I noticed this on Michael Connelly's site:

September 21, 2009. ABC TV Show Appearance
Castle
"Castle" is a 1 hour witty drama about a famous crime and horror novelist, Rick Castle, who helps the NYPD homicide department solve crimes. Michael Connelly will appear as himself in the season premiere, which airs September 21st at 10pm (EST). Check your local listings for time in your area.

I wonder if the show can maintain the same success that "Murder She Wrote" did years ago. Imagine, an author as detective! Jessica Fletcher, revived? I wonder.

I'll be watching, if for no other reason than to see the Connelly cameo. Hopefully for the series it can suck me in. I don't watch TV anymore, so it would be a hard sell.

My Verdict on the Brass Verdict

The Mystery Book Club read The Brass Verdict for June.  I'm sorry I will miss the meeting this Friday, but I hope that some of the members may leave comments of their own about the book here.

Last year, the club read The Lincoln Lawyer by Michael Connelly and it was so well received that the group decided to read the "sequel" this year.  I was not as enthusiastic about The Lincoln Lawyer as other members of the club; I gave it an 84 - a solid B, so not too bad. However, I really enjoyed The Brass Verdict (BV), yes, more so than The Lincoln Lawyer (LL). (I gave the BV an 90.)

======Spoiler Comments Follow=======

Part of it is that I like Mickey Haller more in this book. He is cast as a real human, that is, flawed, in both books, but he seems less cynical in the BV.  This leads to the frustration I feel about the book's ending.  The lies of all parties involved in the complex case(s) in the BV leaves Mickey so emotionally exhausted by the end of the book that he is ready to quit, to leave the practice of law - again. This really frustrates me because Connelly really drew me into Mickey's character and the support team around him including Lorna (his ex-wife and administrator) and Patrick Henson (his newly hired chauffeur).  I am interested in the whole team, and now it appears the Haller is not going to be a candidate for another book.

Yet despite the frustration of the apparently imminent closure of his briefly established law practice, Mickey's reaction makes perfect sense and enhances his character.  He has changed a lot over the two books, to the point where the lies of his client, his deceased and murdered co-counsel, the chief judge, and even the lead detective (who turns out to be his brother) completely knocks the wind out of his sails.  As well these things should. He has been manipulated and "used" by so many characters in the story.

It's too bad.  After a well accomplished recovery from prescription medications (the LL plot left him severely wounded - the physical recovery led to dependence on pain medications), Haller jumps enthusiastically into the challenge of "inheriting" two dozen active cases from his murdered co-counsel.  Haller does some really nice things, like helping out the accused jewel thief by hiring him as a chauffeur; Connelly has me rooting for him.  But the dismaying events of the corruption of justice and bragging client steals his love affair for the practice of law. Even his own native cynicism is not enough to shield him from all these cynical people: he wants to quit.

My problem is this: if he quits and the Haller series ends, I'm am going to be unhappy; yet if he doesn't quit, I will have a tough time relating to him. Hopefully Connelly will find a work-around to bring him back.

There was  just about the right amount of tension throughout the book. A few times I thought something bad would happen when it didn't (I thought Henson would get murdered by mistake by the unknown murderer going for Haller). I had no doubt, early on, that chief judge Holder would end up as a chief suspect.  But that thought did not dim my interest in the plot.  There were plenty of other surprises built into the ending.

Bringing Connelly's Bosch into this narrative was a welcome and creative idea.  However, weaving in the clues that lead us to discover the family connection was just a little bit too far-- it was the one thing that did not resonate with me at all.

All in all - a most enjoyable read.

Reaction to The Lincoln Lawyer (Connelly)

I just returned from a book club discussion of The Lincoln Lawyer (by Michael Connelly)... maybe you have read it too?

There was a range of reaction, none severely negative, mostly positive. WARNING!! Some spoiler comments follow.

Some ranked the book quite high- a 98/100 was one score! Now this is the guy who has said that "only Sherlock Holmes merits a 100."

He and all of the members enjoyed the book's description of legal strategies and the courtroom repartee. Personally, I love books that provide an extensive dialog of lawyers examining witnesses. For me, it all began with Perry Mason when I was in the 8th grade! At least 9 of the authors on my favorites list write books about lawyers. BTW, I prefer legal drama (Perry Mason) to legal thriller (The Firm), but I like them both. Id say that The Lincoln Lawyer falls about midway on the continuum between drama and thriller.

None of us work in the "justice" system and can claim the ability to judge the realism in the book, but most of us had the feeling it was accurate. Unlike Perry Mason, Connelley's criminal defense attorney almost never has an innocent client. Indeed, that became the crux of the problem for the lead character who must face the mistake of contributing to the incarceration of an innocent man.

Some interesting plot twists: the attorney's investigator gets killed. Gosh! The author killed his Paul Drake!

In the final twist: we find out how the "bad guy" is able to move undetected across town to commit murder while wearing an anklet alarm system. OK, the author had me fooled, but my peers in the discussion group had figured it out in advance.

Most of the difference of opinion about the book revolved around the central character. Some of us did not feel sufficient attraction to the character. It was suggested that defense attorneys created by J. F. Freedman were more likable/attractive. Other participants liked the development of the character through the book; as the book opens, the attorney is thoroughly jaded and seems resigned to perform a service, no matter how low he must stoop. By the end, he seems just a bit (thus, realistically) reformed by the crisis he underwent with the two principle clients featured in the plot. At the very least, the crisis brought out his more noble side.

The group also exchanged views on the credibility of the evil client and his equally equal mother. This led to a reflection on the different mental states of murderers, including Jeffrey Dommer and Charles Stuart.

I felt the book was a solid "B" and others in the group had no trouble giving the book a solid "A."

If you read the book, how would you rate it?

Why the titles for the first six selections??

First of all: I am not pushing any author or book. Period. If I ever get around to writing/publishing something (LOL), I might push that.

These first titles happen to be the ones my (non-virtual) library book club chose to read. (Alluded to in my "welcome" post.) I will be sharing comments about the book from the library discussion group each month. Of course, that will be after the due date for each book.

So why did the library book club choose these books for this year (Sep 07 - Aug 08)? Well, last year, the group deliberately selected books by New England authors. No one in our group had pre-read the books we chose; they simply represented a good assortment of local scenes. Some authors had many books to their credit; some new writers had very few. As the year progressed, we read a number of books that our group absolutely did not enjoy. Although we had hilarious fun pillorying these books, even using them as a helpful measurement of what we did not like, we just did not have much fun with the actual reading of some of these books.

So our group thought we might increase our odds by reading award winning books. Even that is no guarantee. We recently read New England author Thomas Cook's book, The Chatham School Affair, which won the 1997 Edgar Award for best novel. Boy did our group differ in reaction to that book! Several of us REALLY like the book (myself included); others seriously did NOT like the book at all. Our group is well aware that movie-goers often disagree with movie critics, and that may be our experience with Award Winning mystery books. Nevertheless, for this year we have left the local authors theme and gone to the Award Winners theme.

The first six books represent a variety of genres and authors. The awards are not all from the same source (organizations giving awards have their biases too!).

Here are the books and the related awards:

The Lincoln Lawyer (Connelly) - 2006 Macavity Best Novel; 2006 Shamus Best Novel, 2006 Edgar Finalist for Best Novel; 2006 Anthony Finalist for Best Novel.

The James Deans (Coleman) - 2006 Anthony for Best Paperback; 2006 Shamus for Best PI Paperback; 2006 Edgar Finalist for Best Paperback; 2006 Macavity Finalist for Best Novel.

California Girl (Parker) - 2005 Edgar Finalist for Best Novel.

The Virgin of Small Plains (Pickard) - 2007 Finalist for FOUR Awards: Edgar Best Mystery Novel, Agatha Best Novel, Macavity Best Novel, Anthony Best Mystery Novel. Not Part of a Series. (Author has written 16 other novels, divided into 3 series. She has won 3 other Agatha Awards.)

Paranoia (Finder) - Actually it was his book Killer Instinct that won the 2007 Thrillerwriter Award for Best Novel.

Devil in A Blue Dress (Moseley) - Actually he won the Shamus Award for Cinnamon Kiss, the most recent in the series with the Easy Rawlins character. However Devil in a Blue Dress was the first in the series (also made into a movie) and quite good. (Yep I have read most of these.)

The Janissary Tree (Goodwin) - 2007 Edgar Award for Best Mystery Novel, Finalist 2007 Macavity Award for Best Novel

Welcome

I've been reading mystery books all my life. You could say I am addicted to them! During the last 15 years I have been writing down the titles of the hundreds of books I've read, and grading the books. My list has helped me in two ways:

1) When I go back to the bookstore or library, I can be sure not to get the same book again. Yes I take the list with me. I just hate to have taken a book along for a plane trip only to get to page 6 and realize -- oops! Been there - read that.

2) I will tend to look for more books by the authors of books I have already ranked highly. (Sometimes that doesn't work, but generally it does.)

Around 2005, I joined our local library's "Mystery Book Club." It was (and is) a small group of regulars. We read a different book each month and gather to discuss the book. In the second year, I proposed that we actually grade the book, using a ranking sheet. Not every participant enjoys doing that but it has really focused the discussion.

One thing is clear, we don't always agree about what we like or dislike! Sometimes we are almost shocked to find that a book that one person "loved" was almost "hated" by another. We have learned that these different evaluations are almost unpredictable! But it has been such FUN!! At times uproarious!! I hope you won't think me mad if I tell you that the Book Club is the high point of my life (apologies to Poe).

So I am inviting YOU to join our little book club (virtually). For the next twelve months we will be reading award winning mystery books of different genres. The due date is the 10th of the month! The first due date is November 10, '07, so please get the book and start reading. You will have the opportunity to share your thoughts on the book, and, after the 10th, to hear what the members of my (non-virtual) Book Club thought as well.

We are just finishing The Lincoln Lawyer by Michael Connelly. More on that in future posts.

So I invite you to read along with me (us): California Girl by T Jefferson Parker. Get it from your library, local bookstore, or buy the book from this web page (see right, top).

More on participation in the Book Club reading, and participation in the Blog can be found by clicking these Labels-
*Join/Participate
*Future Plans

(By the way, for now, I will leave the city library that hosts my Mystery Book Club a secret. Maybe it will forever remain a secret, I don't know yet.)