Micro Mention "The Force"

If he had just predicted the pandemic, Don Winslow might have been a prophet with this book, “The Force.” The sheer passion and drive in this novel is like a clenched fist, nails driving into the palms until blood is drawn.

This book is all momentum and the characters in it never stop unless they're stopped, and that's always violent. Winslow captures the whole tension with policing in America right now and renders it in vibrant jagged relief for us as the reader. To sum it up, it's a very aptly named novel about corrupt cops.

If you'd like to read my full review of it, you can find it here.

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Author's Website: http://don-winslow.com/

"The Force," by Don Winslow--Fiction Review

For today’s review, let’s talk about something soothing—just kidding, let’s dive into Don Winslow’s ultra fast-paced crime thriller “The Force.”

***The Non-Spoiler part of this review***

What I love about this book:

There is an energy to Winslow’s writing, a momentum that doesn’t just propel you forward through the plot of this novel, but rather it feels like it flings you bodily. It’s in everything, in the punchiness of the writing, the structure of the story, the settings described, and especially in the manic characters who inhabit Winslow’s version of New York. I found myself still thinking of this book days after having finished it.

I like that this story isn’t a rehashing of the concept of watching the main character struggle with the best intentions but gets corrupted by certain choices and circumstances. No, that shit is all in the past—Detective Malone and his crew are dirty cops from page one. And right there, on that first page, is where the crumbling of their world starts to crescendo—implied by the first sentence! The pacing from there only barely takes little breathers, and sometimes I like an ultra fast-paced narrative. I like this book for that.

With this subgenre of police thriller/suspense, the world’s authenticity and believability are the book’s lifeblood, and Winslow doesn’t disappoint in that regard. In fact, with everything going on with protests and whatnot, I’ve said before that if Winslow had just managed to predict a global pandemic in the next few years when this book came out in 2017, he’d be a god damn prophet. So it feels believable.

What I don’t love about this book:

I don’t like Detective Denny Malone. I know, weird thing to say about a story I said I like that pivots around the character of Denny Malone. He’s vital for this story’s narrative—no argument there—but I still don’t like him. It’s not that I can’t stomach a protagonist who is a bad person. After all, I thoroughly enjoyed “The Godfather,” which I’ve seen this book described as “The Godfather” for corrupt cops. What I don’t like are characters who delude themselves into thinking of themselves as somehow justified, especially people in positions of power within society—like corrupt cops.

Speaking as a liberal snowflake myself—in more than one way given my lily-white complexion—this was an incredibly awkward book to listen to right now. I’ll give you an example, but first, as you might have read before in my earlier reviews, I’m an audiobook person. That’s important to my story. Quick aside, Dion Graham did an amazing job narrating. Anyway, back to the story, whilst grocery shopping, I listened to this book, on high, because grocery stores are noisy places. This means that if you are, say, in the same aisle as me, you might hear my audiobook blasting in my head. Especially when Dion Graham starts scream-singing “F the Police,” not that song’s actual title, by N.W.A. because that’s what the characters are doing in the story—looks were had.

But other than that, it’s just an odd book—a perspective from corrupt cops—to be reading while the public eye intensely focuses on how there is a problem with policing in America. It’s uncomfortable, and I don’t love feeling uncomfortable. I think that’s Winslow’s point though, there IS a problem, and we SHOULD feel uncomfortable. He uses his deeply flawed characters to illuminate those problems through their eyes.

This preview is an Amazon Affiliate link; 

as an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

Author's Website: http://don-winslow.com/

***The Spoiler part of this review***

***Ye be warned to turn back now***

The quick and dirty synopsis:

Like I said above, right off, we’re told that Detective Denny Malone is a corrupt cop, and other authorities than himself have just caught up with him.

"The Ark," by Patrick S. Tomlinson--Fiction Review

Today we’re going to escape Earth for a new beginning in a new solar system—sounds pretty good given everything going on right now—in this science fiction/detective mystery “The Ark” by Patrick S. Tomlinson. Don’t worry—people are still shitty generations later and in space.

***The Non-Spoiler part of this review***

What I love about this book:

It’s an interesting concept because the plot is essentially a murder mystery baked into a science fiction setting. You might think that blending the two genres might weaken both elements, but Tomlinson has the chops to do both justice.

I was pleasantly surprised that “The Ark” is pretty consistently hard science fiction despite having one of those high-concepts that could easily shift into soft science fiction. You’d think a murder mystery in space would be more focused on the more psychological elements, typical of crime fiction, and shared by soft science fiction. Tomlinson does address the psychological motives, so it isn’t unaddressed, but he also never takes his hand off the wheel when describing the science and engineering behind “The Ark.”

 

What I don’t love about this book:

Our main character, Benson, for the most part, is a likable gumshoe to be following around, but his follow-through feels inconsistent to me at times. So when they discover the body of a murdered crew member, floating out in space outside of the ship, he personally goes out in a maintenance pod to retrieve it. Then there is the bit where he alienates the owner of his favorite restaurant and another time where he storms onto the bridge to demand answers from the captain, to get the truth, damn it! So you’d think, this here is a guy that will do anything to get the job done right. Except he also sleeps with his girlfriend at a crime scene. Then there is the time he calls off a manhunt half-way through because, eh, he doesn’t feel like they’re going to find anything.

This preview is an Amazon Affiliate link; 

as an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

Author's Website: https://www.patrickstomlinson.com/

***The Spoiler part of this review***

***Ye be warned to turn back now***

The quick and dirty synopsis:

So the story begins with Benson at a sports event. It’s a game called zero played at—you guessed it—zero gravity. Benson is a big fan because he used to be a captain of one of the teams when he was younger and before he was a cop. Now, he’s “chief,” such as it is of his own police department on his side of the Ark, the great generation starship humanity created to save a select few and find a new homeworld when Earth was destroyed.

"A Study in Scarlet," by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle--Fiction Review

For this Friday, my obscure gumshoes, we’re dusting off our magnifying glasses and deerstalker caps and heading back to the end of the 1800s with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “A Study in Scarlet” the story that introduced us to the legendary Sherlock Holmes. 

***The Non-Spoiler part of this review***

What I love about this book:

“A Study in Scarlet” is the classic story that introduces the archetypical detective. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes wasn’t the first detective in classic fiction. Edgar Allan Poe may have done that with his C. Auguste Dupin before there was a word for “detective”—but all the same, I’d argue Sherlock Holmes is the one whose larger than life persona shades all others. A lot of the reason for this, I feel, is because Holmes is such an eccentric character, which is why we keep remaking movies and tv shows about the character. In his first appearance with this novel, he doesn’t disappoint in being the full-fledged weird know-it-all he’s consistently portrayed as throughout the generations—and I’ve always loved this oddball coke addict.

I should reveal now that, no, I can never figure out any of these mysteries before the solution is revealed. Nor would I want to, I imagine, if I can figure it out, it would take away the mystique of the character.  

What I don’t love about this book:

There is a hard shift in part two of this book to a story about the American west, and the founding of Salt Lake City, and Mormons—and honestly, I thought I was suddenly reading something else, the break in narrative flow is that extreme. It circles back to London, and Baker’s Street, and Sherlock Holmes after a while, but it isn’t a short interlude this whole sordid Mormons tale. It’s a significant component of “A Study In Scarlet” and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle—doesn’t feel right to me to call him anything other than his full name—does eventually explain through the narrative when we do return to London with Holmes and Watson. The device is to tell who the murderer was and why he murdered his victims. Still, I don’t really like it because it makes the narrative seem to become a completely different story, and if you’re not prepared for it, the whole experience is jarring.   

This preview is an Amazon Affiliate link; 

as an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

***The Spoiler part of this review***

***Ye be warned to turn back now***

"Down the River unto the Sea," by Walter Mosley--Fiction Review

It’s Friday gumshoes, and today’s review is of a noir-style detective mystery, “Down the River unto the Sea” by Walter Mosley.  

***The Non-Spoiler part of this review***

What I love about this book:

First, the gritty uncompromising detail of this novel, it’s a noir-style mystery, so that’s appropriate. Also, the main character, Joe King Oliver, who was formerly NYPD and was framed and disgraced by dirty cops in the department and sent to Rikers Island, has the added dimension of being an ex-cop in prison and being black. So it doesn’t go well—would be a massive understatement. Mosley captures the horrors of being a black man on the wrong side of the law and the unique terror of being simultaneously a fallen paragon of said law.

It’s no secret here if you’re a return reader of this blog, but I’m a big audiobook fan. So a big reason I like this book is that the narrator, Dion Graham, perfectly captures the voice of the world-weary PI. Something about his performance makes Walter Mosley’s already polished but blunt—straightforward but educated—prose sparkle. There is a quality to the writing that without coming right out and saying it, that this is what the real lived-in world is like, and it sweeps you up in its narrative and doesn’t stop until it’s over.     

There are references to jazz, and Thelonious Monk in the narrative, which are appropriate because if a book could capture the spirit of a jazzy improvisational style without being a book specifically about jazz music—it’s this one. Mosley’s writing above all else to me is musical, lyrical even. 

What I don’t love about this book:

A lot of criminal mystery novel clichés are packed into this plot. The twists and turns in the plot are all rote and barely caused me anything resembling shock. I don’t want to give you the wrong impression, and this doesn’t make it a bad novel, it’s just a little predictable. 

You know how I just said this novel two paragraphs ago, captures the spirit of jazzy improvisation? Yeah, I meant that purely in how Mosley writes, the actual writing stylistically ebbs and flows, changes, and experiments. The plotting doesn’t do that. Nearly every chapter of the book has a sandwich quality. What I mean by this is: the critical information comes at the beginnings and ends of each chapter. The in-between bits are where the character work happens, which is enjoyable, since Mosley’s characters are all flawed, and interesting, multifaceted people.

There is one thing though about the main character that I don’t like: he has a troublesome relationship with women, in general. He doesn’t hate them or hit them, nothing like that, but you could say he loves them a little too much, which includes his daughter. Some of his comments and observations are creepy.    

Every time I read a detective mystery, or a police procedural, where there is someone seemingly in the inner circle of the detective who is probably a traitor, I play a game. And the game is called: is the traitor the detective's best friend/long time partner/trusted mentor?  

 

This preview is an Amazon Affiliate link; 

as an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

Author's Website: http://www.waltermosley.com/

***The Spoiler part of this review***

***Ye be warned to turn back now***