True Detectives: A Novel
by Jonathan Kellerman
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Book Reviews of True Detectives: A Novel
Book Review: A brilliant novel and may well be Jonathan Kellerman's best work to date
Summary: 5 Stars
TRUE DETECTIVES is a brilliant novel and may well be Jonathan Kellerman's best work to date.
Let's start with the primary characters. Moses Reed and Aaron Fox were introduced in 2008's BONES. Interesting secondary characters in that book, Kellerman fleshes them out and gives them living, breathing substance in TRUE DETECTIVES. These half-brothers are very different from each other. Reed is a flashy, stylish dresser who is well ahead of the GQ curve and possessed of an observant eye such that he immediately "gets" Dr. Alex Delaware's digs from a once-over of the outside. Fox is comfortable in undistinguished clothing and is not so much unstylish as unconcerned. Reed is an extremely successful private investigator with a quietly A-list clientele and a contact sheet of equal quality. Fox is an L.A. homicide detective, a de facto protégé of Milo Sturgis, with a dogged tenacity fueled by a desire to do well for the sake of the job.
They do not get along. Although Fox is white and Reed is of mixed race, their racial difference is not the source of their disagreement, though it would have been easy enough for the author to go down that route. Kellerman, however, does not take shortcuts when exploring the fraternal relationship. He makes you believe that race is not the etiology for the problems between them; it goes deeper than that. And when Fox and Reed realize that their respective cases throw them uneasily together, they find that they have to confront their differences --- and themselves.
But that is only one element that makes TRUE DETECTIVES such a joy. There is a real plot here, buoyed by Kellerman's L.A. triptych tour of the restaurants and attractions of Los Angeles --- from the boulevards to the side streets and all points in between. The focal point is a private investigation of a missing person initiated by Reed at the behest of one of his regular clients, an enigmatic Russian expatriate who he knows only as Mr. Dmitri. Reed is retained by Dmitri to investigate the disappearance of Caitlin Frostig, the adult daughter of one of Dmitri's accountants. The job brings Reed into contact with Fox, who was the primary investigator on the case and who wound up with nothing but dead ends. The unsolved case grates at Fox, as does his brother's interest in it, so the two form an uneasy and occasionally unwilling alliance to determine the fate of the missing woman.
Caitlin's boyfriend seems to be a likely suspect, and their investigation of him soon reveals that he is a gofer for an almost washed-up actor who has a load of problems, not the least of which is the company he keeps. When Caitlin's disappearance appears to be related to the unsolved murder of a prostitute, Fox and Reed soon find that their investigation is leading to the highest echelons of the Hollywood power structure and beyond, though to places they never could have anticipated.
The aspect of TRUE DETECTIVES that makes it an addicting read is the manner in which the two brothers work so well together by virtue of their very separate but compellingly equal ways. It is their differences that ultimately fit the fruits of the their labors together, like pieces in a puzzle. And this is very much a Fox and Reed book, if you will; Sturgis and Delaware make brief, if important appearances, enough to provide a sense of continuity but not enough to steal the show from the brothers. Not that they necessarily could. Fox and Reed may be the most interesting detective team you will encounter this year, and TRUE DETECTIVES is the perfect novel to officially launch them. I would be happy to see more of them, and Dmitri, in the future.
Book Review: Truly Entertaining, but Change is Hard
Summary: 4 Stars
Poor Jonathon Kellerman. I'm beginning to think he's a victim of his own success. Having created an extraordinarily likable and interesting protagonist in his Alex Delaware novels, it's hard for the reader not to feel cheated when he writes anyone else. At least, I think that's part of the reason for some of the (IMHO) surprisingly-negative reviews here of True Detectives, a book that I found genuinely fun and involving in its own right.
The two leads in True Detectives, half-brothers Aaron and Moe, appeared as secondary characters in Kellerman's last Delaware novel. In fact, I started reading True Detectives thinking it was a Delaware book. It wasn't until a couple of pages in that I realized, with disappointment, that my favorite child psychologist/detective wasn't the star of this novel. It made me a bit cranky, to be sure.
But as I continued to get into it, and set aside my preconceptions, I came to really like Aaron and Moe. Kellerman does a great job establishing the brothers as antagonists and, slowly, throughout the book, revealing more and more of the history that got them to where they are today. The story of their estrangement is a secondary mystery in the novel, and, for me, was at least as engaging as the primary one.
Many of Kellerman's books have far-fetched conclusions, and this one is no different. But Kellerman excels in keeping the psychology of his characters believable even when their circumstances aren't.
I loved seeing cameo appearances by most of Kellerman's series regulars in True Detectives: Dr. Delaware, Milo and Petra all drop in. Even Milo's partner, the good doctor, pops up. It's great fun seeing these familiar characters through other eyes.
Speaking of other eyes, the Delaware novels are generally written in the first person. While we get to see the characters as Delaware sees them, he is, of necessity, in every scene. Since True Detectives is told in the third person, Kellerman is free to focus on several characters in a way that he rarely can. Since I love the way Kellerman writes people - the telling details, the empathic understanding and his wonderful gift for dialogue - it's a treat to have him introduce so many new people in a way he can't in the Delaware books.
Was this book as good as the best of the Delaware novels? No. Is it interesting to see Kellerman stretch in a new direction and focus on some other people for a change? Absolutely. True Detectives stands on its own and I would like to see more of Aaron and Moe in the future. As long as we don't have to sacrifice Alex Delaware to do so, that is. That far, I'm not willing to go.
Scott Sherman, author, First You Fall: A Kevin Connor Mystery
Book Review: Mediocre story line and characters (2.5 *s)
Summary: 2 Stars
Thirty-something private detective Aaron Fox, son of Darius Fox a black LAPD policeman gunned down years ago, and the younger Moe Reed, son of Darius' white patrol partner, and, strangely enough, Aaron's mother, also white, making Aaron and Moe half-brothers, have never been able to overcome their rivalries towards each other. But it is precisely these highly unusual, if not confusing, family dynamics that are brought to the fore when Moe, a LAPD homicide detective, and Aaron, hired by a well-to-do Russian employer who is curious about the distress of one of his employees, are coincidentally both tasked to find a young college student Caitlin Frostig, now missing for 15 months.
The case at first seems to involve little more than rechecking facts and again shelving it. There were no apparent complications in Caitlin's life: she was a homebody and good student with an equally mild-mannered boyfriend. But the two brothers, operating mostly independently, start finding cracks in this wholesome scenario. From the boyfriend's drug-dealing the case expands with ties to fading and flailing Hollywood types, prostitution, street lowlifes, Christian fundamentalism, abusive relationships, and even the staged and brutal death of a good looking hooker.
The contrast between the brothers is a constant backdrop. Some may disagree, but Aaron with his GQ mentality and ambition is the more appealing character; gauged by success, there is no debate. However, there is little attempt to understand the interplay among the brothers; little more than convenient tolerance is evidenced when required. Likewise for the remaining characters: all are minimally sketched with no particular appeal. The plot has more busyness than complexity. Perhaps the rule that one has to follow all the leads as they unfold is legitimate, but the brothers got seriously sidetracked from their original mission, which was one interview away from being solved quickly.
The cameo appearances of the author's stalwarts don't rescue this book. The story line, the characters, and the intangibles never rise beyond the mediocre. In addition, the fairly evident effort to be politically correct along racial lines seems forced and clumsy.
Book Review: Half Brothers, a Homicide Detective and a PI, Compete to Find a Missing Woman
Summary: 3 Stars
"Two nations are in your womb,
Two peoples shall separated from your body;
One people shall be stronger than the other,
And the older shall serve the younger."
Genesis 25:23
Before getting into this book, let me make it clear that Alex Delaware barely appears in it, and Milo Sturgis has an even smaller role (if that were possible). If you want lots of those characters, give this book a miss.
The detection part of True Detectives is built around two dualities:
1. Two half brothers (same mother, different patrolmen fathers who were partners) compete to solve the same mystery. The two will remind you of Esau and Jacob more than Cain and Abel.
2. One half brother, Aaron Fox, is a slick private detective with a generous client. The other half brother, Moses Reed, is a homicide detective for LAPD. They each work the problem differently. Together, they can be unbeatable . . . but can they cooperate long enough to succeed?
The mystery begins with an unhappy accountant whose daughter, Caitlin Frostig, has been missing for sometime. Aaron Fox is hired by the accountant's employer to find her. Aaron soon finds that Caitlin's boyfriend, Rory Stoltz, is traveling in some pretty fast Hollywood company. Those connections, in turn, reveal a likely relationship to an unsolved murder. Aaron has no choice but to check in with his half brother. The two seem to enjoy trying to one-up each other more than they enjoy finding out what's going on.
One thing leads to another, and it's clear that there are some pretty heavy evil-doers involved. But who did what to whom? From there, it's an interesting combination of police procedural within the law/private detection outside the limits of the law that provides faster moving action than most police procedurals can provide.
I didn't find the characters to be very arresting or interesting. The competition between the two was almost a distraction in what is a pretty complicated mystery. With Alex Delaware and Milo Sturgis in the middle of this mystery, this would have probably been a four-star or five-star product.
Book Review: Superb Standalone
Summary: 5 Stars
I love Jonathan Kellerman's standalones; my previous favorite was Billy Straight. My new favorite is True Detectives. Reprising their appearance in his novel, Bones, we again meet Moses Reed and Aaron Fox. Fox is a PI, Reed an LAPD detective. They are also half-brothers. While not at violent odds with one another, they have not been close. In True Detectives they find themselves working the same case from different directions. In order to solve the crime(s?) they must put together their individually-secured evidence and, in the process, put together their relationship. Thus, we also have converging plot lines, all of which Kellerman handles well.
More interesting than the plots, in some respects, is the fact that Kellerman must develop a new voice in order to tell the tale. Sturgis and Delaware are shadowy background figures here, making brief cameo appearances and being referenced by the principal characters. Instead of a psychologist who feeds koi, walks a dog and loves a luthier, we have a mixed-race PI and his LAPD half-brother. The language is appropriate for their voices and their thought patterns. It's not quite full-blown L.A. Quartet/Ellroy, but it's closer to Ellroy-speak than to Delaware-speak, a staccato shorthand laced with street argot and cop idiom. And it's done absolutely expertly.
Kellerman steps out of his comfort zone and into the realm of if-not-quite-genius, at least pulp and crime fiction heaven. The setting is, as always, fully realized, the plotting highly skilled and the mystery at the center a disquieting pattern of man's inhumanity to just about everybody. Highly recommended.