The Crossing (A Harry Bosch Novel Book 18)

Connelly is a fantastic writer and this addition to his Bosch series is Bosch at his best! In The Crossing, we see Bosch in retirement dealing with time on his hands and missing the following of "his personal mission" of finding justice for the unjustly dead by following the clues that bring down their killers.This time he also deals with his own "crossing over to the dark side" as he drawn into working for his defense lawyer brother to find the killers and free the client sitting in jail. The case against him is air tight and trial is expect to be a slam dunk with all evidence (including DNA of the accused on and in the innocent female victim), but to Bosch, some things don't quite fit and "the mission" is on!This novel is great. Cornell's ability weave a fast paced detective novel is unsurpassed. THAT SAID, one thing PISSED ME OFF!NOTE to KINDLE USERS: Pay absolutely no attention to the number one customer review of this book by Phil in Magnolia IT IS FALSE and MISLEADING.It states that the Kindle edition includes at no additional cost the second Lincoln Lawyer book by Connelly at the end of "The Crossing" . It does not! The review was written in 2015, so maybe it included it back then, but apparently does not include it in 2018. The first half of the review (about half a page of it) raves about the incredible bargain of getting the Bosch novel and the Lincoln lawyer novel at one low price in the Kindle edition. He does complain that the Kindle edition quits counting pages after page 394 but the new novel continues complete. Well, it does quit at page 394, but that is because the whole book plus all the accompanying advertisements for other Connelly books ends on page 394 with nothing other than the review link page left. It would seem like false advertising using the Kindle brand and Amazon brand names except it is written by a "verified purchaser". Amazon and Kindle may not be responsible for what people put in there reviews, but they need to pay some attention to the reviews they pipe directly to MY Kindle just as a course of good business practice. Obviously the first review of the novel did not say the novel sucked and wasn't worth the $9.99 price. I suspect a review like that would not be first in the list of reviews.Again, I really enjoyed reading The Crossing, by Michael Connelly. I like the series, having bought and enjoyed all 17 of the prior Bosch novels. My gripe review is about Amazon and Kindle placing a bogus review at the top of their customer review list in order to gain up sales. I don't give flaming reviews, but this hacked me off when I had time on my hands, I think their marketing department needs to get head out of their butts and maybe their computer programmers also. My wife and I are perfect algorithms of targeted marketing in Eliterature. We have 3 Kindles between (had them for years) and buy a lot of Ebooks from the store on our devices. They do not need to market us with phony reviews to get us to buy the things we are already buying. I bet this 5 Star review does not go to top of the customer review list.

The remarkable and lucky, one and only Harry Bosch bobs n weaves in and out of dangers one after another to find the truth. Riding a crest of perception above all others involved he unravels extraordinary deception and succeeds against all odds. What read!

In his 20th Harry Bosch novel, Michael Connelly reunites Harry with his half-brother Mickey Haller, the defense attorney from Lincoln Lawyer. Connelly first matched them up in The Brass Verdict (2008). But make no mistake, this is Harry Bosch’s story.Maddie, Harry’s daughter is now 18 years old, within days of high school graduation and already has plans to attend Chapman College, the same school that Mickey’s daughter will be attending. The girls will room together. If you have followed Harry’s story through the years, you know that Maddie has not had it easy and her friendship with Mickey’s daughter seems to be a sign of emotional good health. Likely, it is also a set-up for one or more future Haller and Bosch novels where the girls’ encounter murder on campus or domestic terrorism and the dads come to the rescue. Connelly stays current with the backdrop of his stories.In The Crossing, Harry is now retired from LAPD and suing the department for forcing him into early retirement. When Mickey’s PI, Cisco, is sidelined with an injury after his Harley-Davidson is deliberately sideswiped by a burnt orange Camaro, Mickey asks Harry to step in for Cisco. He needs his help on a case involving a young black male artist with a wife and two sons who was arrested for the brutal beating death of the wife of a sheriff’s deputy. Haller is sure Da’Quan Foster is innocent of the murder of Lexi Parks, killed in her own bed. Harry turns him down, reluctant to commit to the crossing from cop to PI for the defense, thereby spitting in the eye of every LEO in LA and the county and earning their eternal hatred.He goes home to rebuild the 1950 Harley gathering rust in his garage, a project that will occupy his attention for quite some time. With the carburetor dismantled, all the parts cleaned and drying on newspaper, John Handy’s sax playing on the stereo, Harry studies the Clymer manual detailing step-by-step restoration of his vintage Harley. While reaching for a part, Harry realizes the newspaper was one he intended as a keepsake. It showed the former governor with one of his pals, a state assemblyman whose son’s prison term for murder was reduced to seven years by the governor on his last day in office. Harry liked to look it occasionally to remind himself of the strange bedfellows of politics and justice. After some internet research of Lexi’s murder, Harry agrees to read Haller’s case file on Foster, then to be Cisco’s temporary replacement.It is joy for any mystery lover or police drama lover to read a Connelly novel. He is one of if not the best at making police procedure exciting to read. Bosch’s mind is a well-oiled machine and he is tireless in following every loose thread and fitting it into the whole story. He revisits crime scenes, re-interviews witnesses, and immerses himself in the feel of those places, using his instincts but also his very disciplined mind.Mercifully, Connelly reviews all the pertinent data Bosch gathers by having him compose a timeline of all the known and unknown events, loose threads, and things that do not “fit.” He brings the clues altogether for the reader, to organize the story before the climax. There are a lot of characters and a lot of events in this fast-moving story.Bosch’s dogged investigation coupled with Mickey Haller’s formidable lawyering make The Crossing a splendid read for any mystery or suspense fan. This is another home run from Michael Connelly. Harry Bosch, PI – can’t wait for the next one.

At the end of The Burning Room we saw Hieronymus “Harry” Bosch being suspended from service for the LAPD after having been caught on film picking the lock to his Captain’s office. There was nothing dubious behand this - he had simply wanted to keep up the momentum of the case he was working, and needed to access an old case file. That counted for nothing, however, and he was put on suspension. As the novel opens, Bosch is still seething, and has hired his brother Mickey Haller, “the Lincoln Lawyer”, to sue for wrongful dismissal. Haller, like Bosch, suspects that the LAPD was looking for any excuse to dismiss him, in order to reduce its exposure to Bosch’s impending retirement pay-off.Bosch quickly becomes bored with so much unaccustomed time on his hands, and meets up Haller who tells him about his current defence case. As a lifelong law enforcement officer, Bosch is generally dismissive of the work that Haller does, believing that defence lawyers undo all the positive work of him and his colleagues designed to take criminals off the street. Haller convinces him that on this occasion, he is absolutely convinced of his client’s innocence and suspects that he has been framed. Bosch grudgingly agrees to help out, crossing what he previously considered to have been an inviolable line, and consenting to act as Haller’s defence investigator.The case on which he is engaged is a difficult one, involving the rape and murder of a senior civic official and wife of a local police sheriff, and seemingly an open and shut case owing to the severely incriminating presence of the defendant’s DNA at the scene. Bosch is very cynical about the defendant’s professions of innocence, but starts to look into the case. After all, if the defendant is indeed innocent, then the actual offender is still at large.Connelly’s tight prose propels the story along, and Bosch soon finds that he has rattled some angry feathers among the law enforcement community, who see his work for a defence attorney as a betrayal of his life’s work. Unusually for Connelly’s Bosch stories, we are also given an insight into the thoughts of the perpetrator. This works well, lending a sense of immediacy to the book.

A really good book, Harry is normally a homicide detective. Now, he is a defence investigator. There are multiple murders, and there are cop killers, cop killers who will stop at nothing to prevent Harry from bringing evidence to court to prove a man's innocence and proof that two cop killers are guilty.The cop killers are watching Harry, Harry is at the end of the investigation he's talking to a witness at his business when the cop killers kick the door and bullets start flying everywhere a cop killer gets away the other is injured.Harry goes home only to find the other cop killer us in Harry's home, Harry leaves his gun on his record player the cop killer stands there with his gun raised ..... Great ending.

I don't know how he does it but Connelly has produced yet another great Harry Bosch novel, even though our hero is now no longer a police officer and is getting on a bit! Also, teaming up with his half brother, The Lincoln Lawyer, once more brings a nice conflict of interest and a clever way of depicting the opposite ways a police officer and a defence lawyer view the same case. It's totally against the grain for Bosch but, as always, he has to do the right thing when he realises the suspect may, in fact, actually be innocent! As always the story is driven by excellent dialogue and descriptions of police procedure set against the now familiar background of LA. I've read all the books in order and was looking forward to this one. It didn't let me down. But I fear age is catching up with our hero and there won't be many tales left in Harry.

Michael Connelly's knowledge of police procedure and how the law works makes his books superior to lots of other crime fiction out there. Some recent UK entrants into this over-crowded field would do well to read a few Connelly books to see how it's done. In this one, Bosch teams up with lawyer Mickey Haller to work a case that goes against everything Bosch stood for when working for the LAPD. This believable, ever-combustible chararacter, once again drives the relentless pace of the story as he goes about proving the innocence of someone convicted for a brutal murder and rape - by going after who actually was involved. Procedure and process drive Bosch's systematic approach to things, but Connelly never overlooks the human side of his stories, using Bosch's own frailties and vulnerabilities (notably in parenting skills) to make things plausible and engaging. The theme of 'the crossing' is perhaps over-worked a bit, as if trying to justify the title of the novel, but overall this is pacy, superior fiction. Recommended.

This is a terrific story featuring Harry Bosch and Mickey Haller, his half-brother, working together to solve a case. What makes it different from previous Harry Bosch stories is that Harry is no longer a police officer and is working for Haller's defence team rather than the prosecution. All very different for Harry ... and the reader.The story grips you virtually from the start when Mickey contacts Harry for help in his defence of a client who Mickey believes has been set up to take the rap for a murder he did not commit. However all the evidence seems stacked against his client and Harry is not sure if he can ... or should ... get involved. Once he does, he discovers life on the 'other side' is just as dangerous as being on the side of law and order and, in some respects, more challenging.Once again Michael Connelly reveals more facets of Harry Bosch's character. Not only does he struggle with his self-worth and being considered by former colleagues as having crossed over to the 'other side', he also has to deal with his concerns about how it may alter his relationship with his daughter.As with previous books in the series, the writing is crisp and taut ensuring the story moves along at pace with the tension rising with every passing page. The story cleverly weaves both the police procedural aspects of the case with courtroom drama. Absolutely brilliant storytelling at its best.