...is what I'm having. I've been reading quite a bit, though, most of it pretty good or at least interesting. Most recently finished A Philosophical Investigation by Philip Kerr, about which I'm ambivalent. Bought a used copy that had about fifty pages missing--printer error--from 209-270 or so. Had to buy another copy new to finish it, and was not too pleased. This is one of the interesting books: the time is 2013, and Scotland Yard has refined the investigation of serial killers. The heroine is an inspector of 'gynocide,' i.e., serial murders of women, who gets called into to solve a more traditional male-on-male string of murders. I cycled between fascination and boredom again and again--there is enough here to make this a worthwhile read if you can get it cheap, but maybe not if you have to spend $20 for two copies. I rarely throw around the word 'pretentious' but a lot of the killer's 'philosophical' monologues were striving to earn that descriptor, and were pretty damn tedious. And as much as I like tough, kick-ass women, our heroine was also a bit of a pill. 

A less self-consciously cerebral and more comfortably intelligent novel was Boy in the Water by Stephen Dobyns: interesting atmosphere, compelling language, and believable characters. Our tragic hero is a psychologist who takes a position as headmaster of a declining boy's school. He's got scars and a haunting past, and all kinds of bad things start happening after his arrival. It's less gothic than it sounds, though, and that's all to the good. Finishing this, I went to buy Dobyns' The Church of Dead Girls, which delivers more creepiness, a serial killer, small-town tensions, and a fairly compelling ensemble of characters. I was less happy with how a gay sexual orientation seemed inherently linked to a kind of moral ambiguity, but on the other hand the entire careful structure of the novel was its own warning against prejudice and assumptions, so don't let this caveat keep you from a killer story. 

Moving on to the gay mystery genre, found a used copy of Michael Nava's The Little Death, and as always enjoyed following the noirish investigations of Henry Rios. They're never as dark or gripping as Wilson's Justice novels, but they're still similar in many ways. 

Finally read Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, long after its heyday. What can I say about this? There's a reason they were able to wait five years before issuing this in paperback. I think I waited so long to read it out of sheer perversity, but it was highly engaging, all the more so because it was about real people and it's a shock to realize that there exist in actuality characters just as whimsical, complex, and over-the-top as any fictions ever invented. 

Last but not least, a recommendation of Places in the Dark, by Thomas Cook. This one felt thinner, starker than his usual works--skeletal, even--not sure why. I haven't compared to see whether it's actually shorter than his other books, but think it's not an issue of length but of style. You know how sometimes a particular work of a writer defines their essence? Well, this is Thomas Cook burned down to pure, dry ash and a bleak handful of bones. I won't say he needs to lighten up--that's hardly his thing--but he needs to resume writing about human beings rather than bloodless wraiths. 

That's all for now. I'm going back to sleep....

The book to read if you want to write Alex Krycek. Or one of them, anyway. Granted, we're not talking the truly sociopathic version, here. Or the feral sexaholic with a dark Russian past. This is just a nice, quiet tale about a professional hit man, what he thinks about, his worries, his conversations with Dot (the fixer), his girlfriend issues, his therapy, his dog. Think Wentworth's Ripley, but funnier, in a dry contemporary way. Think Martin Blank in Grosse Point Blank or Leon in The Professional.   

I liked this so much, I went right out and bought the next in the series, which just came out in hardcover. A hell of a quick read, for twenty-five bucks, but better value for the money than any three of your average piece-of-shit movies playing in theaters right now. 

Okay, I'll admit: John Keller, our antihero, is not really that much like Alex Krycek. But you probably need some fannish motivation to buy this book, after which you should enjoy it. Plus you'll get a lot of insight into the methodical business of killing people you don't know. Always helpful if you're planning a second career. 

The big question is always: is this book worth $6.99 in paperback, and what is the world coming to these days? 

Answer: yes. 

Buy yourself a Hit Man at Amazon.com.

Best mystery I've read in a while. Sentinel readers and writers may find this especially interesting, not because it's slashy or sentinelesque, but because it's set in Seattle and is very true to the city, and to certain keynotes of the coastal Pacific Northwest in general (the racial mix, the weather, the backdrop of the bay). 

Soon you'll be able to read my full review on Amazon.com (it's the one that says "The Real Deal," and will be dated sometime in late December), but in short: damn good. And unexpectedly so. I made a six-dollar decision to buy this, as with so many other seemingly fast-food books (which I often buy at the supermarket along with the chicken and cookies), based on the cover art and blurbs. I assumed when it said it was a story about a "Seattle cop" that it was a detective story. Where'd that assumption come from? It made me realize it's getting so that cop = detective in the minds of the viewing and reading public. Think about it. Any police movie or police procedural these days is likely to have a detective as its hero. I think it's because we're a hierarchical society that we assume the most interesting people are those with higher rank. 

Anyway, this revolved around a case worked by a few patrol cops, with limited detective involvement, and it was very satisfying. The details of Seattle are dead-on; this stays mostly in the First Avenue area, as the title suggests, which is more or less the Pike Place Market area. Lots of local color, but it was hard to pinpoint when this story was supposed to have taken place--now? Twenty years ago? I couldn't tell. It's that vague. I suppose I should be able to tell based on the technology--there don't seem to be any cell phones, for one thing. 

The characterizations are nice; everyone seems kind of zen, though. Kind of detached and muted. But that seems appropriate for a noirish tale like this. 

The plot's climax made me anxious; the subplot's climax made me sniffle. Not many books make me cry, so I must give a nod to the author's success in having wrung a few drops free. 

All in all, worth the money--and I know I'll re-read this at some point. 

Go to First Avenue on Amazon.com.

I bought this because the cover said 'Award-Winning Author' and had five blurbs from the New York Times Book Review, Booklist, Kirkus, et al. One of the blurbs said "A truly frightening scenario [blah blah]. . .nearly irresistible." It's that "nearly" part I should have paid attention to. 

I guessed the "truly frightening scenario" halfway through the book, and waited for it to be confirmed, which it was, and waited for something more that actually was truly frightening, which never came. The scenario, medical in nature, was rather like the heart of a Robin Cook thriller but rendered far more earnestly. This reads like the print version of a Lifetime original movie, or maybe something they bought the rights to from CBS at discount prices.You could feel the author straining the thin corset of her ability all the way through, and half of the story seemed missing, the fleshy half. In short, this is an author trying to put on weight, and failing. 

I didn't hurl the book across the room when I was done, cursing the hours wasted, but I didn't make any plans to run out and by another Rosemary Aubert book either. So there you go. 

Give yourself Free Reign at Amazon.com.

I read Ann Rule pretty religiously--one of the few true crime writers you can trust not to creepily sensationalize a story. Though I'm not clear on how she gathers her source material or the relationships she establishes with witness and paticipants, you can sense the foundations of trust and respect in her books for everyone involved. Except for the criminals, of course. 

Trouble is, most of her later books don't pack the same wallop as her chilling and fascinating examination of Ted Bundy, The Stranger Beside Me. They're methodical and detailed, but they don't carry the sharp whiff of visceral involvement that Stranger did. Still, And Never Let Her Go is interesting as a portrait of a repulsive everyman who obsessed on a young woman, killed her, and then topped off his moral grotesquerie by being a selfish, manipulative prick. It's the post-mortem behavior rather than the killing itself which will strike the reader as especially icky. 

I know it's horrible to say, but I didn't work up a lot of interest in the victim here. Rule effortfully tried to create sympathy, but by the end of the book I still really didn't care about the victim's eating disorder or work at the governor's office, her difficult childhood or how close she was to her family. I myself would make an unsympathetic victim, I think, to the average reader. Or a boring one. 

I'd give this a solid B. Nothing particularly gripping, but it was absorbing, if you like that sort of thing. 

Find And Never Let Her Go at Amazon.com.

I bought this in about thirty seconds while looking for  brown-bag reading material--no, no, wait. Brown-bag, i.e., for lunch, not smut. So anyway. At a glance, the deciding factors were a beautifully designed cover, an Edgar Award nomination seal, and the words 'Scotland Yard' and 'criminal psychology' in the back-cover blurb. Such is the power of marketing. 

And my instincts, along with those of marketing MBAs, were true, because this is a very good book. It seems to be the author's first, which is nice too--another name that can be added to my mental browse list, which was getting a bit thin. 

The plot is summed up on the back cover, but basically it's a post-WWI novel set in England, in which a Yard dick applies a smattering of new criminal profiling techniques to finding a serial killer. I don't know how accurate the evidence procedures are for the period, but this is loosely based on fact and it was refreshing to read a 'vintage' mystery that wasn't built on the fluff of house-party chats and drawing-room confessions. The serial killer aspects themselves were not of the grotesque style we're used to reading about in contemporary fiction--no skinning of faces or anything--but still interesting. And the character of John Madden was brooding, scarred, and damaged. All good traits for a protagonist. 

There wasn't really any slash, except that it seemed like every time Madden had sex with his lady, he dreamed or thought of a man afterwards. Of course, it was subtle and I look for those things, but it was still kind of funny. 

Worth the money, so check out River of Darkness in paperback on Amazon.com, if you're needing mysfic.

Reginald Hill. Probably the best mystery author you're not reading. Hill started off writing weird, spy-gothic shlock which didn't break new ground; but then, sometime in the late 60s, early 70s, he kicked off his brillant Dalziel / Pascoe mystery series. In two or three books he hit his stride and then he was off, never looking back. 

Dalziel / Pascoe is a bit of a misnomer, since the books revolve around a triumvirate of Yorkshire cops. The third wheel is Sargeant Wield, but these books would not be what they are without him--which is, a perfect three-point balance of earthy wit, intelligence, and character. Hill offers stunningly well-tuned Yorkshire dialogue, seven different kinds of wit, a natural storytelling style, and a cast of enduring characters: Superintendent "Fat Andy" Dalziel, Detective Inspector Peter Pascoe, Wield, Ellie Pascoe, et al. I'd blather on, but you can read excerpts; just keep scrolling. 

Asking for the Moon is a collection of four short stories ranging from the detectives' first to last mystery (the last story is set several years in the future); and, really, it's a book for fans of the series. Not where you'd want to start chewing if you were working your way down the author's buffet table. It is what I'm reading this week, but this isn't just a tease--if you want to someday pick this up, start with Hill's series in order. His maturation can be traced from book to book, and you'll like seeing the characters develop. 

I'm telling you to grab these books now because you have a golden opportunity. Many of his titles that have been out of print in the U.S. were recently re-released. (Asking is a re-release as well.) Snap these up! Careless publishers will almost surely let them go out of print again. 

Here's a list of the titles in order published, with links to Amazon.com; some of these detail pages (more recent titles, mostly) will have excerpts: 

A Clubbable Woman (1970) -- trade 
An Advancement Of Learning (1971) -- trade 
Ruling Passion (1973) -- mass market 
An April Shroud (1975) -- trade 
A Pinch Of Snuff  (1978) 
A Killing Kindness (1980) -- trade 
Deadheads (1983) -- trade 
Exit Lines (1984) -- trade 
Child's Play (1987) -- trade 
Under World (1988) -- trade 
Bones And Silence (1990) -- mass market 
Recalled To Life (1992) -- mass market 
Pictures Of Perfection (1994) -- mass market 
The Wood Beyond (1996) -- mass market 
On Beulah Height (1998) -- mass market 
Arms and the Women (1999) --hardcover 
Asking for the Moon  

You may also want to try looking for used copies at Bibliofind.com.

What's with Laurie King? She used to be pretty cool, with her fan-fictionish Sherlock Holmes spin-offs and her nice lesbian detective series. But her latest in that series is rather lame. I've read it, it's over, and I have only a dim memory of the killer's identity because that person was irrelevant and as soon as I closed the book I didn't care. Maybe even before that. 

And I bought the damn thing in hardcover. 

But, you know, I'll probably give her two or three more tries--maybe even in hardcover--before I stop snapping up her books the way I stopped with Sandra Scoppettone. Every lesbian mystery protagonist exerts a certain compelling...um, compulsion. Simply by being a rare beast. 

(On the other hand, that argument holds less water when you're trying to read the lame prose of Ellen Hart, whose protagonist Jane Lawless is about as amusing as carpet lint.) 

So do I rec King's book? Not especially. Not for $20 plus bucks. Wait for paperback, and then if you like it more than you expected you'll really feel like you got a deal. Read it when you're desperate for light prose and read it with chocolates and booze at hand, like when you're sick or bored, or both. 

Still, go take a look at Night Work at Amazon.com if you're so minded.

This is the third in the Justice series that includes Simple Justice and Revision to Justice. The fourth is also out in hardcover: The Limits of Justice. It's an L.A. noir type of series with a gay protagonist, Benjamin Justice. He's a reporter down on his luck, with scandals in his past, trying to regain a foothold on life. 

This is a great series--not at all a lightweight contender,  serious without being earnest. It has solid plots, an interestingly damaged character, rivers of angst, and intimate relationships. The sex is soft-core or the scenes are elided, but there's a good current of electricity running through each book. There's political awareness without  self-conscious political correctness, and the style is a bit akin to that of Thomas Cook, only lower in key. 

If you like mysteries and have been looking for something slashy while splashing around in the mainstream, you won't be disappointed. 

Take a look at Simple Justice at Amazon.com.