“Death is my beat. I make my living from it.” These lines kick off The Poet
(Little, Brown, $22.95 hard) and they set the tone for Jack McEvoy, the
narrator-protagonist of the book. McEvoy, a reporter for the Rocky Mountain
News, is no stranger to the dark side of life. Nor is his creator, Michael
Connelly.
Connelly knows a thing or two about cops, crime, and the darker side of human
nature. He moved to L.A. from Florida at the beginning of the decade and worked
the crime beat for the Los Angeles Times. His debut novel, The Black Echo, won
the Edgar book award for best first novel. With his protagonist, a troubled and
mercurial Vietnam vet/L.A. homicide detective named Harry Bosch, Connelly had
achieved the impossible: he had created a new character and a new franchise in
this most-overworked parcel of literary real estate. The subsequent Bosch
novels — The Black Ice, The Concrete Blonde, and The Last Coyote —
breathlessly anticipated, proved that we’d pinned our hopes on a winner.
Connelly’s voice has only grown stronger and more confident with each book.
He’s a very cool guy, his books are among the hottest titles out there, and
he’ll be signing them at Borders, Friday January 26, 7pm.
— Jesse Sublett
This article appears in January 26 • 1996 and January 26 • 1996 (Cover).