A Long Line of Dead Men (Matthew Scudder Mysteries Book 12)

A Long Line of Dead Men – Matt Scudder #12I almost hope no one reads this but here goes nothing.I am a huge fan of Lawrence Block’s Matt Scudder books and over the last year or so have picked up the series again with A Walk Among the Tombstones. I guess I lost my way through the series but thought I would continue with a chronologically later story with A Long Line of Dead Men. I haven’t read any other author who has the ability to create dialogue like Mr. Block. He makes you feel like you are sitting at the next table overhearing his conversations. For this reason, I am totally devoted to him and his characters. Yes…I know they are not real and I’m trying hard not to react like a crazed fan who doesn’t know the difference between a finely crafted story and reality but come on… didn’t Matt tell Elaine in A walk Among etc. that he minded her seeing her clients and asked her to hang up her call girl shingle? Ok…she had already done that on her own and didn’t make a point of telling Matt but that was probably because she didn’t want him thinking she was looking for more of a commitment from him. Commitment is a funny word. I personally believe that marriage is overrated. But, commitment is so much more. Although, when I think about the word commitment sometimes it’s enforced by someone other than yourself (you know...like she was committed to the asylum for her own good). Now to get to my point. I am now reading A Long Line of Dead Men and very engrossed with the story and then thinking oh no…is Matt going to order that bottle of booze? But no, thank heavens; he’s going to make a call. Not to his sponsor but to Lisa…What???? I remember Lisa from another book and he’s been hitting that all this time? And he actually asked Elaine to give up her side job in the earlier book but is still going to Lisa so he doesn’t pick up that bottle. And he’s using the tried and true excuse that it’s a chromosomal thing that men sometimes just need someone new and let’s not forget so much younger and let's not forget Lisa has daddy issues and therein her attraction to him lies. I actually had to stop reading and go back and make sure that his talk with Elaine was in Book 10 and here we are reading Book 12 and obviously not in a committed relationship with Elaine. Knowing that Matt Scudder is a card carrying member of AA and having a very good understating of an alcoholic’s mentality (I never met one that I didn’t like and then love and then not so much) but this shocked me.I’m going to finish the book and have ordered two more trying to get some sense of my understanding of the characters involved.O.K. I just got the next two books and not only is Lisa still in his life but now he’s married to Elaine. Oh wait…. Elaine surmises that he has someone on the side but since she knows how men are , blah, blah, blah and as long as he still loves her she’s ok with it. But...he never really tells her about his relationship with the other woman.Let me stop here because this is not a review. This is a rant. I guess I knew Matt Scudder was flawed in many ways but I also thought with sobriety came honesty. I was wrong.

I just finished Lawrence Block's latest Matt Scudder book, "A Drop of the Hard Stuff". It's his first book in a few years and I found it of 5 star quality and wrote a review for Amazon. But it is not Block's best Scudder book. That was "A Long Line of Dead Men", originally published in the mid-1990's. (After the first attack on the World Trade Center but before the second.) I make it a habit to reread the book every few years, but I hadn't done so in about 5 years. So, I went back and read it, hoping it would be as good as I remembered it. And it was.Lawrence Block's novels - and he has had several series using different characters - are never particularly action-filled. Oh, people get killed - in Block's "Keller" series a lot of people get killed - but he's not a graphic writer. In the Scudder series, Block writes in the first person, as Matt Scudder. Scudder is a retired cop, a recovering alcoholic, and an under-the-table private investigator. People hire him to "look into things". And as I wrote in my review of "Hard Stuff", most of the Scudder series touches on AA and its Step program. "Hard Stuff" was heavily into it and this book, "Long Line" also uses AA as a plot point. But the focus of this story is on a club - a private, secret men's group that meets yearly at a steakhouse in New York. The "Club of 31" meets to mark the march of life and death. Every year they enjoy a good meal, good drinks, good conversation, and list the men who have died since the club was formed. Then, when the club is down to the last man living, he chooses 30 young men to start the march all over again. The old list of names is destroyed and a new list of names begins as the 30 age. A long line of dead men.But the members seem to be dying off at a quicker rate than nature or accidents would account for. By the time Matt is hired to "look around", the club of 31 is down to 16 or so members. Scudder takes the case and begins a quiet search for who is knocking off the members. The only ones who know about the club are the members themselves, so suspicion is focused inward.Now, Lawrence Block is a master of dialog and conversation. Most of this book is written as conversation between the various characters - Scudder, his girlfriend, the club members, TJ, old friends who are cops and drinkers, etc. Each character is finely drawn and the information about them expands in Block's dialog.This is not a book for readers who want action. Neither is it so cerebral that it's in any way boring. Block is such a good writer that each page of this book is a treat. I thought it was the best mystery/detective book I'd read when I first read it years ago. I have no reason to change my mind about it now!

This has somewhat of a Sherlock Holmes type plot. What could have been tremendously silly almost becomes plausible.The pace is fairly slow but I never became bored with it. The dialogue really is brilliant and there are plenty of witty one liners. Matt Scudder is a fascinating character and the other characters in the book are fully formed and realistic.New York is almost a character as well.

A good yarn entertainingly written page by page. Just a few 'amusing' conversations go on a little too long. I just happen to prefer Keller to Scudder.

Lawrence Block just keeps knocking out detective stories with his non-detective, Matt Scudder. Set in New York City, as always, this latest has a clever variation in the old locked-room mystery. Good? Fugetaboutit...

Nice concept and execution.

Good enough,a bid slow but entertaining