Oliver Clarke's Blog: Little Slices of Nasty, page 11

Lost Hills by Lee Goldberg #BookReview

CriminOlly thinks: With a credible mystery at it’s heart, this is light and a bit throwaway, but compelling throughout. 3/5

Title: Lost Hills | Author: Lee Goldberg | Series: Eve Ronin #1 | Publisher: Thomas & Mercer | Pages: 237 | ISBN: 9781542093804 | Publication date: 1st January 2020 | Source: Self-purchased | Content warnings: Yes | Tolerance warning: No

Review

‘Lost Hills’ is a book by a writer you may not have heard of, but whose work you almost certainly know. Author Lee Goldberg has been writing novels since the 1980s, but it’s his scripts for popular TV shows you’re more likely to have experienced. He’s written for ‘Diagnosis Murder’, ‘Monk’, ‘Baywatch’, ‘Seaquest DSV’ and many other series. His books reflect that background – they’re often set in Los Angeles and are short, punchy, undemanding and very enjoyable. I’ve read half a dozen or so and found them to be wonderful distractions from everyday life, just what popular entertainment should be.

‘Lost Hills’ is no exception. It tells the tale of a young, female cop in LA, Eve Ronin. Eve is thrust into the limelight after a video of her arresting a celebrity who has been beating his girlfriend goes viral. Promoted to detective and partnered up with a ageing male officer who is counting the days until retirement, Eve lands a big case when she stumbles on a house that shows signs of a bloody struggle, but no sign of the family who lived there.

The book that follows is fast-paced, light hearted and lots of fun. Eve is an engaging heroine, determined and smart and constantly fighting the male colleagues who attribute her promotion to quota filling. Whilst the book has the glossy sheen of a TV show, it’s also packed with the kind of investigative detail that gives it a pleasing verisimilitude. There’s forensics, interviews and lots of lots of legwork.

What shines most of all is Goldberg’s ability to construct a compelling mystery and then allow his sleuth to credibly solve it. Eve never makes the kind of leaps of intuition that sometimes derail mystery novels, instead it’s logic and determination that lead her to the solution. The result is a book that’s light and a bit throwaway, but also absorbing and satisfying.

Here there be spoilers!

My reviews are always spoiler-free (guaranteed, or double your money back ). Sometimes there is information about a book that potential readers might find useful, but which might give a thing or two away. Below this line you’ll find the publisher’s synopsis of the book (pretty much guaranteed to have spoilers in my experience), content warnings and tolerance warnings. Generally, I won’t not review a book just because it contains views I don’t agree with, but if it does, I will call it out.

Synopsis

A video of Deputy Eve Ronin’s off-duty arrest of an abusive movie star goes viral, turning her into a popular hero at a time when the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department is plagued by scandal. The sheriff, desperate for more positive press, makes Eve the youngest female homicide detective in the department’s history.

Now Eve, with a lot to learn and resented by her colleagues, has to justify her new badge. Her chance comes when she and her burned-out, soon-to-retire partner are called to the blood-splattered home of a missing single mother and her two kids. The horrific carnage screams multiple murder—but there are no corpses.

Eve has to rely on her instincts and tenacity to find the bodies and capture the vicious killer, all while battling her own insecurities and mounting pressure from the media, her bosses, and the bereaved family. It’s a deadly ordeal that will either prove her skills…or totally destroy her.

Warnings

Tolerance Warning: All good

Content Warning: Domestic abuse

Razorblade Tears by SA Cosby #BookReview

CriminOlly thinks: Cosby has reinvented the pulp crime novel for the 2020s. Thrilling, compassionate and righteously angry. 5/5

Title: Razorblade Tears | Author: SA Cosby | Publisher: Headline | Pages: 336 | ISBN: 9781472286529 | Publication date: 6th July 2021 | Source: Self-purchased | Content warnings: Yes | Tolerance warning: No

Review

Quite rightly, everyone raved about SA Cosby’s blisteringly kinetic crime debut ‘Blacktop Wasteland’ when it was released last year. That includes me, and you can read my review of it here. The danger with an out of nowhere, word of mouth smash like that from a new author is that it ends up being a flash in the pan. A one off work of genius that the writer can’t repeat. For that reason I was nervous opening ‘Razorblade Tears’. It took me precisely one paragraph to know I had nothing to worry about.

The setup of the book is one of my favourite things about it. The heroes, Ike and Buddy Lee, are both ex-cons, one white, one black. They’re brought together when their sons, a married gay couple, are murdered. The two men set out to find the killers and kick off a truly memorable, gripping novel that is one of the best examples of popular fiction I’ve read in years. It mixes mystery, action and a buddy movie style odd couple to make a thriller that ticks every single box. In ‘Blacktop Wasteland’ Cosby proved he could write car chases that screamed off the page with the energy of a great movie. In ‘Razorblade Tears’ he does the same thing with gunfights. The shootouts here grip and thrill completely, not least because the reader really cares about the outcome.

Not only is it brilliantly entertaining, it also comments on the state of modern America without ever feeling preachy. It covers racism, homophobia, and the affects of poverty, in a way that doesn’t shy away from the hard questions. Ike and Buddy Lee both struggle with their sons’ gay identities but come to a new understanding of equality in a way that feels completely natural. They’re both great characters. Ike a dour, determined man who reminded me a little of Walter Mosley’s Socrates Fortlow. Buddy Lee a washed up, wisecracking alcoholic redneck who finds redemption through his quest for justice.

I really think that Cosby has reinvented the pulp crime novel for the 2020s. His prose may go over the top at times, but it’s never less than brilliantly readable and has a raw authenticity that makes it a delight to read. Whether he’s describing acts of violence or tenderness his words have huge impact. ‘Razorblade Tears’ really does have everything you could want from a book. It’s filled with humour, compassion and righteous violence. It thrilled me and moved me and I can’t wait for Cosby’s next book.

Here there be spoilers!

My reviews are always spoiler-free (guaranteed, or double your money back ). Sometimes there is information about a book that potential readers might find useful, but which might give a thing or two away. Below this line you’ll find the publisher’s synopsis of the book (pretty much guaranteed to have spoilers in my experience), content warnings and tolerance warnings. Generally, I won’t not review a book just because it contains views I don’t agree with, but if it does, I will call it out.

Synopsis

Ike Randolph has been out of jail for fifteen years, with not so much as a speeding ticket in all that time. But a Black man with cops at the door knows to be afraid.

The last thing he expects to hear is that his son Isiah has been murdered, along with Isiah’s white husband, Derek. Ike had never fully accepted his son but is devastated by his loss.

Derek’s father Buddy Lee was almost as ashamed of Derek for being gay as Derek was ashamed his father was a criminal. Buddy Lee still has contacts in the underworld, though, and he wants to know who killed his boy.

Ike and Buddy Lee, two ex-cons with little else in common other than a criminal past and a love for their dead sons, band together in their desperate desire for revenge. In their quest to do better for their sons in death than they did in life, hardened men Ike and Buddy Lee will confront their own prejudices about their sons and each other, as they rain down vengeance upon those who hurt their boys.

Warnings

Tolerance Warning: All good

Content Warning: Racism, homophobia, transphobia, drug abuse

6 Pulp Paperback series on Kindle

Everyone knows part of the fun of pulp fiction is in the physical books and the lurid covers, but sometimes the physical books can be challenging to get hold of, not to mention expensive.

Fortunately, this being the digital age, many of the series have been born again on Kindle, They’re not always cheap (unless you catch them in a deal) but they are at least immediately available. If nothing else it can be an easy way to try out a series or author and decide if you want to play hunt the paperbacks.

In no particular order, here’s my pick of 6 that are worth a look.

Edge

Penned by British author Terry Harknett under the pseudonym George G Gilman, this brutal western series started in the 1970s and ran to over 60 books. You can read my review of the first book here.

Amazon UK link

Matt Helm

Portrayed by Dean Martin in the movies (and featured in Tarantino’s ‘Once Upon a Time in Hollywood’), Helm is often seen as the American Bond. I reviewed the first book, ‘Death of a Citizen’ here.

Amazon UK

Eastern Front

Written by British horror master Shaun Hutson under the name Wolf Kruger, presumably to cash in in the success of Sven Hassel’s books. This short lived World War 2 series has all the violence and misery you’d expect from Hutson writing war fiction.

Amazon UK

MIA Hunter

Written by Stephen Mertz and a few others (including at time Joe R Lansdale), this men’s adventure series features grizzled special forces heroes rescuing US POWs in far flung lands. My review of the first book is coming soon.

Amazon UK

Gor

John Norman’s decidedly dodgy fantasy series has gone under various titles – ‘The Chronicles of Counter Earth’, ‘The Saga of Tarl Cabot’, ‘The Gorean Cycle’, and more. Whatever you choose to call them, they’re a slightly uneasy mix of traditional pulp adventure and misogynist wish fulfilment. I’ll be reviewing the first book here soon.

Amazon UK

The Executioner

No list like this could be complete without Mack Bolan. The Executioner books and their sister titles were my introduction to men’s adventure back in the 1980s and there is still a lot to enjoy in them.

Amazon UK

Good Neighbours by Sarah Langan #BookReview

I’m delighted that this review is part of the Titan Books blog tour to promote ‘Good Neighbours’. Massive thanks to them for the opportunity to take part and for providing me with a review copy of the book.

Welcome to Maple Street, a picture-perfect slice of suburban Long Island, its residents bound by their children, their work, and their illusion of safety in a rapidly changing world.

But when the Wilde family moves in, they trigger their neighbours’ worst fears. Arlo and Gertie and their weird kids don’t fit with the ways Maple Street sees itself.

As tensions mount, a sinkhole opens in a nearby park, and neighbourhood Queen Bee Rhea’s daughter Shelly falls inside. The search for Shelly brings a shocking accusation against the Wildes. Suddenly, it is one mom’s word against the others in a court of public opinion that can end only in blood.

Title: Good Neighbours | Author: Sarah Langan | Publisher: Titan Books | Publication date: 12th July 2021 | Source: Publisher

‘Good Neighbours’ is very different from the kinds of books I intend to review here, but it was so damn good I had to get my thoughts down somewhere. Sarah Langan isn’t an author I’ve come across before, but I’ll definitely be looking out for her work in future.

The cover conjures up the kind of domestic thriller that I usually take pains to avoid. The Liane Moriarty kind of thing with suburban women talking to each other a lot and some kind of mystery stringing it all together. Fortunately, ‘Good Neighbours’ is a very different beast. It has a darkness at its core that Shirley Jackson would have been proud of and the kind of well observed take on modern middle class society that Celeste Ng does so well.

The story concerns the Wildes, a slightly rough around the edges family who have moved to a well to do suburb that does little to welcome them. Two relationships anchor the story, one between Gertie Wilde and her neighbour Rhea Shroeder and another between their daughters, Julia and Shelly. Right from the off, Langan includes excerpts from books about a violent tragedy that befalls the residents of Maple Street, so we know all along that things aren’t going to end well.

The path between the start and the finale is a twisting one and kept me hooked and off balance. It’s filled with little cruelties and much larger ones, and with an acute psychological insight into what makes people tick. Langan throws in a mysterious sinkhole, which might have felt like a clumsy metaphor but actually works well here, giving the book an otherworldly sinisterness that goes beyond people being beastly to each other.   

The thing that makes the book work as well as it does, is the depth of the characters. All are convincing and sympathetic, even when they’re being awful. Combine that with the sense of impending doom that comes from knowing that you’re hurtling towards a terrible event and you have something very strong indeed. ‘Good Neighbours’ is a rmodern thriller that is as chilling and gripping as it is moving. Highly recommended.

4/5

Pulp Paperback: Edge – The Loner by George G Gilman #BookReview

This is the first book in a new western series, but it’s more than just another novel of the American west. This is the bloodiest and most violent story that ever erupted from our native territory. Here is mean, bone-chilling raw stuff, a compelling tale you’ll never forget.

His given name was Josiah Hedges, an innocent-enough monicker. But one look at the cruel set of his mouth and the icy penetration of his blue eyes and anyone would recognize pure danger in man’s clothing. Now let’s find out how this man lost his name and became known as Edge.

Title: The Loner | Author: George G Gilman | Series: Edge #1 | Publisher: New English Library | Pages: 138 | Publication date: 1972 | Source: Self-purchased

God knows how many times I’ve passed up the opportunity to buy books in the ‘Edge’ series for peanuts, but now that I’ve read one I’ll be scouring the charity shops for them. This is pulp done right: short, brutal and full of colour. Written by Englishman Terry Harknett under the far more grizzled sounding pen name George G Gilman, there were 61 entries in the series, along with another 3 where the titular hero teamed up with another of Gilman’s western characters, Adam Steele. This Kindle edition of the first of the ‘Edge’ books has an introduction from Harknett which talks about how he got into the western genre (writing movie novelisations).

The story here is pretty typical western fare. A lone hero battling a ruthless gang in an attempt to get vengeance for his dead brother.The plot moves along at a pace and is chock full of action and incident. What makes it such a great read is the writing and the central character. Edge is a thoroughly dislikable bastard, but so determined, and so much less evil than the villains of the piece, that you can’t help rooting for in. The fact that he is half Mexican is also fascinating for a pulp western and allows Gilman to address racism in a way that few westerns do.

Gilman’s prose is pure pulp. Terse and punchy but descriptive where it needs to be (mostly when describing sex or violence). It’s superbly gripping and enjoyably nasty, with more than enough death and mayhem to please anyone.

I loved every sweaty, bloody page and can’t wait to read more of them.

4/5

Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke by Eric LaRocca #BookReview

Sadomasochism. Obsession. Death.

A whirlpool of darkness churns at the heart of a macabre ballet between two lonely young women in an internet chat room in the early 2000s—a darkness that threatens to forever transform them once they finally succumb to their most horrific desires.

What have you done today to deserve your eyes?

Title: Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke | Author: Eric LaRocca | Publisher: Weird Punk Books | Pages: 120 | ISBN: 9781951658120 | Publication date: 1 June 2021 | Source: Self-purchased

Eric LaRocca’s ‘Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke’ seems to be everywhere on social media at the moment. So much so that it managed to wheedle its way into my subconscious like some kind of literary parasite and nag at me until I bought it. My resistance was worn down by the brilliant cover, the intriguing title and the excellent tag line “what have you done today to deserve your eyes?”. All wonderfully creepy and when combined with a slew of 5 star reviews I ended up feeling like I had no option but to buy the damned thing. 10 quid for a 100 page novella. Ouch.

And what’s it like? Well basically it’s fucking weird. A lot of that is deliberate but some of it, I fear, really wasn’t. Told in a series of emails and instant messenger conversations it describes the remote relationship between two women which rapidly shifts from the mundane to sadomasochism, with one of them dominating the other and forcing her to undertake a series of increasingly extreme tasks.

The style makes it quite readable and the gradual ramp up in the severity of the instructions lends it an undeniable tension. You know it’s going to keep getting worse and it does. It all makes for an interesting study of abusive/dependent relationships but too often I found myself scratching my head in bemusement. This was the case right from the start, the opening being a lengthy discussion of an antique apple peeler that felt just idiosyncratic enough to be distractingly bizarre.

The other problem I had was the ridiculously flowery language the women use at times. The IM conversations work well, but the emails often felt completely unconvincing and took me right out of the story. And then there’s the fact that the story doesn’t really go anywhere. It does gradually increase in extremity and bizarreness as it progresses, and the ending is quite creepy, but I couldn’t help feeling I was reading a different book to the one everyone is raving about. My reaction when I finished it was an overwhelming “so what”.

3/5

Nocturne by Ed McBain #BookReview

In Isola, the hours between midnight and dawn are usually a quiet time. But for the 87th Precinct detectives Carella and Hawes, the murder of an old woman makes the wee hours anything but peaceful–especially when they learn she was one of the greatest concert pianists of the century long vanished. Meanwhile 88th Precinct cop Fat Ollie Weeks has his own early morning nightmare: he’s on the trail of three prep school boys and a crack dealer who spent the evening carving up a hooker.

Title: Nocturne | Author: Ed McBain | Series: 87th Precinct #48 | Publisher: Hodder | Pages: 291 | ISBN: 9780340695401 | Publication date: 1997 | Source: Self-purchased

I wasn’t planning to write a full length review of this entry in the 87th Precinct series, but it’s such an interesting example of McBain’s craft I felt compelled to once I’d finished it.

It’s very much a book of two halves. It’s common for these books to have two or more storylines, but I’m not sure the difference between two parallel plots has ever been as stark as it is here. There’s a cosy caper that feels a bit like the one of those 60s Hitchcock films with Cary Grant, with Carella and Hawes investigating the murder of an old woman and her cat, whilst the victim’s lounge singer granddaughter also chases down the facts. She is accompanied by a comic duo who are both her bodyguards and her lovers and the book contains a brilliantly funny sex scene, as well as some wonderfully farcical moments where both they and the cops keep nearly running into each other. I’m fact ‘Nocturne’ had me laughing out loud more than any other recent book in the series.

On the other hand, Fat Ollie Weeks investigates a crime spree perpetrated by 3 privileged white college boys in Diamondback, the predominantly black borough of the city. This storyline contains a number of moments of casual violence which are both nauseating and chilling. One murder is so murder so graphic and horrid that it matches anything you might read in a horror novel. It leaves that half of the book feeling like the lost Bret Easton Ellis novel between Less Than Zero and American Psycho

The huge gulf between the two plots left me wondering whether ‘Nocturne’ was a failed experiment on McBain’s part or a work of genius. I think I’ve ended up leaning towards the latter, with the contrasts that the book throws up feeling measured and deliberate rather than haphazard. If nothing else, McBain is highlighting the whole spectrum of humanity. That can lead to this being a very tough read at times, even though it is peppered with his trademark humour.

4/5

Romance by Ed McBain #BookReview

Romance is the name of a new play opening uptown–a play about an actress who gets stabbed. But when the lead actress really does get knifed, the spotlight turns to the guys from the 87th. It’s up to Detective Bert Kling, involved in a budding romance of his own, to get to the bottom of it all.

Title: Romance | Author: Ed McBain | Series: 87th Precinct #47 | Publisher: Coronet | Pages: 320 | ISBN: 9780340638163 | Publication date: 1995 | Source: Self-purchased

I’ve been powering through the 87th Precinct books in the last couple of months, having read 11 of them in quick succession, with only a few other things thrown in. I think that’s a pretty good measure of how enjoyable they are, and how McBain manages to stick to his central formula, whilst still making each book distinct and fresh. Having not taken the time to write a full review of one of them for a while, I thought I’d pause to consider this one in a bit more depth.

Many of the other recent entries which have multiple threads woven together. The last book ‘Mischief’ certainly did that, with a couple of mysteries (graffiti artists being murdered and old people being abandoned), a tense hostage negotiation storyline with Eileen Burke, plus the Deaf Man making an appearance. ‘Romance’ is far simpler, just one mystery and a character based sub-plot about Bert Kling’s relationship with police surgeon Sharyn Cooke.

The mystery is a really fun one concerning an actress receiving death threats and then being stabbed. The twist being that she’s in a play about an actress receiving death threats and then being stabbed. McBain does a great job with this, giving you just enough information to make you feel like you’re one step ahead of the cops, when in fact you aren’t at all. I found the denouement a tad less thrilling than it might have been, but it’s still a very entertaining read. At over 300 pages it’s a longish entry in the series, but he still manages to keep it gripping.

The sub-plot about Kling and Cooke is also good, with McBain exploring the challenges of being a mixed race couple in 90s America. The handling of the subject isn’t always as deft as it might have been, but it’s still thought provoking and credible in its romantic suspense. I’ve really enjoyed the ongoing character-based storylines that have run over the last few books, and the Kling/Cooke one is no exception to that.

Throw in the normal McBain highlights – cracking dialogue, humour and lots of digs at Hill Street Blues and you end up with a treat that any fan of the books will enjoy.

4/5

Ghosts by Ed McBain #BookReview

A young woman stops at the grocery store after work, but she never makes it home—at least not all the way. She is stabbed to death in front of her building, her groceries strewn across the cold pavement. Upstairs her neighbor and popular ghost story author Gregory Craig lay dead as well, stabbed in his apartment. When Craig’s publisher is found murdered just days later, Detective Steve Carella has a deadly mystery on his hands, one unlike any he’s ever had before.

Title: Ghosts | Author: Ed McBain | Series: 87th Precinct #34 | Publisher: Pan | Pages: 212 | ISBN: 9780553145182 | Publication date: 1981 | Source: Self-purchased

When you’re up to book 34 in a series, I guess as a writer you’re allowed to play with the formula a bit. That’s something Ed McBain does a few times in the 87th Precinct series, normally to good effect. Book 33, ‘Calypso’, wove a gothic horror story into the normal police procedural format and it worked. ‘Ghosts’ tries to do the same thing with a supernatural tale and, for me at least, comes up short.

The book opens with detectives Steve Carella and Cotton Hawes arriving at the scene of a double murder. The victims are a successful author and one of his neighbours. The writer’s most recent work was an ‘Amityville Horror’ style non-fiction account of a haunting and his (now bereaved) girlfriend claims to have psychic powers. She also looks uncannily like Carella’s wife, Teddy, a fact that allows McBain to muse on infidelity, as he often seems to. It goes without saying that Carella doesn’t succumb to temptation.  

The book has a lot of the things that make the 87th books so great – crackling dialogue, a strong mystery, brilliant incidental detail and convincing police work. ‘Ghosts’ is set at Christmas, which allows McBain to throw in some fun scenes about the negotiation within the department on who has to work the 25th. There are also a number of domestic scenes featuring Carella and family, they slow the pace a bit, but they’re so sweet it’s hard to dislike them.

It’s the supernatural elements that drag the book down, they feel uncomfortably shoehorned in and I couldn’t help feeling that had McBain just left them out the book would have been stronger. They make ‘Ghosts’ an interesting experiment, but not a successful one. There’s still a lot to enjoy here, but it’s definitely not one of my favourite 87th Precinct books.

3/5

The Bride Wore Black by Cornell Woolrich #BookReview

No one knew who she was, where she came from, or why she had entered their lives. All they really knew about her was that she possessed a terrifying beauty-and that each time she appeared, a man died horribly…

Title: The Bride Wore Black | Author: Cornell Woolrich | Publisher: American Mystery Classics | Pages: 288 | ISBN: 9781613162002 | Publication date: 1940 | Source: NetGalley

I first read Cornell Woolrich as a teenager, after finding a few of the wonderful 1980s Ballantine paperback reissues of some of his books in my local library. I immediately feel in love with his mastery of suspense and the dark vibe of his books. He was, by all accounts, an incredibly troubled individual, unable to come to terms with his sexuality and dependent on alcohol as a result. That desperation comes across in his work. In spades. His work has long been out of print, so it’s great to see his books finally starting to turn up on Kindle and in print again.

‘The Bride Wore Black’ is a classic revenge tale, with a mysterious woman murdering a seemingly unconnected series of men. Her crimes are tracked by a detective, amusingly called Wanger, who doggedly refuses to give up on the victims. The book is rigid in its structure. The killer stalks and then kills a victim, giving some kind of clue to her motives right before the murder. The detective investigates but gets nowhere. Rinse and repeat.

What makes it work so well is just how dark it feels. The murderess inserts herself into everyday, often domestic situations with ease. She even makes the victim’s young son complicit in one of the murders. In each case you know what the end will be, but not the means and there is a sick delight and tension in trying to guess the murder weapon before the figurative axe falls. That darkness is only deepened by the horrific denouement, which casts all that has gone before it in a totally different light.

Woolrich wasn’t the best writer in the world, his prose is sometimes so purple it would delight emperor:

An indistinctly outlined, pearly moon seemed to drip from the sky like a clot of incandescent tapioca thrown up against the night by a cosmic comic.

But his ideas and pacing are first rate. I enjoyed this just as much as I expected to, and am delighted to see this new edition, which also includes an excellent foreword.