This is Book 26.5 in the Harry Bosch Universe. I’ve read every actual book that isn’t a point something book in the Harry Bosch Universe, so I was excited to see this in my digital library.
This is Book 26.5 in the Harry Bosch Universe. I’ve read every actual book that isn’t a point something book in the Harry Bosch Universe, so I was excited to see this in my digital library.
I believe in this book Harry is in the retired from the LAPD, but back on the cold case squad portion of his career. He had many retirements and many returns to being a cop. His old motto “everybody counts or nobody counts” is especially prominent in his cold case days. Switchblade is about an old case of a teen boy’s murder with a switchblade.
Part of the cold case sqad’s mission is to reopen cold cases where there’s a new DNA hit, or new evidence from somewhere. Harry gets lucky with a DNA hit based on new techniques, but he still has to get the baddie to talk.
We’re immediately immersed in Harry’s world in this book, and his unwavering attention to justice.
My rating: 4
Ok so this book is a group of three short stories and considered book 14.7 in the Harry Bosch series. I’d love to see the math that goes on in determining the book numbers for all of these. So I guess this is somewhere in the early to middle part of the Bosch series, but the three stories span a great deal of time.
The first story is Christmas Even. I guess I really should’ve paid attention to that title, because it really is telling. Bosch gets called to a burglary where the burglar is found dead. It happened on Christmas Eve. The shopkeeper is there and there are not many signs of trauma on the dead guy. He has a history of burglarizing this particular shop, and the shopkeeper has filed many complaints. Harry Bosch just has the ability (and the want) to look past the surface details and see things that many other investigators would miss.
In the second story, Father’s Day, Bosch is called to an office building where a father has left his child inside a car for hours and hours in the hot L.A. sun. There’s a lot of “this could’ve happened to anyone”, “I forgot he was in there”, and weeping and such. Bosch unrelentingly questions the father and pulls out details that contribute to potential motives and cast doubt on the whole terrible incident being an accident.
The third story, Angle of Investigation was definitely the best. We get to travel back in time to one of Bosch’s first homicides as a uniformed patrolman, which turned into an unsolved case. Bosch wasn’t a detective back then, so he didn’t exactly know all the details. He dives back into it though and discovers some new / unnoticed evidence. It was so satisfying to see the bad guy go down after thinking he got away with it for twenty years.
I have read every Bosch novel, and all of the Bosch universe novels. I love them, and learning about how Harry was created was interesting. Michael Connelly’s writing style is just my jam!
This is a super quick read, barely considered a book. It just took me right in immediately though, as all the Bosch works do. We kinda dive into how Michael Connelly created and molded the tough nut with a semi soft center that is Harry Bosch.
It really was like a peek behind the curtain into the making of Harry Bosch. Michael Connelly talks about where Harry’s love of jazz came from, where he got Harry’s family backstory, and how Bosch came to be a “tunnel rat” in Vietnam. There’s a little bit of Michael Connelly’s childhood in there, and it totally fits into the Bosch persona.
I also thought it was interesting to hear how Harry got his interesting first name. There are a bunch of Bosch books where a character sees or hears Harry’s first name – Hieronymus – for the first time and is totally baffled about where it comes from and how to say it.
Like I said – it’s really short, but if you’re a rabid Bosch fan like I am, you should totally read this.
Here we are again with the crazy chronology math. This is apparently Harry Bosch #14.6 per Goodreads.
There are also three stories in this book.
The first story, Suicide Run is just a slow burn of creepiness. Bosch and Edgar are called to an apparent suicide (there’s even a note), and Edgar can’t wait to call it a suicide and get out of there. That’s just his character throughout the book, but he’s not a bad guy in general, just not a great cop. Anyway, Harry sees the little inconsistencies that people (cops) who aren’t looking closely enough or don’t care enough don’t see. Everyone tells him from the beginning that he’s wasting his time and it’s just a suicide. The ending of this story was just so chilling but satisfying at the same time.
The second story, Cielo Azul is a heartbreaker. We travel back and forth between the past when Bosch found the unidentified girl’s body that they named Cielo Azul (Blue Sky) and the present where Bosch is traveling to death row to talk to the murderer to see if he’ll give up the girl’s name. It’s one case that Bosch solved (found the bad guy), but never crossed off the list because he didn’t find out her name. There’s a lot of triumph in the past in finding the bad guy and saving another girl, but we can feel Bosch’s frustration when talking to the bad guy.
The third story, One Dollar Jackpot is a clever play on words. Bosch actually figures out the truth by tricking someone into giving him a dollar with evidence on it. A professional poker player is murdered after scoring big, and there’s a long list of people who could’ve wanted her dead.
Ok we’re unfortunately done with the Bosch short stories, but The Safe Man did not disappoint me. It’s totally unrelated to Bosch in any way, and I don’t even feel like it takes place in Los Angeles!
Who knew Michael Connelly could write a ghost story?
We meet a safe cracker named Brian. He considers himself a “safe man”, and it’s in his blood. There’s a little backstory about how his dad got sent to prison, but it’s just a little nugget.
Brian is called to the house of a particularly bitchy rich guy who wants a safe cracked. He had just moved into the house and there’s a safe in the floor that he wants opened and removed. He wants Brian to put the safe door out for the trash so everyone can drive by and see that the safe in the floor (that he believes paranoidly everyone knows about) was opened and is no longer a temptation for robbers.
Brian eventually cracks the safe and opens the door. But he kinda lets something out he shouldn’t have. The ghost element is super creepy, because it’s personal. I really liked this short story, even though there was no Bosch in sight!
This is another “just written by Michael Connelly” book that doesn’t involve Bosch at all. I believe it’s all located in Los Angeles though, so that’s a plus. Michael Connelly makes me feel like I’ve been to L.A. and could point out landmarks, and I’ve never even been to California!
One reviewer on Goodreads got it right when they said: When Connelly stories don’t feature Bosch, Ballard, or Haller they usually aren’t my favorite and that’s the case here. Ooh I remember reading Void Moon a few years ago and felt the same way! He also said: A quick read though for any Connelly completionist. And we know that apparently sums me up! I’m more of a Bosch completionist, but I will pick up and read anything by Michael Connelly.
However, I did love The Safe Man (right above), so that’s an anomaly.
The first story is Cahoots, and I was a little confused about what the heck was happening for most of the story, but then there’s a twist at the end that kind of explains it all. There are cheaters and shootings in a backroom poker game that I didn’t really care that much about.
The second story is Mulholland Drive and I think it’s the best of the three. They’re all short, and this one is no exception, but Connelly packs a lot into a few pages. An accident recreator (or something like that) is called to the scene of a deadly crash and asked to figure out what happened. Of course there’s a twist, but it’s actually clever and very satisfying.
The third story, Two-Bagger isn’t terribly memorable. There’s a cop tailing an ex-convict who he thinks is about to kill someone. I don’t remember much about it, but there was a twist to this one too.