FFB Review: "In The Best Families" by Rex Stout (Reviewed by Patrick Ohl)

I was reminded of this review by Patrick Ohl earlier this week thanks to the memories function on Facebook. Since it had been five years, it seemed like a good time to run it again. Make sure you check out the full list over at Sweet Freedom. Have a good one!

PAPERBACK

The last time we checked in at Nero Wolfe’s brownstone in The Second Confession, the great man was directly confronted by Arnold Zeck, a criminal mastermind who is something like the Professor Moriarty to his Sherlock Holmes. Luckily for Wolfe, soon afterwards, an event occurred that placed Zeck squarely on Wolfe’s side. But Zeck has gone too far this time.

It happens when Sarah Rackham asks for Wolfe’s help. She is a wealthy woman, and has been happily married to Barry Rackham for four years. In that time, Barry has regularly asked for money, but lately his demands increased so dramatically that Sarah refused to give him anything the last time. After that, Barry no longer asked her for money, and yet his extravagant spending habits are unchanged. Where is all this money coming from?

No sooner does she leave, a package of sausage is delivered to Wolfe’s door. Except the sausage manages to metamorphose into tear gas, and Arnold Zeck is soon on the line, gloating to Wolfe that had the package contained a bomb, Wolfe would now be dead. He then formally demands that Wolfe not investigate the Rackham case.

AUDIO CD

But Wolfe is not one to be bullied and sends Archie along to the residence of Calvin Leeds, Mrs. Rackham’s cousin, ostensibly to investigate a dog poisoning. (In a delightful tip of the hat to the events of The Second Confession, Archie at first proposes that he go down to Mrs. Rackham’s country house for a weekend party, only to have the idea firmly rejected.) Before you know it, a murder occurs, and Archie is once again dealing with the same officials as in The Second Confession. But this time, when Archie returns to the brownstone, the door is wide open, and Nero Wolfe is nowhere to be found…

The conclusion of the Arnold Zeck trilogy is typical of trilogies. The first one introduces the concepts and the second one expands on them. In the third instalment, the story goes into maximum overdrive with the stakes higher than ever before. The only thing with trilogies is that most of them seem to misstep on the third outing, with a few notable exceptions. In that regard, In the Best Families is a satisfying conclusion for the Arnold Zeck trilogy, but in the interests of fairness, I have to admit it’s the weakest of the three books.

The problem for me is that Wolfe and Archie, so delightful together, spend most of the novel completely apart and only reunite near the end. We miss out on that classic Wolfe-Archie banter, and although Archie is terrific on his own, he’s always so much better when he’s nagging Wolfe. And really, the lengths Wolfe goes to in this novel are just… extreme, especially for him. I’m not entirely sure whether I liked this or not. I’m in danger of saying too much, so I’ll just shut up now.

AUDIBLE

The murder mystery that starts the ball rolling is a decent one, with a clue or two pointing you in the right direction, but long before the solution, the book abandons the central mystery and becomes more of a thriller. The mystery is resolved in the end, and its solution really is satisfactory, but it’s been left more-or-less alone for so long that it loses some of its impact.

I liked In the Best Families just fine, but compared to the two entries that precede it, it’s pretty underwhelming. But it stands up decently on its own merits as a Nero Wolfe story, and it really is fun to read about these characters. The stakes are high and Wolfe’s playing a very dangerous game. The book sags a bit in the middle when Wolfe goes missing, but when he reappears near the end, the book springs back to life for one whizz-banger of a finale! And for once, the mystery at the book’s core is pretty decent, especially by Rex Stout standards. Overall, this one is recommended, but only for those who’ve read the previous entries in the Zeck series.

Patrick Ohl ©2014, 2019

Patrick Ohl is a 20-year old Canadian crime fiction aficionado who enjoys hobbies such as taxidermy and runs a dilapidated motel in the middle of nowhere alongside his crazed mother. He enjoys relaxing in his subterranean evil lair while watching his favourite hockey team, the Toronto Maple Leafs, and will occasionally make chicken chow mein to die for. His life is accompanied by a soundtrack composed by John Williams, and James Earl Jones provides occasional voice-overs.

At the Scene of the Crime: Fantastic Deities and Where to Find Them

At the Scene of the Crime: Fantastic Deities and Where to Find Them: I have never been very good at approaching my reading systematically. I will pick up whatever the heck I want to read, whenever I want to...

At the Scene of the Crime: Signed in Blood

At the Scene of the Crime: Signed in Blood: Mrs. Wentworth came to see Father Bredder with a very disturbing story. She was terrified of being murdered – burned to death – by her hu...

At the Scene of the Crime: Enter the Murderer

At the Scene of the Crime: Enter the Murderer: Set in the world of the theatre, Derek Smith’s Come to Paddington Fair brings back Algy Lawrence as well as his policeman sidekick, Chie...

At the Scene of the Crime: Treasure Island

At the Scene of the Crime: Treasure Island: Introduction: Goodness me, it has been a very long time since I last reviewed a book, not since late August of 2015!! Unfortunately, the ...

FFB Review: "THE JULIUS CAESAR MURDER CASE (1935) by Wallace Irwin (Reviewed by Barry Ergang)

Friday means Friday’s Forgotten Books. Before you go take a look at the complete list over at Patti Abbott’s blog, consider The Julius Caesar Murder Case by Wallace Irwin. Not only did Barry review it today, but Patrick Ohl offered his take on this book back in 2013 for FFB.

THE JULIUS CAESAR MURDER CASE (1935) by Wallace Irwin

Reviewed by Barry Ergang

Forget about what you know from history lessons or Shakespeare’s drama. Julius Caesar’s demise did not occur as accounts have described it elsewhere. No, it is only through the unremitting pursuit of truth by one Publius Manlius (Mannie) Scribo, ace  reporter and sports columnist for the Evening Tiber, that we know what actually occurred on that fateful Ides of March. It begins with the murder of J. Romulus Comma, a producer at Pompey’s Theater, a crime Q. Bulbus Apex, “city editor and owner” of the tabloidium and Mannie’s boss, does not want Mannie to investigate. Nor do the famous General Mark Anthony, “Julius Cæsar’s dummy Consul, the Administration’s handshaker,” and Chief of Police Kellius. But pursue the case Mannie does, despite opposition from those and other quarters, and in the course of things uncovers a conspiracy to do in Caesar himself.  

In addition to the aforementioned Caesar and Anthony, Mannie’s investigation puts him into the presence or orbits of significant figures including Cleopatra, Brutus, Cassius, Casca, Cicero, and Caesar’s former wives. Along with his faithful and canny British slave Smithicus, he also encounters the acting troupe from Pompey’s Theater and must contend with his conflicted feelings for the unpredictable Romula, daughter of J. Romulus Comma.

The book has been reissued in both print and electronic editions by Ramble House. I read the electronic edition, which is not without some typos here and there—e.g., J. Romulus Comma at least once called Q. Romulus Comma, and multiple varied misspellings of Caesar.

The book is a humorous whodunit. Or, at any rate, is meant to be. But humor is a very subjective matter. While the puzzle and solution were well-handled, and though I smiled and even chuckled aloud in a few spots, I thought the overall result was too self-consciously “cute”—the author’s “Look, folks, I’m being clever and comical!” affectation.

In his introduction to this edition of the novel, Richard A. Lupoff points out that “Through the eyes and in the voice of Mannie Scribo he goes out of his way to lampoon craven editors, ruthless publishers, and Roman politicians,” adding “He also manages to include offensive caricatures of blacks, Greeks, Jews, Britons, gays, Chinese, and little people. If Wallace Irwin was a bigot, at least he was an equal-opportunity bigot.”

If a character in a story or novel uses, whether in thought or dialogue, a racial or ethnic slur, the reader can assume the author wants him to understand this bigoted aspect of that character’s personality. It’s a different matter when the author resorts to such slurs, as Wallace Irwin does, in what are ostensibly objective portions of his narrative. I don’t mean to come across as holier-than-thou; I’m well aware that novels often reflect the attitudes of their times and authors. But I found Irwin’s slurring and stereotyping a long way from funny.

My suggestion is to read some or all of the first chapter at the Ramble House website to decide if The Julius Caesar Murder Case is your kind of mystery. You can read Richard A. Lupoff’s introduction there, as well.

© 2015 Barry Ergang

Derringer Award-winner Barry Ergang’s written work has appeared in numerous publications, print and electronic. Some of it is available at Amazon and at Smashwords. His website is http://www.writetrack.yolasite.com/.

At the Scene of the Crime: Nobody Knows the Truffles I've Seen...

At the Scene of the Crime: Nobody Knows the Truffles I've Seen...: It’s been a while since my last review, and I’m starting to get out of practice. I can’t quite figure out how to start today’s review of Ch...

The Geometry of Murder (At The Scene Of The Crime)

The Geometry of Murder (At The Scene Of The Crime)

A, B, C, D, E, F, G... (At the Scene of the Crime blog)

A, B, C, D, E, F, G...  (At the Scene of the Crime blog)

Talking About the Detection Club

Talking About the Detection Club

2014 FFB Review Roundup

Fridays mean Friday’s Forgotten Books hosted by Patti Abbott. While it is a new year, I thought today a look back was worth doing. Below, organized by the month, you will find the FFB Reviews that Barry, Patrick, and I did over the course of last year. The list does not include the numerous links to FFB things at the blogs of Randy Johnson, Bill Crider, and others. So, grab a beverage and whatever you use to make a reading list and start working on your reading plan for 2015……

January

Bones of the Rain: A Blue-Eyed Indian Mystery by Russ Hall

Baby Grape and Huskey by Thom Rodgers

The Floating Lady Murder by Daniel Stashower (Barry Ergang)

Cover of Snow by Jenny Milchman

The Remake: As Time Goes By  by Stephen Humphrey Bogart (Barry Ergang)

February

The Last Refuge by Chris Knopf

The Tattoo Murder Case  by Akimitsu Takagi / Translator Deborah Boehm (Patrick Ohl)

The Corpse in the Car by John Rhode (Patrick Ohl)

KIRINYAGA: A FABLE OF UTOPIA by Mike Resnick (Barry Ergang)

March

BAR-20 by Clarence E. Mulford (Barry Ergang)

In The Best Families by Rex Stout (Patrick Ohl)

The Perfect Defective: A Novella by Clark Casey

Artie And The Long-Legged Woman by Jan Christensen

April

Too Late For Tears by Roy Huggins (Barry Ergang)

A Patchwork of Stories: 9 Tales from Sunny Side Up to Over Hard  by Kaye George

Fast One by Paul Cain (Barry Ergang)

The Education of H*y*m*a*n K*a*p*l*a*n by Leonard Q. Ross (Barry Ergang)

May

The Feedstore Chronicles by Travis Erwin

Strange World: A Biff Bam Pop Short Story Anthology  compiled by Andrew Burns, JP Fallavollita, David Sandford Ward and Corina Newby

The Ugly Princess: The Karlathia Chronicles by Elizabeth Burton

THE BRAT by Gil Brewer (Barry Ergang)

The Last Horseman by Frank Zafiro (the Thrilling Thirteen collection)

The Dream Walker by Charlotte Armstrong (Patrick Ohl)

June

The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino (Patrick Ohl)

The Last Call: A Bill Travis Mystery by Gorge Wier

NIGHT SQUAD by David Goodis (Barry Ergang)

Cop Hater by Ed McBain (Patrick Ohl)

July

Red¸ White, And Blue Murder: A Sheriff Dan Rhodes Mystery by Bill Crider

Not Sleeping, Just Dead by Charles Alverson (Barry Ergang)

The False Inspector Dew by Peter Lovesey (Patrick Ohl)

The Death of Laurence Vining by Alan Thomas (Patrick Ohl)

August

The Man Who Turned Into Himself  by David Ambrose (Barry Ergang)

The Merry Hippo by Elspeth Huxley (Patrick Ohl)

Drum Beat-Madrid by Stephen Marlowe (Barry Ergang)

The Singing Bone by R. Austin Freeman (Patrick Ohl)

The Zebra-Striped Hearse  by Ross Macdonald (Patrick Ohl)

September

The Religious Body by Catherine Aird (Patrick Ohl)

The Toll House Murder by Anthony Wynne (Patrick Ohl)

A Vampire Named Fred by Bill Crider

A Werewolf Named Wayne by Bill Crider

October

The House of Silk by Anthony Horowitz (Patrick Ohl)

Walking The Perfect Square  by Reed Farrel Coleman

A Painted House by John Grisham

Patterns In Silicon: A Lea Sherwood Mystery by Maureen Robb

Texas Vigilante (Ellie Taine Book Two) by Bill Crider

November

Short Stories of Earl Staggs by Earl Staggs (Barry Ergang)

The Devil’s Bones by Larry D. Sweazy

Kings of Colorado: A Novel by David E. Hilton

Four of a Kind: Four Tales of Mystery and Suspense editor Douglas Quinn

December

As Tough As They Come edited by Will Oursler (Barry Ergang)

Too Late To Die by Bill Crider

Protectors: Stories to Benefit PROTECT editor Thomas Pluck

The Sinatra Files edited by Tom Kuntz and Phil Kuntz (Barry Ergang)

That was our efforts for 2014. Next week Barry kicks off the 2015 FFB Reviews……so stay tuned.

Via At The Scene Of The Crime--- Gone Baby Gone

Gone Baby Gone

FFB Review: "The Religious Body" by Catherine Aird-- Reviewed by Patrick Ohl

Patrick Ohl is back this week for Friday Forgotten Books hosted by Patti Abbott. This week he is reviewing The Religious Body by Catherine Aird.

I made my first acquaintance with Catherine Aird by reading His Burial Too. Although I expressed genuine enthusiasm for the locked-room situation and its resolution (which contains a very good trick at its core), I thought the book suffered from a poor sense of pacing, with a second act that dragged interminably on as the detectives investigated trails that were all-too-obviously dead ends. I had hopes that The Religious Body would be an improvement— the plot sounded like a riot and Aird showed an excellent sense of humour that could make such a story enjoyable. The result was not quite what I expected, though…

The Religious Body opens in the Convent of St. Anselm. One of the nuns, Sister Anne, is nowhere to be found, until somebody stumbles over her body at the foot of the cellar stairs. C. D. Sloan arrives with Constable Crosby in tow to investigate, and he decides that all this just doesn’t add up. Eventually, he decides Sister Anne was murdered, and begins to try finding the killer.

The plot begins promisingly and carries through on its promise for about half the book. We even see a priest get sucked into the action, doing some amateur sleuthing and giving the coppers some tips here and there. Unfortunately, at about the halfway mark, Aird seems to lose interest in the book. The central fascination I have with the idea of murder in a convent is that fundamental paradox. Convents are not places of violence— they are places of peace, and you’d expect a nun to be the last person in the world to actually kill one of her fellow nuns. Aird unfortunately bails out on this angle, introducing the usual, unoriginal, and unexciting motives. (Curiously enough, the TV show CSI: Crime Scene Investigation really jumped the shark for me in a similar episode, where a woman is discovered murdered in a Catholic church, having been crucified. The promising beginning fell apart into a dismal drama involving a priest’s affair with the dead woman, and it permanently turned me off the show.)

This book’s pacing is a general improvement on His Burial Too (although it was written first)— the plot does move a lot quicker. However, the plot itself is extremely problematic. One of the main points that leads Sloan to conclude Sister Anne was murdered is a lack of blood on the cellar steps, which meant the blood clotted and dried somewhere else and thus didn’t fall to the cellar floor when the body was dumped there. At the same time, Aird makes a serious goof by having a major plot thread about one of the nuns getting a bloody thumb-mark, presumably from the un-findable murder weapon. If the blood from the corpse has had enough time to clot, why in heaven’s name would this nun get wet blood on her thumb to make a bloody thumb-mark in a book? (As for the un-findable murder weapon, it’s really a dull and anticlimactic revelation that wasn’t worth the trouble. I’m surprised the cops didn’t find it sooner.)

Another major angle involves a group of agricultural students who study next door to the convent. On Guy Fawkes Night, the day after the murder, they burn an effigy of a nun as a practical joke, but the police are informed of this and arrive to douse the flames—only to discover the effigy is wearing a habit that is missing from the convent and is wearing the dead nun’s glasses! This leads to a predictable second murder, but the motive for this second murder is positively laughable and quite vague at the same time. “I can’t be certain of this, sir,” Sloan might as well have apologetically reported to his superior, “but I believe Thomson murdered Thompson because he recognized him that night in the dark, since he hadn’t brushed his teeth.”

The solution, when it finally does arrive, has elements of cleverness to it, but the holes in the story stand out a lot more, which is a genuine shame since the pacing of the book is overall better than that of His Burial Too. Aird shows genuine wit, which makes the book fun enough to follow. Unfortunately, I really can’t recommend the book. It has tremendous promise but really falls completely flat.

Patrick Ohl ©2014

At The Scene Of the Crime

FFB Review: "The Zebra-Striped Hearse" by Ross Macdonald--Reviewed by Patrick Ohl

Patrick Ohl is back this week for Friday Forgotten Books hosted by Patti Abbott. If things are still running as scheduled, this week Evan Lewis will be doing the links later today on his Davey Crockett’s Almanack of Mystery, Adventure, and The Wild West. A blog you should already be reading and enjoying so if you don’t know about it, get with the program. Today Patrick reviews The Zebra-Striped Hearse by Ross Macdonald.

Raymond Chandler is known for creating mean streets on which his detective, Phillip Marlowe, would walk. Ross Macdonald, however, took the hardboiled genre in a new direction by creating Lew Archer, a private detective who was sensitive. The Zebra-Striped Hearse was published in 1962, three years after 1959’s The Galton Case, which was the first book by Ross Macdonald that I read.

Macdonald’s The Zebra-Striped Hearse is an intricately plotted book that keeps twisting and turning long after you think it’s finished. The story revolves around Colonel Blackwell, who consults Lew Archer about his daughter, Harriet. A month ago, she met a man named Burke Damis in Mexico, and now she wants to marry him. But the Colonel, overly protective of his daughter, senses that the young man is as phony as a three-dollar bill, and he hires Archer to look into Damis’ past life in order to uncover just what he is up to and expose him to Harriet.

Audio

The resulting plot is a complex one, and Macdonald uses it to tell a powerful story. These aren’t the mean, gangster-infested streets of Raymond Chandler. Rather, Macdonald takes crime and puts it into the neighbourhood, where even that nice old lady who lived down the street might have some connection with the murder in the newspaper headlines. In a way, the story is similar to that of The Galton Case; both novels evoke the loss of a child and the loss of a parent, both of which Ross Macdonald experienced. In both, Lew Archer sometimes seems more like a family therapist than a traditional private eye. Some use this to criticise Macdonald, saying that he wrote the same book over and over again. I can see the point, but from what I’ve seen, Macdonald uses a somewhat similar formula but produces something brilliant both times. The result is highly readable, literate, and there’s a note of genuine passion underscoring the book. That kind of combination is just outstanding.

Incidentally, I was expecting the titular “zebra-striped hearse” to be some crazy metaphor about life and death and stuff, because that’s kind of what I got to expect from the hardboiled, with titles like The Big Sleep or The Long Goodbye… but it’s an actual hearse, and it has actual zebra stripes. It pops up every once in a while as Lew Archer investigates. This alone makes the book worth a read.

Lew Archer is a decent sort in a tragic world, trying to help the victims of violent crime while bringing the guilty party to justice. In The Zebra-Striped Hearse, Macondald’s mystery is fairly clued, with complexity that could match wits with a Golden Ag author any day. But most intriguing of all is the way Macdonald uses the mystery to create a small piece of art that wouldn’t disgrace the pages of a “serious” literary author. The theme of loss and the family struggling to stay together have poignant notes to it that I like very much. I can’t think of something the book does wrong… and that’s always a good sign. Ross Macdonald apparently considered it one of his best books, and it was nominated for “Best Novel” at the 1963 Edgar Awards. It was beaten by Ellis Peters’ Death and the Joyful Woman, which I have yet to read…

To read The Zebra-Striped Hearse, I relied largely on an audio recording I’ve taken a great fancy to. It is complete and unabridged, but read by a full cast, with Harris Yulin as Lew Archer. The musical scores are well-placed, and the sound effects (like someone knocking at the door or the ocean being heard in the distance) really enhanced the reading experience for me. If you get a chance to listen to this recording, I highly recommend it.

Patrick Ohl ©2014

Make sure to read more of Patrick’s excellent work here on the blog as well as his website At The Scene Of The Crime.

Via At The Scene Of The Crime--- New Publications

New Publications

Via At The Scene Of The Crime--Visions

Visions

FFB Review: "The False Inspector Dew" by Peter Lovesey --Reviewed by Patrick Ohl

 Patrick Ohl is back this week for Friday's Forgotten Books. make sure you check out the list of suggested reads later today on Patti Abbott's blog. By the way, please note that Patti's books CONCRETE ANGEL and SHOT IN DETROIT have survived the shutdown of Exhibit A Books and have been picked up by Jason Pinter and Polis Books. Thrilled for Patti as well as readers everywhere......

H. H. Crippen was one of the 20^th century’s most infamous murderers—or, at the very least, accused murderers. Over time, much doubt has been cast upon the “guilty” verdict, and some controversial new DNA evidence suggests that the remains found in Crippen’s basement may not have been his wife’s after all. (This evidence cannot be completely trusted, however. I’d go into details, but you’re here for a book review, not a true crime article.) Whatever the truth of the matter, Crippen and his lover, Ethel le Neve, fled to Canada, but thanks to the miracle of wireless communication, were arrested upon arrival by Inspector Walter Dew, who simply took a faster ship to get there first.

It is this infamous real-life murder case that inspires The False Inspector Dew by Peter Lovesey. In it, a dentist named Walter Baranov decides to murder his shrew of a wife Lydia on board the ocean liner Mauretania. The plan is a perfect one— he will be free to live with his lover Alma, a girl absolutely devoted to him. And in a touch of irony, to get away with the scheme he registers under a false name as Walter Dew, after the famous inspector who caught Crippen. There’s no way the scheme could possibly fail. But, irony of ironies, when a body is found bobbing in the ocean, the captain of the ship quite innocently asks the eminent Inspector Dew to investigate!

An awkward situation, investigating a murder of your own— especially when you haven’t the slightest idea how to act like a detective! So Inspector Dew goes around talking to his fellow passengers and discovers that he may not have been the only one up to no good during the night…

The False Inspector Dew combines a little bit of everything—inverted mystery, comedy, and through an ingenious plot development there’s a genuine mystery to be solved as well. It’s a delightful and downright delicious book to read. The plot twists and turns throughout, making it a definite page-turner. It’s ingenious as well—Lovesey gives his readers every clue, and when you reach the ending you realise just how neatly the author has treaded the line between cheating and fair play, while always remaining firmly on the “fair play” side.

The characters are also on the good side. The titular “False Inspector Dew” is a wonderful character; he’s a boring lover and a bad detective who is desperately trying to pass himself off as an ex-inspector. His lover Alma is a bit on the psychotic side, but in a very funny way—she is the one who starts the whole romance, finding Walter’s smallest, most ordinary gestures filled with romantic symbolism. She is a big reader of romantic novels and has unrealistic expectations, and that makes for plenty of fun. Even the doomed wife Lydia can be plenty of fun with her pig-headedness over the most unreasonable requests. And then there are all the passengers aboard the boat…

The writing is excellent and can be very funny indeed, especially in those moments where Inspector Dew’s mask drops and he says something he really shouldn’t have. It can also be quite suspenseful, such as a great scene during a storm, or another scene where a killer is apparently caught-red-handed. It’s part of the package that makes The False Inspector Dew such a treat— and the ending is just plain perfect. It’s a really nice way to wrap everything up for good.

Overall, I highly recommend The False Inspector Dew. It won the CWA Gold Dagger Award, and in my opinion it was a very deserved prize. The story is an ingenious one, with terrific plot twists throughout to easily hold your interest. The ending is top-notch, and the reader is given every clue to solve the mystery that crops up. The comedy is terrific. The characters are loads of fun. And when you look at it in retrospect, there are some passages where I can only admire the author for creating a grand puzzle-plot in the fine old tradition. In short, the book is an absolute triumph. I highly, highly recommend it.

Patrick Ohl ©2014

At The Scene Of The Crime

Via At The Scene Of The Crime-- Hear Me Roar

Patrick Ohl reviews King of the Weeds by Mickey Spillane at Hear Me Roar

At The Scene Of the Crime Update--- Why I've Been So Silent Lately...

Patrick Ohl explains "Why I've Been So Silent Lately..."  and I sincerely wish him all the best as he embarks on a major turning point in his life.  It has been an honor and a pleasure to run his reviews here for Friday's Forgotten Books (still have a few more which is good) as well for his long distance friendship.

In the wake of what has happened to both Sandi and myself my advice is to do what feels right at the time and not count on the future. I am not the first to say the future is by no means guaranteed. I am not saying stop saving for retirement or not to do some planning. I am saying to make sure you tell folks you love them and make sure they know it. We never saw the twin freight trains coming that have barreled into our lives forever ending our plans to someday buy a home on some land so that we could have horses and travel the country. Do what you can now when every day isn't a struggle on so many fronts.

Trust me....you will be glad you did.

FFB Review: "Cop Hater" by Ed McBain --- Reviewed by Patrick Ohl

Patrick Ohl is back today for FFB with his review of Cop Hater by Ed McBain. After you read his review, go check out the other possibilities here.

Someone has a grudge against the police department… more specifically, the cops at the 87^th Precinct. Cops are being gunned down left and right, apparently at random by a “cop hater”. It is up to the cops of the 87^th, already overworked and understaffed, to avenge their fallen colleagues and bring their murderer—or is it murderers?—to justice.

This plot device has been used many times in mystery fiction—whether in X Vs. Rex by Phillip Macdonald, or, more recently, Cop to Corpse by Peter Lovesey. But this time it is being used by Ed McBain in one of his 87^th Precinct police procedurals. Sergio over at Tipping My Fedora is on a quest to review the entire series, and his reviews are always extremely intelligent and for the most part enthusiastic. So I decided to give McBain a chance despite my historical dislike of the police procedural… so could McBain rise to the challenge?

Well, yes and no. McBain is a gifted writer and the way he describes something such as lab techniques in detail is fascinating. In particular, I was fascinated to see how a police lab in the 1950s worked, since many of these techniques are long out of date and in some cases scientifically worthless! In the hands of a lesser writer, these segments would come out dry and that would kill the novel’s chance of success…

Ironically, I have no problem whatsoever with the detailed portrait of the investigation—I liked, for instance, the way the cops have to follow the most unlikely leads through—but I just didn’t like many of the other elements. Basically, I wasn’t fond of the way irrelevant passages kept cropping up. Cop Hater is a short book as is, but all these elements come across as excessive padding nonetheless. We get long and useless descriptions of the heat at this time of year… one of the cops fantasizes uncomfortably about the woman he is interviewing… and so on. These segments don’t add to character, don’t contribute much to atmosphere or story or anything really… they’re just… there.

Enough of my whining— this book does have some things working to its advantage. We get to know some of the cops in detail and this helps us sympathise with all involved—although the opening slab of dead meat is onstage so briefly that the attempt to characterize him via his desire for an air conditioner comes across as a very poor bit of writing. But putting that aside, since this is the first book in a series, everyone is a potential casualty (unless you know who the main detective is going to be in later entries). This helps to ramp things up a notch since you’re not given a clear-cut detective to look towards.

But also, the climax is just brilliant. It is everything a climax should be: it keeps you turning the pages in suspense, holding your breath as you wonder how everything will turn out. It’s a thrilling confrontation that seems like it can only end in tragedy… and I will say no more about that.

There’s one more thing I admire a lot about this book—although it is a police procedural, there is also an element of genuine fair-play mystery that is so good I didn’t even realize it was there (although I did instinctively guess at the answer). This takes pure skill— it’s no mean feat to write a police procedural that also fulfills the requirements of a fair-play mystery. It’s not a particularly challenging mystery—as I said, I guessed the answer instinctively—but when you look back at the clues that were there, it still leaves you appreciating the feat very much.

So overall, despite some excessive padding, Cop Hater turned out to be a wonderful and most entertaining read. I would recommend it to fellow aficionados as a solid starting point for this series. It takes a classic plot device and does a really nice job with it… and I will say no more out of fear of those darned Spoiler Rapids!

Patrick Ohl ©2014

http://at-scene-of-crime.blogspot.com/