Finished: 'Songs of Innocence'

Recently finished "Songs of Innocence" by Richard Aleas. It's book #33 from Hard Case Crime publishing.

Aleas, whose real name is Charles Ardai, is the founder of the publishing company and this was his debut novel.

As mentioned before, I'm into the crime/mystery thing, particularly the old-style 1950s hard-boiled crime noir. Donald Westlake and Lawrence Block are my faves. Some of them get pretty gritty and dirty, but none more so than this one.

Three years ago, detective John Blake solved a mystery that changed his life forever — and left a woman he loved dead. Now Blake is back, to investigate the apparent suicide of Dorothy Louise Burke, a beautiful college student with a double life. The secrets Blake uncovers could blow the lid off New York City’s sex trade...if they don’t kill him first.

It was a little darker than most. Dealt with some disturbing topics like suicide and another I can't tell you about without ruining the ending. So I won't. And it's that ending. Man, it made the novel great, the plot awesome, but also made me not like the book. Hard to explain. The Washington Post pretty much nails it with this:

"Songs of Innocence[’s] devastating final scenes elevate the novel to an instant classic. The painful climax of this novel, as unexpected as it is powerful, will move you in ways that crime fiction rarely can." 

Goodreaders give it a 3.8 out of 5. I'm torn, but will defer to the writing skills of the author and will give it a 7- out of 10 on the Haugenometer.

As a pallet-cleanser I've moved on to Dean Koontz's "Ashley Bell."

I'm about 100 pages into this 700-page tome and it's vintage Koontz. The only reason I don't like reading Koontz is because he makes me feel so inadequate as a writer. This could be one of those losing-sleep knockout novels.

Koontz gives me pen envy.