The Scarecrow

Next up in the Harry Bosch Universe is the second Jack McEvoy book. I read this years ago as a stand-alone and loved it. I remembered nothing about it other than really enjoying it, but wanted to reread it working my way through these stories. I loved it! Jack is at the end of his career with the LA Times, working his last two weeks after having received his pink slip. He starts investigating the case of a trunk murder in the hopes of going out on a high note with a fantastic story and hopefully getting an innocent kid out of jail. His investigation takes him to Las Vegas, and eventually Arizona and with the help of Rachel Walling, the reader is in for quite the page-turner. I can highly recommend this book whether you’re reading along with the series or just as a standalone. I do think it would benefit the reader to first read The Poet (another book I can highly recommend) but it isn’t necessary to enjoy this one.

I am on record for heaping praise on Michael Connelly's standalone novels. They are not necessarily superior to the Bosch novels, but they are certainly the equal of those books. One of the very best is The Poet. Now, in The Scarecrow, Connelly reunites the central characters of The Poet: journalist Jack McEvoy and FBI Special Agent Rachel Walling.At the outset of the story Jack has been given two weeks notice by the L.A. Times. Another victim of the internet, the paper is downsizing and Jack, with his high salary, is a tasty target for the corporate beancounters. He vows to go out on a high note by writing one last, big story. He investigates a murder case in which a drug dealer has been convicted of a brutal sex crime. His grandmother claims that he could not possibly have done it. As Jack examines the facts of that case he discovers a cognate case and realizes that the two individuals convicted must each be innocent. Ironically, while he is investigating the case the real perp is investigating him. It is doubly ironic, since the perp is an IT whiz, a master of the technology which is destroying the Times and Jack's journalism career. Reunited with Rachel, the couple discover a web of evil which they proceed to examine and, finally, dismantle. The serial killer (like Harris' Buffalo Bill) is a boy with mom problems, mom problems that have distorted his personality and set him off, somehow, on a life of rape, torture, murder, fetishism and computer fraud.I am not spoiling the novel, for we learn much of this information early in the book. This is not a mystery, but a cat-and-mouse suspense thriller. Actually cat-and-mice, with Rachel in the picture. Actually cats-and-mice since the eponymous killer has a sidekick.So why are we seeing The Scarecrow on the shelves of grocery stores and Wal-Mart as well as on the point-of-purchase rack in your local bookstore? Because Michael Connelly is a master story teller. Because here he has recreated two superb characters, whose personal interactions are as interesting as their investigations. Because we want to know how a major reporter investigates major crimes and Connelly's nonfiction book, Crime Beat, wasn't quite as satisfying as this fictional depiction of the process. Because Connelly plots like a master and knows just what information (and how much of it) to reveal at any moment. Because we're fascinated by contemporary technology and we want to know how it operates and how it displays a capacity for good as well as for evil. And, finally, because the book builds to a crescendo and disrupts all of our plans for the day as we sit locked in our chairs, reading the book to its conclusion.This is Connelly at the top of his form. It's not Conrad and it's not Dostoyevsky (nor does it attempt to be), but it is the beach and airplane book of the summer and you'll love every word. Caution: it starts a little slowly as Connelly erects his superstructure. Be patient, the death race is coming.

Connelly is now my favorite crime fiction writer. I wish he would have kept Jack McEvoy around as a character longer.

A

Jack McEvoy is back in Michael Connelly's latest thriller, The Scarecrow. McEvoy, a crime writer who was previously featured in The Poet, is now writing for the LA Times.As The Scarecrow opens, McEvoy is becoming a dinosaur. So is the newspaper business in general. He's given two weeks notice if he agrees to train his new replacement, Angela Cook. McEvoy decides that he is going to go out in a blaze of glory, writing a story that will make The Times regret that they gave him the boot. He stumbles upon a case where a young gang-member has been blamed for the rape, torture and murder of a woman found in the trunk of a car. But McEvoy starts discovering that perhaps the kid is innocent after all and that this might actually be the work of a serial killer. He elicits the help of FBI agent Rachel Walling (who appeared in 3 previous Connelly books, including The Poet). Even with the help of the FBI, their lives are in danger as they match wits with someone so evil and with more tools than they can imagine. It's a race to see if McEvoy will even live to write his story.The Scarecrow has another story to tell as well, and that is the demise of the newspaper business. Connelly is a former crime-beat writer and knows the score. McEvoy muses "Like the paper and ink newspaper itself, my time was over. It was about the Internet now. It was about hourly uploads to online editions and blogs. It was about television tie-ins and Twitter updates. It was about filing stories `on' your phone instead of using it to call rewrite. The morning paper might as well be called the `Daily Afterthought'. Everything in it was posted on the web the night before." He calls Angela Cook a "baby reporter...She's very good and she's hungry, but she doesn't have the chops...The newspaper is supposed to be the community's watchdog and we're turning it over to the puppies." As someone who can't survive without a morning newspaper or two, this is all very depressing stuff.I'd be hard pressed to decide which of Connelly's characters I like best--Bosch or McEvoy. I think I'm leaning toward McEvoy as I suspect that there is a lot of Connelly in his fictional newsman. But whichever one I choose, The Scarecrow is a superb book to add to Connelly's accomplished body of work.

The bad guy is very smart and his plan is perfect. It brings out an interesting narrative because Jack and Rachel have to be smarter to catch the killer anyone doesn't even know about.

Lecture addictive

Superb !

Another great read from Michael Connelly - and Amazon price difficult to beat

Fast paced novel with interesting turns. Read it in two day and had a hard time to put it down