Harry Bosch and Renee Ballard return in another fantastic installment of Michael Connelly’s new series pairing two police detectives—one mostly retired, one fully immersed in her job—dogged in their pursuit of finding the truth.
When Bosch’s mentor from his early LAPD days dies, his widow gives Bosch the crime book from an unsolved murder 20 years earlier. Why did he have it all these years? Was he trying to solve the case, or was he trying to hide something? Why is a key piece of evidence blacked out in the murder book—was that from the original detectives or something Harry's mentor did?
Bosch teams up with Ballard to try and figure out what really happened—was it really just a drug deal gone wrong? Meanwhile, Ballard wants to stay on a case she was the first to respond to—a young, homeless man burned to death in his tent on the street—but it turns out there was more to this man than anyone realizes. But to get involved means tangling with her former supervisor, with whom she has a bad history.
As the two both work the cold case and Ballard tries to keep her hand in the fire investigation, Bosch also works on a third case, to try and find a murderer in an effort to ensure he didn’t help set one free. The bond between the two of them deepens, they have to confront their own issues, and realize the truth is not as clear as they thought.
Connelly is truly one of the best crime writers out there. I’ve always loved Bosch, and Ballard is a fantastic, complicated character, so their pairing is dynamic. There’s a lot going on here, so at times it got a little confusing, but Connelly’s writing brings you back into the story.
You can read this as a stand-alone or as part of the series. But if you like crime novels, you should check out his earlier Bosch novels. (There are so many of them!) You'll see what an amazing storyteller he is.
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