I finished Ken Bruen's Blitz last night. It's the fourth of
the White Trilogy. Although I found it highly entertaining,
even laughed out loud a number of times, I was a little
disappointed. As usual, the characters, especially Brant,
were great; it was nice to see them again. Porter Nash is a
very nice addition. And the bad guy, Barry Weiss, was well
developed. However, I felt Bruen slighted the suspense and
plot; he was even a bit sloppy in places.
{Although I discuss a few events late in the book, I've tried
to be vague enough not to spoil anything.)
First, the sloppiness. Near the beginning, Weiss lists the
cops who had previously "harassed" him. Now I buy that Brant
might have forgotten their previous contact, but PC McDonald
actually ran him in, so there'd be paperwork. Later in the
book he is sent in undercover with Weiss. Yet no one seems
aware that there had been previous contact between the two
(and although Weiss immediately spots him as a cop, he does
not recognize him specifically, even though he earlier named
and described him). Now the books in this series are far from
meticulous about police procedure, but this seemed a bit
much.
As for the lack of suspense, at one point in the book, a
chapter ends with an attacker coming out of the bushes at one
of the series regulars. The next chapter cuts to another
subplot. However, I never felt any sense of danger to the
character. Somehow, I knew the regular would survive. This
was not always the case in the earlier entries (and not all
of the regulars did survive).
None of these books is heavy on plot. Any crimes that are
solved are usually done so through lucky breaks, not solid
police work. And frankly, that's part of their appeal. This
one seems a bit too sketchy, though.
That said, I still thoroughly enjoyed the book. And I'll
definitely read Vixen, the next in the series (hope Porter
Nash is back), but I've enjoyed other Bruen books even more.
This especially paled compared to the last of his I read, The
Guards.
Mark
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