Worth reading, but not one of Connelly's best
935867
THE OVERLOOK is the latest Harry Bosch novel released by Michael Connelly. This book, previously released in serial form, is about half as long as a regular Bosch novel. I'm a fan of Connelly and I've only read 5 or 6 of his books but have to admit I'm disappointed in this book. First, considering it's length, you are getting half the novel you usually get from Connelly. Knowing that, the content of the novel has to be judged even more critically, ie. quality, not quantity. In the Bosch books I've read, they've always been short on twists and turns. They've been more like straight forward procedurals that slowly grow on you as the novel moves on. In The Overlook, the novel doesn't have a chance to build up steam, it has to capture you right away. And I don't beleive it does.

Harry is awake, at home around midnight, when he recieves a call. He's a homicide detective now and there's been a murder. Harry calls his new partner Iggy to meet him there. Stanley Kent was murdered at the Overlook, a scenic spot in Hollywood that looks out over the city. Rachel Walling, an FBI agent that Bosch has a history with, also shows up at the scene. The FBI is also highly interested in Stanley Kent. Kent worked in the medical profession with cesium, a highly radioactive material used to treat cancer. Because of the cesium, the FBI believes there may be a possible terrorist angle to the case. Bosch goes to the Kent house and finds his wife, Alicia, naked and hog-tied in the bed.

We learn all that in the opening, and the middle part of the book is what disappointed me. First, since this book is so short, there isn't much room for plot twists and turns. In this book there isn't any. Connelly details the investigation in extreme detail, and unfortunately, none of the details are very interesting. Second, Connelly establishes that the primary conflict in the novel will be jurisdiction. Harry wants the case since it is a homicide. The FBI is more concerned about the national security angle. The novel follows Bosch going back and forth with Walling, backstabbing, playing politics, all in the name of jurisdiction. I'm sure law enforcement agencies have jurisdiction problems all the time, but as a plot device in a novel, it gets old. And it especially doesn't work as the central conflict that drives the novel.

Now, the novel has strong points as well. I've found many Connelly novels to focus on what seems to be boring details, only to have the details come back to matter later. That is true in THE OVERLOOK as well. Every seemingly tedious observaiton Bosch makes in the beginning plays a part in how the case is solved. Bosch fans will enjoy this novel, as I did, because of its brevity and because Bosch is his usual self. I didn't much care for Connelly's commentary on the motives of the FBI in the case, but that really doesn't play a part in the quality of the book. I recommend this to all Bosch fans, but I certainly wouldn't pay full price for a book this short.
1596221
The second installment of the Lincoln Lawyer series, "The Brass Verdict" is sure to please fans of Michael Connelly. This book contained his two main characters, Mickey Haller and Harry Bosch, as well as a small appearance by crime beat reporter Jack McEvoy.

The book starts in 1992, when Mickey Haller was still at the public defender's office. Involved in a double murder trial, Haller has evidence that the prosecutor, Jerry Vincent, used some underhanded tactics in the trial. Vincent, knowing his career as a prosecutor would be finished if the information came to light, tried to make a deal with Mickey. However Haller went for the jugular and got his client an acquittal. Fast forward 15 years and believe it or not, Vincent and Haller are friends and stand in for each other when one cannot make it to court. Apparently, leaving the prosecutor's office was the best thing ever for Vincent's pocket book. He never would have been this well off if he had stayed.

Haller has taken a one year hiatus from practicing law (we later find for a drug dependency problem due to being shot in the previous book) and is thinking about coming back to work slowly when he is called into chief judge Mary Holder's office. She informs Mickey that Jerry Vincent had been murdered the previous night and that Jerry had named Mickey to inherit his law practice. Among Vincent's cases was the high profile murder case of studio mogul Walter Elliot, who stood accused of killing his wife and her lover at his Malibu beach house.

These cases, and especially the Elliot case, would set Mickey up quite nicely, although it was not really the slow comeback he had planned. He meets Harry Bosch, who is lead investigator on the Vincent murder, and soon begins their strange love-hate relationship. Vincent kept all his trial strategy on his laptop, along with hard copies in his briefcase, both of which were stolen after his murder. Mickey was forced to reconstruct Vincent's calendar from the case files in Vincent's office. Bosch is certain the key to Vincent's killing lies in one of the case files, but Mickey is unable (and unwilling) to breach the attorney-client privilege.

The main focus of the book was in fact the Elliot murder case. However, there was another case Mickey thought was somehow connected. He racked his brain until he finally found it. Also interesting was his handling of a one time professional surfer accused of theft, who Mickey ultimately hired to drive his Lincoln. Bosch's investigation of Vincent's murder was seamlessly integrated into the plot making this book a treat for both Mickey Haller and Harry Bosch fans.

I took off one star because the ending came out of nowhere. Mickey had found the person pulling the strings with information received from Cisco, his investigator. This is fine except that information was never shared with the reader until Haller dropped his bomb. I like to try to solve mysteries along with the protagonist. I am not always good at it, but at least I like to give it a try. I felt cheated on this one because there was little chance of solving this without the crucial piece of evidence dropped on us at the end. I will admit it was a shocking ending, but not the way I prefer it being presented.
3930152
I'm not one to think every book has to be a page-turner. Every book has its own pace that's unique to the material and the characters and, especially, the story. But I found the pace of this novel by Ace Atkins to be a bit off-putting. Just not enough bite to keep me pushing ahead. I appreciated the characters and the story - by itself - is solid. But I found myself plodding along page after page thinking "get on with it, man!" From the preponderance of stellar reviews it could have just been me. Plenty have found this to be a quite enjoyable book. But for now I've put it down in favor of a remarkably steady Michael Connelly Harry Bosch book.
486093
Not a bad read for mystery fans.  Not as well-written as a Michael Connolly masterpiece or as engrossing as a Jeffrey Deaver thriller, but this novel does hold your interest, in an Agatha Christie sort of way.  Characters are appealing and well-developed, but the fate of some of them is left hanging at the end.  The main drawback of the novel is that the murder doesn't occur until the final part of the book and is somewhat predictable.  Still, it's well worth reading.
2480929
"The Concrete Blonde" is Michael Connelly's third book, was first published in 1994 and - like his previous two - features Harry Bosch as its central character. A little of Bosch's background, and many of his quirks, have been touched onin the previous two books. He's a jazz fan, with a taste for coffee, beer and cigarettes. Having served as a Tunnel Rat in Viet-Nam, he' returned home and joined the police force. Bosch currently works at the Hollywood Division's Homicide table, though he had once been a member of the LAPD's elite RHD (Robbery - Homicide Division). The last case he worked in RHD, about four years previously, had been the "Dollmaker Case". Harry and his colleagues were hunting a serial killer, whose afvoured victims were prostitutes. The case was closed when Harry shot and killed Norman Church, the leading suspect. As a result of his actions, however, Bosch was investigated by IAD (Internal Affairs Division), suspended for a month and 'demoted' to his current position.

The Dollmaker Case resurfaces in this book. Bosch and the Police Department are being sued by Church's widow, claiming that her husband was innocent and that Harry had killed the wrong man. Her lawyer is Honey Chandler, a civil rights attorney who specialises in police abuse cases. Bosch meanwhile - like the police department - have no doubt that Church was the Dollmaker, and "good" for the eleven killings. Unfortunately, for Bosch there's a fly in the ointment. Just as the trial starts, a new body is found buried beneath a concrete slab in a derelict building. The directions to it were contained in a note delivered to Harry's station - not only does it claim responsibility for the murder, but it also matches some other notes attributed to the Dollmaker. Obviously, this raises some very awkward questions - most notably, is the Dollmaker still alive ? If so, Bosch is obviously in a lot of trouble with his court case. There are other possibilities, though - the Dollmaker may have been working with another killer, or there may be a copycat. Bosch must not only deal with the court case, but assist in the investigation.

Like Connelly's previous two books - "The Black Echo" and "The Black Ice" - I found this to be a very enjoyable book : it's possibly the best of the three. I would, however, recommend reading the three in order. The previous books will cover some parts of Harry's life and career that are referred to in this book - for example, his mother's life and death, his history with Irving, how he met Sylvia Moore and the nature of their relationship. Knowing the "full story" will add to the enjoyment of this installment. The other books are very enjoyable also - reading them will be anything other than a burden !
2441376
I bought this book thinking it was another in the Harry Bosch series, then realized that it is related to Bosch only tangentially.  One of the heros of Scarecrow, Jack McEvoy, the is same character that appeared in Connelly's earlier novel, The Poet, which indirectly connects to Bosch.  That said, I ended up being glad I had purchased The Scarecrow, as it has a very good plot and I really like the way Connelly has developed the McEvoy character.

Unlike some of the other reviewers, I found the plot of this novel quite believable, as cyber crime is increasing and it seems logical to me that people will use the Web just as much for evil purposes as for good.  I love the opening of the book when Connelly introduces us to Carver by showing just how much information Carver is able to collect on an individual simply by knowing which sites to visit and how to employ some basic hacking skills.

Rachel Walling, the FBI agent who turns up in a couple of other Connelly novels, is also featured in The Scarecrow and I like her character as well.  For one thing, it's nice to see a powerful female lead for a change and Connelly is successful in making Rachel feminine as well as tough.  This is not the easiest thing to do, judging by the other thriller writers who have tried this and failed.

Overall, this is not the best of Connelly's novels (My favorite is Echo Park), but it is a good summer read that will entertain and satisfy the intelligent reader.
4260227
I've read everything by Connelly, and I love the Harry Bosch character, and this is good, but not one of his best.
1790643
I didn't like this book as well as the Lincoln Lawyer because I ended up not liking Harry Bosch as a person. The theme is just as exciting as other books by Michael Connelly, in going after the man who committed the crime, and
the action toward that end is also quick moving, and interesting getting to know the characters, but Harry doesn't show me the character traits I admire in Connelly's lawyer books.  He sometimes comes across to me as crude in his methods and language, but perhaps that is what makes his character as a cop tough and believable ,but for me to
want to read about more of his work in getting the bad guy, I need to like him as a person.  Have I given Harry a
fair chance?
3030486
Harry Bosch is on involuntary stress leave after putting his supervisor through a glass window.  Not only is his career in doubt, his house has been red-tagged after an earthquake and is slated for destruction.  Sylvia Moore, Harry's one-time squeeze, has run off to Venice, presumably never to return.  And the coyote that used to roam the canyon behind Harry's house hasn't been seen since the earthquake.
In this outing Harry is both more reckless and more human than we've ever seen him.  We see more of Harry's early past than we've ever seen before.  We learn a little more about Marjorie, the mother who was both prostitute and murder victim.  Marjorie remains a rather shadowy figure, yet Connelly lets us see tough-guy Harry's love for her and makes us think we'd have loved her, too, for all her faults.
The plot is Connelly's usual stew of bad doings in high places, and, as in most of the Bosch books, it's pleasurable but secondary to the characters.  Harry is more alone, and more vulnerable, than in the previous books, and his single-mindedness will lead to tragedy--Harry won't be this reckless again.  Even the dread deputy chief, Irvin S. Irving, will continue his slow evolution toward being almost human.  And, as in all the Bosch books, Hollywood itself is almost a character, from the cheesy corner where Marjorie's body was dumped to the absurdly rococco mansions of the rich and powerful.
Two words of caution.  While Harry is as finely drawn a character as you'll ever find in detective fiction, and other male characters, such as Irvin S. Irving, are vivid if sometimes simple, Connelly has yet to create and sustain a believable female character.  Sylvia Moore, introduced in "The Black Ice," seemed promising, a wise, somewhat weary cop widow and school teacher aware of Harry's darker corners.  Indeed, at the end of "The Concrete Blonde," she and Harry seemed committed to the affair.  Yet by the beginning of "The Last Coyote," she has disappeared--to Venice, of all places!  on a teacher's salary?--with no explanation.  Harry's grief is understandable, but it seems unfair to a reader to have a character built up over two previous books to behave in such a flighty fashion with no warning.  You'd think that a woman who'd have sex in her newly-deceased husband's bed with a man she'd just met--even if that man is Harry--would be hardy enough to live with Harry's warts.  Sylvia's disappearance is a disappointment.
The other word of caution deals with the lady offered as a love interest in this outing.  She is even less believable than either Eleanor Wish or Sylvia Moore, and the romantic interlude here is essentially pointless.  It adds nothing to the plot and little to our understanding of Harry--the one revealing moment with "Jazz" is really just a continuation of a revelation begun in Harry's mandatory counseling sessions, and it could as easily have been handled in that fashion.  Unfortunately, the presence of this female leads to an ending which seems at odds with the rest of the book, and which will, in the next Bosch novel, be completely ignored.  So the whole episode could have been removed from the book without injuring either the plot or the character development.  Strange that the most compelling female character Connelly has developed in this series is the dead Marjorie, who never speaks a word and lives only fitfully in Harry's memory.
Those two caveats aside, this will please anyone who likes a good  detective story or anyone who loves Raymond Chandler's atmospherics.  Connelly's LA is never as dark or as twisted as James Ellroy's town, but it has plenty of shadowy corners and shadowy doings, and a fitting guardian in its lone-wolf lover, Harry Bosch.
3646499
Decent read, but for those looking for the detail and excitement of the other Bosch novels, this one is not on par with the level we have become accustomed.
2009566
I want to start by saying Michael Connelly is my hands-down favorite author. I have read him for approx 30 years. Bosch is, by far, my favorite character. I have even watched all of the Bosch episodes on Amazon Prime. Titus Welliver would not have been my choice as the actor to play Bosch, but I have come to love him in that role. I even enjoy all of the Mickey Haller books, even though the flavor is different.  So, I was very surprised that I didn't like this book. The main character is just too flawed. It isn't believable. And, while the 'bad cop that gets good things done' works well for the Bosch character, Renee Ballard just does too many things that she should and would get fired for in the real world.  The 'LAPD is so crooked that they can't police their own' just doesn't fly here.  I think it is because Connelly just doesn't write Renee well enough so that it is believable.
If it was any other author, I would write it off as poor writing, and not read another book in the series.  I also would have given the story 1 star. But, Connelly still gives enough to his audience to warrant 3 stars. And, because it is him,  I believe that future stories can be great.  It'll take a lot more for me to give up on Connelly.
140692
Seems the Harry Bosch character is slowing down, not that he hasn't had a great run. Teaching new partners wouldn't have been a consideration in the early days, but seemed successful in this episode. I hope he can find the bucks there for him when he makes it to retirement.
3048590
This book has all the elements going for it.. two characters who we have loved from past books, Mickey Haller and Harry Bosch, working on the same side. But there is no suspense, no zing, no real surprises. I'm sorry I bought it new. I didn't hate it... but I'd feel better if I had gotten it from the library. And what's with the ending? It just seems to chop off. If Connelly is setting us up for a sequel I hope he puts a lot more thought and care into it.
4959701
I am a Harry Bosch fan.  This effort which is described in other reviews is a pleasant read.  It is shorter and less compelling than a normal Michael Connelly story.  Because it is so short we do not have the time to develop the characters.  I hope that this short effort does not mean that we have to wait another year to get another Connelly.
4805816
After two weaker efforts, Angels Flight and Void Moon, Connelly is back with a vegenance here (in more ways than one).  The story is tight and very noir.  This is not happy story for either bosch or terry.  It probes motive and explores the pysches of both burdened men.  It has the usual brillant touches--a paragraph where Bosch sees Thelma from Void Moon going back to work--and a note about selling the TV and Movie rights to Blood Work.  Jack McEvoy is here and still a bit sleazy (although his sleaze factor is no where near that of earlier reporters in this series).  A bit outlandish at times, but overall a wonderful book that explores motives and behaviors of the good guys.
2348024
First of all, I am a fan of Michael Connelly, and I  liked The Lincoln Lawyer. Gods of Guilt is not badly written, it is just not very interesting. That's not to say something interesting doesn't happen in it, but  you sure have to wait a long time for that. By the time it does, you are so invested in the book that you might as well finish it. I should say that I am a retired trial lawyer, and a well-written courtroom tale is right up my alley. So many of them get things wrong, sometimes on purpose so they can make the book more interesting. Courtroom tales are rarely the stuff you write books about. They can be downright boring, tedious, and just plain dull. What happens in Gods of Guilt is not so far from what happens in a real trial, which is to say that it is a bit tedious, but for the big event late in the novel. But there you go. Book writers, even if they are also lawyers, need to add some buzz to make their courtroom tale fun. I venture to say that what Connelly comes up with is just so unlikely that it will be heard of in a lot more novels than it will ever be heard of a in a real live courtroom. Especially with a person who is a witness and not the defendant.
2174101
I found this Harry Bosch novel disappointing. Although the unraveling of the mystery through police work was, as usual, quite well done, details of the plot were just too unrealistic. To have two police officers take off on their own to shoot up a highly placed political figure was just unrealistic, and was too  much of a stretch. There were a couple of other things that stuck out as very unrealistic. When I didn't just gobble the whole book down in a few sittings, I knew that it had crossed the boundary from fiction to fantasy. I love Connelly's books generally. This one read like it was forced out on a publisher's schedule rather than the authors.