That's it. If I never read another Lawrence Block novel (I shudder at the thought), this book on it's own solidifies in my mind that Block is one of the best crime novelists out there. But this is so much more than just a "detective novel." It's a vividly written character study of the struggle to ...
What starts out as Matthew Scudder, fresh off of a drinking bender that landed him in a hospital, helping a hooker "get out of the game" turns into layer upon layer of murder and mystery in a city where people keep killing each other and there are eight million ways to die. This installment of La...
Lawrence Block has quickly become one of my top favorite hard-boiled/noir writers. To date I've read 11 of his books including a couple as short stories.As you may have noticed, I've already claimed to love the pimp, Chance, in this story. Can't help myself; the guy is a real cool dude, not your ...
Whoa, this is good. You can't say that it "transcends genre" because it is solidly to its core a hard-boiled mystery. You can't say it "elevates genre" because that would suggest that this sort of story can't be brilliant on its own. What is does is relish genre. It's brilliantly and violently a har...
A book about the mystery of a dead hooker becomes a book about Matt Scudder taking one day at a time, trying to save himself from alcohol. The prose was dry and matter-of-fact; the words of a police report detailing his movements and contacts. And yet the way they were arranged, their anti-drama sen...
The actual murder mystery takes second place to Scudder's struggle with the bottle in 8 Million Ways to Die. When I realized that I was 60 pages in and the murder hadn't been committed yet I knew I was going to like this book. I look forward to reading the earlier books in the series to get more of ...
Wow. Just wow. I can easily say this is the first "great" Scudder book. I knew I made a mistake rating the first 4 novels at 5 stars each. It's not that they're bad books, they're just not in the same league as Eight Million Ways to Die.In the 5th installment of the series, Block takes Scudder a...
A hooker hires Matthew Scudder to tell her pimp she's leaving. Scudder delivers the message and everything is cool. Only the hooker ends up dead and the pimp hires Scudder to find out who killed her. Can Scudder find the killer before he ends up dead himself?Sometimes, I really struggle with rati...
Another quick novel is Eight Million Ways to Die by Lawrence Block, author of the “Burglar” series of mysteries (wonderful stuff). In this book his hero is Matthew Scudder, who reminds me of Ross Mac- Donald’s hero, Lew Archer. Scudder is hired by Kim, a hooker, who wants him to intercede wi...
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