The Black Echo by Michael Connelly
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I do love me some hard-boiled detective fiction. :) I think it all started when I plied the big bookshelves at my grandparents’ house beginning in my early teen years. Those bookshelves were a trove of everything from astronomy to animal husbandry to romance, historical, classic, mystery, SF–it seemed to have everything. So I got my first taste of the likes of Mickey Spillane, Raymond Chandler, and Dashiell Hammett, which turned into a lifelong affinity for the genre.
The Black Echo speaks to me on that level, although it has a contemporary setting and echoes of the Vietnam War. The main character is the loner who might still find love, who does the right thing as he sees it, who wants justice. The plot is nicely complex and the supporting characters intriguing, and of course there’s that interesting twist at the end. Really enjoyed this read–it was engaging and fast-paced. I’ve read Michael Connelly before and find him a very reliable storyteller.
