I thought I'd chime in with what I've been reading lately. I
didn't jump in earlier because I wanted to finish Pelecanos'
The Night Gardener, which impressed me a great deal. It was a
very mature, realistic work of crime fiction, and my first
experience with Pelecanos' work outside of The Wire. The book
got a lot of praise, and I thought it earned it.
I also recently read The Barbarous Coast by Ross MacDonald.
It wasn't one of the better Archer books. The story itself
wasn't bad, but I don't think the writing was all that great.
It had a howler of a simile (or maybe a metaphor, I don't
have the book handy) where MacDonald compares a woman's
stockinged feet to "furtive animals making love beneath the
hem of her dress" or something like that. Very bad. This book
also had a real viciousness about it, too. MacDonald didn't
hold back when writing about Hollywood and show business. His
animosity leaps off the page, and there are almost no
sympathetic characters.
I also read James Reasoner's Texas Wind, which I didn't like
quite as much as Dust Devils, but it was still a good
read.
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