Classic Noir Police Procedural: An Ace and a Pair

FREE on Amazon

NYPD Detective John Stone has the best arrest record in the 43rd precinct, but in the opinion of his supervisor, Captain Jennifer Cuevas, he’s a dinosaur who belongs to another age. Cuevas decides to kill two birds with one stone by consigning Stone and another out of favor detective she wants to get rid of, Carmen Dehan, to a newly created cold cases unit, investigating cases nobody in NYPD gives a damn about. But, Cuevas has no idea just how hot a cold case can get.

Spending the majority of your time reading self-published crime thriller books in the hopes of discovering a new great author as I do, means many wasted hours struggling through books with stereotypical cardboard characters, bad writing, and poor or nonexistent plots. But, occasionally you are rewarded when you stumble onto a rare hidden gem which is exactly the description that fits An Ace And A Pair by Blake Banner.

It surprises me that I'd never come across Blake Banner before reading this first book in his Dead Cold Mysteries series. After all, Blake is a USA TODAY and Amazon #1 bestselling author of another popular series. Frankly, I only read An Ace And  A Pair because I discovered it listed in the top 20 police procedurals on the Amazon Top 100 Free Kindle books list.

As a fanatical devotee of the books written by the classic noir greats like Hammet, Chandler, Macdonald, and Robert B. Parker, I'm very particular when it comes to what I expect from a novel in that genre. But, I was suitably impressed with Blake Banner's writing in this amazing crime thriller.

While accurate comparisons between Banner's protagonist NYPD Detective John Stone and Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch could be made, I found Stone to be more in the mold of Chandler's Marlowe. In fact, I found Banner's writing style delightfully similar to that of Raymond Chandler's. While Stone is a modern-day NYPD detective instead of a private eye and hails from the opposite coast, Stone and Chandler are quite similar characters.

The strength of the fully developed characters in An Ace And A Pair is but one facet of this excellent novel. There is not only a compelling plot that hooks the reader almost immediately but an interesting subplot that dovetails perfectly. The pacing is near perfect, making it difficult to put the book down. And, there are so many twists and turns, it is impossible to work out the ending until the very final pages of the book.

I recommend An Ace And A Pair to any serious fan of crime thriller books and rate it five out of five stars. This book is a pleasure to read, so much so that I've already downloaded the second book in the series. At the time of this writing, An Ace And A Pair is available free on Amazon, and that goes for everyone - no Kindle Unlimited subscription required. Do yourself a favor crime thriller fans and download this entertaining read today.

 

Only to Sleep: Chandler's Philip Marlowe Returns for Encore

Coming July 2018

Lawrence Osborne brings one of literature's most enduring detectives, Private Investigator Philip Marlowe, back to life for one last adventure

It takes a lot to surprise me these days, but I was literally gobsmacked when I read a recent email from Penguin Random House offering me an ARC for a new Philip Marlowe novel to review.

There hasn't been a new Marlowe novel since Robert B. Parker completed in 1990 Raymond Chandler's Poodle Springs, the eighth Philip Marlowe novel, three decades after Chandler started it in 1959. But, there soon will be when Only To Sleep by Lawrence Osborne is released this July.

Who among us true blue hard-boiled fans haven't wished we could read a new Philip Marlowe novel just one more time. If you're one of those fans, you will soon have the opportunity. Lucky me. I'm reading it right now, and I'll be publishing my review right here at Best Crime Thriller Books in the next week or so.

Here is a brief synopsis...

The year is 1988. The place, Baja California. And Philip Marlowe—now in his seventy-second year—is living out his retirement in the terrace bar of the La Fonda hotel. Sipping margaritas, playing cards, his silver-tipped cane at the ready. When in saunter two insurance men dressed like undertakers, with a case that has Marlowe's name written all over it.

Set between the border and badlands of Mexico and California, Lawrence Osborne's resurrection of the iconic Marlowe is touted as an unforgettable addition to the Raymond Chandler canon.

Coming This October

T. J. O'Sullivan Private Investigator Series, Book 2

 

 

Can't wait for Honolulu Blues, the second installment in the T. J. O'Sullivan Private Investigator series? Then click on the image or the link below to read a FREE sample, the first three complete chapters.

READ THE HONOLULU BLUES SAMPLE

Flashback Friday: The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler

$11.99 eBook Version

If you love Robert B. Parker's Spenser, get acquainted with Philip Marlowe, the inspiration behind Parker's creation.

Raymond Chandler is widely considered the successor to Dashiell Hammett as the world's premier hard-boiled detective fiction writer. Some say that Chandler's character, Los Angeles gumshoe Philip Marlowe, is the archetypal private eye, more iconic and more enduring than any of the private eye characters created by not only Hammett, but the likes of Ross MacDonald, and Mickey Spillane.

Marlowe, like Hammett's Sam Spade, and Robert B. Parker's Spenser, is a man of principle. Despite his tough exterior and rough manners, Philip Marlowe follows a code of honor that stands out as endearingly old-fashioned in a corrupt, often vicious, world. Chandler's novels can be considered morality tales. Beneath all the roughhousing and sexual tension can be detected a critique of American society, run by greed and big money, that makes men like Marlowe necessary.

Chandler's writing is characterized by arresting lines that set a scene, the throwaway wisecrack, novel descriptions of dead men, and creative accounts of what it's like to take a bullet and or have a punch land square on your face. Most of all though, the greatness of Chandler is found in his wonderful dialogue. Perhaps no one in real life ever talked that concisely and cleverly, but when you read it you hope maybe they did.

This week, Flashback Friday focuses on Chandler's most famous novel, and his first, The Big Sleep (1939), a notoriously mixed-up story, which nonetheless rewards successive readings. If you aren't familiar with the hard-boiled tradition, this is the novel to plunge into to get a sense of the genre's possibilities and difficulties.

In The Big Sleep, a dying millionaire hires private eye Philip Marlowe to handle the blackmailer of one of his two troublesome daughters, and Marlowe finds himself involved with more than extortion. Kidnapping, pornography, seduction, and murder are just a few of the complications he gets caught up in.

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