From: "JIM DOHERTY" <
jimdohertyjr@yahoo.com>
> NIGHTMARE IN MANHATTAN by Thomas Walsh
> SIGNAL 32 by McKinlay Kantor
> LAST SEEN WEARING . . . by Hillary Waugh
> GIDEON'S WEEK by J.J. Marric
> THE HECKLER by Ed McBain
> THE BAIT by Dorothy Uhnak
> THE LAUGHING POLICEMAN by Maj Sjowall and Per
Wahloo
> LISTENING WOMAN by Tony Hillerman
> ALL ON A SUMMER'S DAY by John Wainwright
> THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS by Thomas Harris
Have to agree with Jim on THE LAUGHING POLICEMAN.
My own police procedural month experience was disappointing
on the whole, which is why I haven't posted much. But, for
what it's worth, and briefly, here's what I read:
Jerome Charyn: MARILYN THE WILD - Don't know to what extent
this is a procedural. It certainly features cops, but it
never grabbed my attention. Couldn't finish it.
John Wainwright: DIG THE GRAVE AND LET HIM LIE - Jim claims
that Wainwright
"doesn't belt it out of the park every time he steps up to
bat." This was a fresh-air shot (don't know the baseball
terminology, sorry).
Ed McBain: KILLER'S CHOICE - One of the early 87th precinct
novels. This one introduces Cotton Hawes. Not one of McBain's
better efforts (spoiled by featuring, as a key witness, a
young child with a ridiculously advanced vocabulary).
Disillusioned at this point I returned to an old favourite:
William McIlvanney: LAIDLAW - McIlvanney's writing reeks of
authenticity. He writes about people and places with the
assuredness you might expect of a former Whitbread Award
winner (DOCHERTY). Evocative, realistic, brutal, tender and
unsentimental - and hardboiled by most definitions. In
particular, his hard men are magnificently unromanticized.
The story: the raped and murdered body of a young girl is
found in a Glasgow park. Laidlaw, assisted by DC Harkness, is
given free rein in his search for killer. A race against time
develops as two other forces, neither benign nor legal, join
the hunt for the killer.
Finally, Alex Gray: NEVER SOMEWHERE ELSE: Gray's first novel
(a police procedural) which I was led to believe might be
hardboiled. I was wrong. The appearance of the word "grisly"
repeated three times in the first few pages set the tone. Not
a tone that works for me.
Al
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