The geography of crime novels

[Mike Weaver]

Been there. Great book.

But New York is the US city I'm least interested in exploring - read 
plenty of books set there but the city itself holds no allure, maybe 
because it comes across as all city, and flat. Same with Chicago. LA set 
stories range out into the wilds of mountain and desert, it has hills 
within.   Reading Bleeding Edge at the moment, it's all the characters 
that keep me reading - the geography doesn't grab me at all, up, the 
street, down the street, what's it matter, it's the interactions which 
drive it along not where they take place.

On 21/10/2021 21:33, David Morris wrote:
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> No subscription needed link:
> https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/99/10/17/reviews/991017.17mobilot.html?_r=2 
> <https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/99/10/17/reviews/991017.17mobilot.html?_r=2>
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> What Makes Him Tic?
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> /The young narrator of this post-modern detective novel suffers from 
> Tourette's syndrome./
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> 	<http://barnesandnoble.bfast.com/booklink/click?sourceid=4773&ISBN=0385491832>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> *MOTHERLESS BROOKLYN
> *By Jonathan Lethem.
> 311 pp. New York:
> Doubleday. <mike.weaver at zen.co.uk <mailto:mike.weaver at zen.co.uk>> wrote:
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> /
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>     Apart from being a lazy reader and crime novels being little
>     strain on
>     the brain, one reason I enjoy stories set in the US is exploring
>     different parts of the country which has fascinated me since I
>     discovered DC comics in the late 1950s and watched the Lone Ranger
>     and
>     Range Rider on the tube.
>
>     Having realised that Land's End is the nearest I'm likely to get
>     to the
>     US, earlier in the year I decided to explore it by crime novels,
>     starting with LA. With a list of lesser known LA based series,
>     reading
>     mostly using the Internet Archive Library I had Wiki and Google
>     Maps/Streetview open and gradually got the layout and look of LA
>     sorted
>     in my head.
>
>     I can't say I discovered any great prose or notable story telling but
>     two authors I'd recommend as a result are Barbara Serranella and
>     Timothy
>     Hallinan. Street life stories from the former and crim world
>     comedy from
>     the latter - a burglar who does PI jobs for those who can't go to the
>     police, i.e. other criminals - good fun. I read several
>     African-American
>     writers, which was good for social-economic perspectives but none as
>     writers or storytellers a patch on Walter Mosley.
>
>     So where next...
>
>     On 21/10/2021 17:14, Mark Kohut wrote:
>     >
>     https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/21/books/classic-crime-novels-that-still-thrill-today.html
>     <https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/21/books/classic-crime-novels-that-still-thrill-today.html>
>     > --
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