True Crime by Max Allan Collins - A Review (1 Star)

This gets half a star for detail, and half of another for having pages, but misses out on the stars for character, plot,style and narrative.

I couldn't add it to any of my bookshelves as I do not have any labelled "text-book".

This is the second Max Allan Collins I have tried and the second time I have been disappointed. The first was a hard case crime piece of pulp that due to its length meant I was able to chew through it and grumble afterwards. This one was just too much of a hard slog. I try to give books a fair chance, but then I'm a third in and have yet to derive any sort of joy from a piece and am just trying to endure in order to move onto the next book - it's time to call it a day.

I thought the problem with the first Max AC book I read was that he was trying to mimic another person's work - perhaps his own Detective Heller stories would be better. But this one left me feeling disgruntled also. Looking at the author's catalog I think I know the answer.

The guy has written hundreds of books, literally hundreds and the vast majority of these appear to be collaborations, franchise extensions or novel adaptations of a TV series. The guy is a details guy. He copies a particular style, studies it, obsesses over it and researches, researches, researches. And he has skill in all of this (hence so many books) but if I was only interested in fact, I'd read a text book, if I was interested in CSI - I'd watch the series. Unfortunately, with all his mimicry and attention to detail MAC falls short (in the two I have read) in style, suspense or character.

In this piece detective Heller is pretty much a straight arrow - no vices, no interesting contradictions. He carries a gun a license and the pang of inevitability that he will go entirely unchanged by the events of the story. As for the plot - there is one central idea that is pretty much revealed early on and is then drawn out unnecessarily for pages and pages. The uncertainty of the actions and reactions by the characters is minimal and the stakes even more so. And as for the style... I didn't really notice any.

If you're happy for a load of detail and historical accuracy and not a lot of intrigue or personality then this may be for you, but not for me...