{"id":538,"date":"2012-04-26T15:54:49","date_gmt":"2012-04-26T21:54:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/?p=538"},"modified":"2012-04-26T16:19:58","modified_gmt":"2012-04-26T22:19:58","slug":"loren-d-estleman-burning-midnight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/loren-d-estleman-burning-midnight\/","title":{"rendered":"Loren D. Estleman: Burning Midnight"},"content":{"rendered":"
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In olden times Loren Estleman would have been regarded as a master craftsman.\u00a0 He\u2019s sixty plus books into a more than impressive career, setting the bar high in both the Western and the Private Eye genres, while also writing the occasional standalone as well as a couple other mystery series (Peter Macklin, Valentino).\u00a0 This outing is the 22nd<\/sup> in his Amos Walker franchise, the present gold standard for private eye mysteries.\u00a0 Sure, there are other private eye masters at work right now \u2013 Robert Crais, Steve Hamilton, and S. J. Rozan come to mind \u2013 but for the pure, traditional private eye experience no one can beat Estleman.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>His prose is only one reason, but it\u2019s a big one.\u00a0 Laced with sly humor and original descriptions of both people and places, reading an Estleman novel is a rich experience.\u00a0 For a novel on the short side, the reader gets a lot of bang for their buck.\u00a0 This one is set in the Mexicantown area of Detroit.\u00a0 While it\u2019s \u201cMexicantown\u201d there\u2019s a reference to the coiled and dark world of \u201cChinatown\u201d (the film), and the overhanging, deteriorating beauty that is Detroit suffuses the book with atmosphere and menace.<\/p>\n

Walker is strictly old school, smoking cigarettes, swigging vodka and tequila when he comes across it, getting around town in a beat up muscle car, unencumbered by familial baggage.\u00a0 He\u2019s the classic loner, working in the white knight mode dear to every P.I. from Lew Archer and\u00a0 Phillip Marlowe down to the present.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s asked by an old frenemy, Inspector John Aldercyce, \u00a0to try and find the missing teenage brother of his son\u2019s wife.\u00a0 The kid, Nesto, appears to be caught up in a Mexicantown gang, and Alderdyce is hoping both to find him and scare him away from the gang life.\u00a0 The understanding way Estleman writes about this particular teenager is dead on, with their mixture of lying, fear, bravery and stupidity.\u00a0 Walker is more forgiving and understanding than some of the other folks in the Nesto\u2019s life.<\/p>\n

Things take a wrong turn when one of the Mexicantown leaders is gunned down \u2013 the death of El Tigre doesn\u2019t go unnoticed by anyone, and Nesto seems like he\u2019s in the frame for it.<\/p>\n

In reality, every P.I. novel has a certain trajectory \u2013 the detective squeals around town interviewing suspects and looking for clues \u2013 what sets any of them apart is the point of view, the writing, and the characters.\u00a0 Estleman\u2019s writing always sparkles.\u00a0 He also gets in a few digs at present technology.\u00a0 Here\u2019s a favorite:\u00a0 \u201c\u2026you can become dependent on technology of you have constant access to it.\u00a0 That made me the most independent detective in the 313 area code.\u201d\u00a0 And this of course underscores Walker\u2019s good old fashioned detective work \u2013 like Holmes, Poirot and Nero Wolfe,\u00a0 he relies on logical deduction and plain brain power.<\/p>\n

The plot is suitably tricky, I was surprised at the end, and I enjoyed the Amos Walker guided tour of Mexicantown.\u00a0 Twenty-two books in, this is still a fresh, vibrant, and classic series.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In olden times Loren Estleman would have been regarded as a master craftsman.\u00a0 He\u2019s sixty plus books into a more than impressive career, setting the bar high in both the Western and the Private Eye genres, while also writing the occasional standalone as well as a couple other mystery series (Peter Macklin, Valentino).\u00a0 This outing … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[15,7],"class_list":["post-538","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-michigan","tag-p-i"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=538"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":554,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538\/revisions\/554"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}