content, and it's writing style, as with most of Ellroy's work, definitely won't be to  everyone's taste, and I would suggest that people new to Ellroy not start with this one (probably start with the more accessible Dahlia). For a taste of what's in store in the book, here's a portion of the novel where Klein searches police records for a possible suspect:

Keyed up—glom the pervert file. Dog stuff/B&E/Peeping Tom, see what jumped:
  A German Shepherd-fucking Marine. Doctor "Dog": popped for shooting his daughter up with beagle pus. Dog killers—none fit my man's specs. Dog fuckers, dog suckers, dog beaters, dog worshipers, a geek who chopped his wife while dressed up as Pluto. Panty sniffers, sink shitters, masturbators—lingerie jackoffs only. Faggot burglars, transvestite break-ins, "Rita Hayworth"–Gilda gown, dyed bush hair, caught blowing a chloroformed toddler. The right age—but a jocker cut his dick off, he killed himself, a full-drag San Quentin burial.Peepers: windows, skylights, roofs—the roof clowns a chink brother act. No watchdog choppers, the geeks read passive, caught holding their puds with a whimper. Darryl Wishnick, a cute MO: peep, break, enter, rape, watchdogs subdued by goofball-laced meat—too bad he kicked from syph in '56. One flash: peepers played passive, my guy killed badass canines.

Although the style is more challenging than the previous books, making for a less smooth a read as I wanted, this novel is still an incredibly engaging crime saga, and skillfully ties in the events in the earlier novels, bringing the entire Quartet to a close in satisfying fashion (Ellroy's most poignant ending since Dahlia)! Ellroy and his work continues to fascinate me and he just climbed even higher in the ranks of my favorite authors.

To eclipse my guilt with the sheer weight of his evil. I'm going to kill him in the name of our victims, find Glenda and say:
  Tell me anything.
  Tell me everything.
  Revoke our time apart.
  Love me fierce in danger.

GRADE: A-