Thursday, January 24, 2013

Review: "The Black Box" by Michael Connelly


“He knew that occurrences of twenty years ago or longer were now coming together at an undeniable speed. The hand of the past was reaching up through the ground, and there was no telling who or what it would grab and pull down when it finally broke through the surface of the earth.” (Page 434--Large Print Version)


                       
As Los Angeles burned in 1992 Detective Hieronymus “Harry” Bosch and Detective Jerry Edgar, along with two police officers as protection, were sent from one location to another as the bodies dropped.  With the city in chaos and the National Guard as backup, little could be done at each body besides the briefest of investigation and detailing the scene.  It was a war zone in south central and latest casualty is a woman in an alley.

By the time Bosch and Edgar get to the dead woman it is clear that she died a number of hours to a full day ago. It is also clear she was shot through the head and died right there so the debris filled alley is the crime scene. It is also a crime scene that they will have only minutes to work before moving on to the next one.

It will be twenty long years before the case of Anneke Jespersen, foreign correspondent, makes it to Bosch’s desk in the Open-Unsolved Unit.  That happened because the Police Chief, always thinking of the media and politics, ordered a new look at all the open cases from 1992. Labeled as the “Snow White” case, Bosch wanted it back because he didn’t have a chance to do right by her the first time. He isn’t going to let it go wrong again despite the efforts of others within and outside the Los Angeles Police Department.

Michael Connelly’s twenty-fifth book and the latest one in the Harry Bosch series is another good one. A series that began with The Black Echo continues here in a novel that again features Bosch’s quest for justice running head on into politics and agendas of others. Harry doesn’t see race as he sees victims and their families. Families that need answers regardless of the politics involved.

Politics, race, moneyed interests, and more Michael Connelly staples are all here in The Black Box.  So too is Harry Bosch, the dad and the detective, trying to do the best he can at work and at home. The result is a complex and very human mystery that works on all levels to provide yet another satisfying read in this series.

The Black Box
Michael Connelly
Little, Brown and Company (Hatchette Book Group)
November 2012
ISBN# 978-0-316-06942-7
Large Print Hardback (also available as e-book, audio, regular type hardback)
550 Pages
$29.99

Material supplied by the good folks of the Plano, Texas Public Library System.

Kevin R. Tipple ©2013

2 comments:

  1. Kevin,

    Thanks for the well-written review of Michael Connelly's latest novel. My husband and I both enjoy reading his novels.

    ReplyDelete