Skip to main content

I will decide what is 'Best' for you.

Well here we are. For 2008 it is all over but the shoutin'. I have decided to keep my 'Best of' list to a petite three titles. I will call it the The Given Day Memorial List of 2008. I struggled long and hard with the decision to strike the Lehane book from the list. On another day I would put it on this list, but in the end I felt it would be stretching the boundaries of Crime Fiction too far to include it here. It is a great book. A wonderful book and you should read it.

I was a bit dismayed to discover how few 2008 releases I did read. As of right now I have read 41 books. Only 38% were released this year. I need to up that number in 2009 with a primary goal of reading all 2009 releases in the calendar year.

After the top three, I have included one additional book. This book is the best book, excluding 2008 releases, I read this year.

The Given Day Memorial List of 2008

Mr. Chercover had this spot locked a while go. I knew about half way through that this was going to be the book. I felt that many of the books that I read this year were seriously lacking in scope. Plots were razor thin. Character development didn't resonant at all. Now I freely admit this may have more to do with me than the book or the author, but a great book should be engrossing not just while you are reading it. A great book should hang with you for a long time even to the extent that it intrudes on the next book you are reading. TRIGGER CITY was that book for me. It still hangs in my head as the book that tore way the superficial examination of violence and dug at the core of good people caught in a world of evil.


There were a few books this year that looked at the legacy of violence within one's family. THE EVIL THAT MEN DO was the best at capturing that lingering dread. Flashback structures are tricky devices. They are often an author's device as opposed to an organic plot/character development. Here Mr. White is able to sidestep that trap by making the flashback not through the eyes of Mr. Donne, but of his dead grandfather. The lessons Jackson either did or did not learn are not his but his family's, a kind of generational proclivity to seek justice for good and all to frequently ill.



SEVERANCE PACKAGE was the best balls out reading experience I had last year. When I reviewed the book back in June I wrote that 'The book contains an ever amount of escalating violence that strangely becomes only more hilarious.' Gross out humor, only instead of dick and fart jokes there is more and more blood. SEVERANCE PACKAGE found that perfect edge of adrenalin without ever feeling the need to worry about the book corrupting the youth of our nation. Not a serious book, but a seriously fun book.




The Hungry Detective has a backlog of books, and frequently we miss a good one upon its initial release. HAVE MERCY ON US ALL is such a book. The plot was diabolical, something out of a James Bond film yet scarily realist in its presentation. The book was packed with fully realized secondary characters. Many times this year I felt as if I had to fill in the blanks of a character based on the skimpiest of sketches. Ms. Vargas painted those details in very clearly strokes, yet I never felt her hand pushing me one way or the other to like or dislike a character. It was left to me to pass judgment.


Comments

Sean Chercover said…
Wow! Thanks so much. I'm honored to be in such company, and I'm thrilled that you dug the book.

Best,
Sean
Dave White said…
Thanks so much! Glad you liked it!

Popular posts from this blog

The Very Best of Mr. Dennis Lehane

I thought this post would appear in October. Ya, know when SHUTTER ISLAND: THE MOVIE was supposed to be released. And then it wasn't. Something about Leo not being able to do 'press' for the movie. Doesn't really matter the reason, a February release date has one of those fancy Hollywood meanings: Not Good. Look I'll be honest, I didn't connect with SHUTTER ISLAND. I loved the fifties setting, the haunted house atmosphere, and impending doom of the Hurricane. Even the set-up of the story was intriguing but how it played out just didn't work for me. Some interesting characters, a bunch of great set pieces, but the ending announces itself with an expected, thud that went nowhere. Am I still going to the movie? Its Lehane, Scorsese, Leo, and Ruffalo of course I am. Anyway the list. 8. Prayers for Rain - 1999 The last Kenzie-Gennaro book follows our heroes as they investigate a guy who is terrorizing women into committing suicide. The book played like an episo

A Fogotten Post: A Remembrance

[Editor's Note: Started this missive, never came back to it. Still relevant, I suppose.] I am reading MURDER IN OLD BOMBAY by Nev Marsh. This was... technically still is... on my to buy pile. In the before time... the overwhelming to be read pile time... I would have bought this and thrown it on the shelf to read in the near or more likely distant future. I hope I like it enough to buy the second in the series. Buying a book is fun, buying a book that is good is better. [Editor's Note: Abandoned this book, unfinished.] BLACKTOP WASTELAND - S.A. COSBY So glad I didn't buy this last summer. Good decision to put off buying and reading what would have certainly been one of the best books of the year. New goal for the remaining 2021 calendar. Don't be dumb. Buy Mr. Cosby's follow up and read day one! [Editor's Note: I did buy a signed copy of RAZORBLADE  TEARS, meanwhile B.W. won every award, except the Edgar where it wasn't even nominated!? Also Signed firsts of

Small Mercies - The Return of Dennis Lehane

 A time honored tradition at The Hungry Detective HQ is to perform the twice annual, and largely ceremonial, 'Dennis Lehane New book 20XX" Google search. Nothing comes up on his long abandoned Website, except notification of the script work for his television and film projects.  Grousing aside, 2022 was a big year for Mr. Lehane. BLACK BIRD, a show he created, played on Apple+ to solid acclaim. The show's star, Paul Walter Hauser, won a Golden Globe. But despite that I have yet to watch it. Not for any other reason than I am a movie person more than a TV person. The TV I do watch is watched in an arcane order that is difficult to decipher and even more baffling to explain. Short story, I need to watch ANDOR [Editor's Note: Slow going on ANDOR despite everyone telling me it is amazing.] And then BLACK BIRD, or maybe SLOW HORSES. I'll get there...  Anyway at the dead end of 2022, I did the search. Found out he wrote a book. SMALL MERCIES . I was excited to hear it. I