[books 2015] VI Warshawski
May. 24th, 2015 02:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
inulro24. Critical Mass by Sara Paretsky
I'd been renewing this from the library since before Christmas. Partly because I haven't been reading as much as I usually do, but also because I wasn't convinced by the blurb on the back. This despite the fact that I have thoroughly enjoyed the few books that I have read in this series.
Anyway, I picked it up on Wednesday night and returned it to the library on Saturday afternoon. (And these books, like everything else, have been creeping up in length over the years.
I was unconvinced because it's one of those books where everything hinges on things done by various characters' grandparents or great-grandparents during WWII. When done well, it works, but most of the time it's not, and I was especially concerned about it not working in the context of the hard-boiled detective story.
The flashback sequences should have been annoying but they weren't, really, and the story is well paced so that I kept turning the pages anyway.
It's just disposable detective fiction, but it's really good disposable detective fiction. I've mostly read the early books in the series, which date from the 80s, and it's nice to see that VI moves with the times and had an iPad etc. these days. It'll be interesting to see where, if anywhere, the series goes from here - VI is in her 50s, Lotty is getting to be too old to be convincingly still practising medicine, and Mr Contreras is on borrowed time.
I'd been renewing this from the library since before Christmas. Partly because I haven't been reading as much as I usually do, but also because I wasn't convinced by the blurb on the back. This despite the fact that I have thoroughly enjoyed the few books that I have read in this series.
Anyway, I picked it up on Wednesday night and returned it to the library on Saturday afternoon. (And these books, like everything else, have been creeping up in length over the years.
I was unconvinced because it's one of those books where everything hinges on things done by various characters' grandparents or great-grandparents during WWII. When done well, it works, but most of the time it's not, and I was especially concerned about it not working in the context of the hard-boiled detective story.
The flashback sequences should have been annoying but they weren't, really, and the story is well paced so that I kept turning the pages anyway.
It's just disposable detective fiction, but it's really good disposable detective fiction. I've mostly read the early books in the series, which date from the 80s, and it's nice to see that VI moves with the times and had an iPad etc. these days. It'll be interesting to see where, if anywhere, the series goes from here - VI is in her 50s, Lotty is getting to be too old to be convincingly still practising medicine, and Mr Contreras is on borrowed time.
