Skip to main content

The Ocean of Stephen Booth

I have gotten back into reading Stephen Booth after a prolonged absence of five or six years. An absence that was due to the loss of a US publisher for his books and not picking them up once he found a new one. Last summer, I purchased all of the missing books in UK editions. The condition is lacking in most, but seeing as I got the five of them for about fifty dollars I'm not that concerned. Mr. Booth is one of the reasons I am embarking on this project. As it turned out, I had more unread than read books by Mr. Booth. With that in mind, at the end of last year, I picked up where I had left off with THE KILL CALL (Yay!) and LOST RIVER (Eh...).

I find Mr. Booth to be a super reliable author. His best books are very good, and his lesser efforts are only minor dips in the road. If I had any trepidation in reading 2011's THE DEVIL'S EDGE it is that THE LOST RIVER was one of those dips in the road. Long story short the plot just never came together for me. Also giving me pause is that Mr. Booth has always been a slow read for me, as they average about two weeks. This presents a real problem in that I am trying to read a lot of books by a predetermined date. I have four more books by Mr. Booth on the shelf, plus one that I need to purchase, and whatever else he publishes between now and the conclusion of this project. Simply, I could spend 3-4 months just reading Cooper and Fry novels.

Of course, that would be a great pleasure if they all are as good as THE DEVIL'S EDGE. Mr. Booth has always been good at stripping his character down to their raw emotions. Small slights and perceived threats hold the most danger in his work. He draws common characters with uncommon honesty. People pushed to limits who make stupid decisions that all too often only protect their ego, and this goes for criminal and cop alike.

Detective Ben Cooper has always been the cop with folksy charm, maybe not the smartest tack in the drawer, but certainly dogged. He is the lead here as Mr. Booth's other creation, Detective Diane Fry has taken the back seat in the last two novels. Fry has always been a prickly character and never more so in this book. Her rare appearance in THE DEVIL'S EDGE seems timed to not only bring an audible groan out of her (former?) colleagues but the readers as well. I am certainly interested in where this is going as the success of Mr. Booth's books balances on a scale between the two detectives. However, there is no denying Fry's presence in the proceedings has been a bitter pill to swallow going back a few books now. In any case, all will be revealed soon as I will undoubtedly pick up another Cooper and Fry novel soon.

 I'm on to the next one now. Walter Mosely's CHARCOAL JOE.






Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Very Best of Mr. Michael Connelly - Part 2

My August 31 post of The Hungry Detective ranked all the non-Bosch books. This list returns to take on the larger task of Mr. Heironimous Bosch. 9 Dragons made its appearance right before the Indy B'Con, and try as I might... ok I didn't try that hard... I didn't have time to read it for inclusion in these rankings. As a quick aside I don't want to undersell any of the books at the bottom of the list. Mr. Connelly doesn't know how to write a bad book, but in my case there have been occasions where I have not connected with his work. 13. THE NARROWS - 2004 It is because I love THE POET so much that this book is at the end of the list. When Mr. Connelly is at his best his works has the precision of a watchmaker. THE NARROWS just felt forced and not worthy of the intricacy of THE POET. 12. BLACK ICE - 1993 Second book. Third read. I thought the story was pretty flat. It has been well over a decade since I read this book, but the story of Mexican drug runner...
1 comment
Read more

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...
4 comments
Read more

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...
Post a Comment
Read more