Finished the 7th of 10 books nominated for the 1982 Shamus Award. Nothing wrong with the plot of "Early Autumn" However, the main character, our hero, Spenser, is kinda annoying.
Finished #6 of the 1982 Shamus nominees. Arthur Lyons has been a favourite of mine for a long time. This one kinda fizzles at the end........ but that was the point!
Finished the 5th of the 1982 Shamus nominees. This one is a stinker. The detective only became a detective because he is a fan of detective fiction. All the characters are detective fiction related - so they are eliminated from ever being thought of as real people. And he ends it with a whodunit flourish. Crap.
Finished the 4th of the 1982 Shamus Award nominees. This is more like it! "California Thriller" won for best original paperback but "Old Dick" is way better. I guess they gave it to California Thriller because it was a serious private eye novel. Old Dick is just a lot of fun. Turns out I bought another book by this guy about 25 years ago called "Video Trash & Treasures" (a book of reviews of trashy movies).
Finished the 3rd of the 1982 Shamus Award nominees. Could not get into "California Thriller" at all.
Finished the 2nd of the 1982 Shamus nominees: "A Stab In The Dark" by Lawrence Block. This one is not nearly as intense as "Brown's Requiem" but Mr Block does have a fine way with words. He keeps you turning those pages and it's mostly because you care about his main character, the alcoholic Matthew Scudder.
Finished the first of 10 1982 Shamus Award nominees: "Brown's Requiem" by James Ellroy. This did not win best original paperback? That Max Byrd book must be a corker!
Here, our hero PI Fritz Brown deals with all kinds of L.A. weirdos. The kicker: Brown is probably even more of a weirdo than the bad guys.
1982 was the first year of the Shamus Awards. There were 5 nominees for best hardcover novel and 5 nominees for best paperback novel. I plan to read all 10.
It looks like I'll need to read all 10. I've reread 7 of the Arthur Lyons but "Hard Trade" isn't one of them. I read almost all the early James Ellroy's but I can't swear that "Brown's Requiem" was one of them.
Some of the others I've read a few by and some I've never even heard of. My work is cut out for me.
1982 SHAMUS AWARDS
THE EYE (Lifetime Achievment Award)
Finished #6 of the 1982 Shamus nominees. Arthur Lyons has been a favourite of mine for a long time. This one kinda fizzles at the end........ but that was the point!
Finished the 5th of the 1982 Shamus nominees. This one is a stinker. The detective only became a detective because he is a fan of detective fiction. All the characters are detective fiction related - so they are eliminated from ever being thought of as real people. And he ends it with a whodunit flourish. Crap.
Finished the 4th of the 1982 Shamus Award nominees. This is more like it! "California Thriller" won for best original paperback but "Old Dick" is way better. I guess they gave it to California Thriller because it was a serious private eye novel. Old Dick is just a lot of fun. Turns out I bought another book by this guy about 25 years ago called "Video Trash & Treasures" (a book of reviews of trashy movies).
Finished the 3rd of the 1982 Shamus Award nominees. Could not get into "California Thriller" at all.
Finished the 2nd of the 1982 Shamus nominees: "A Stab In The Dark" by Lawrence Block. This one is not nearly as intense as "Brown's Requiem" but Mr Block does have a fine way with words. He keeps you turning those pages and it's mostly because you care about his main character, the alcoholic Matthew Scudder.
Finished the first of 10 1982 Shamus Award nominees: "Brown's Requiem" by James Ellroy. This did not win best original paperback? That Max Byrd book must be a corker!
Here, our hero PI Fritz Brown deals with all kinds of L.A. weirdos. The kicker: Brown is probably even more of a weirdo than the bad guys.
1982 was the first year of the Shamus Awards. There were 5 nominees for best hardcover novel and 5 nominees for best paperback novel. I plan to read all 10.
It looks like I'll need to read all 10. I've reread 7 of the Arthur Lyons but "Hard Trade" isn't one of them. I read almost all the early James Ellroy's but I can't swear that "Brown's Requiem" was one of them.
Some of the others I've read a few by and some I've never even heard of. My work is cut out for me.
1982 SHAMUS AWARDS
THE EYE (Lifetime Achievment Award)
- Ross Macdonald
Accepted in his absence by his friend and colleague Dennis Lynds
- Hoodwink by Bill Pronzini (Nameless Detective)
- A Stab in the Dark by Lawrence Block (Matt Scudder)
- 30 for a Harry by Richard Hoyt (John Denson)
- Hard Trade by Arthur Lyons (Jake Asch)
- Early Autumn by Robert B. Parker (Spenser)
- California Thriller by Max Byrd (Mike Haller)
- Carpenter, Detective by Hamilton T. Caine (Ace Carpenter)
- Brown's Requiem by James Ellroy (Fritz Brown)
- The Old Dick by L.A. Morse (Jake Spanner)
- Murder in the Wind by George Ogan (Johnny Bordelon)
