The Black Echo (Harry Bosch #1) by Michael Connelly *

Reading dates: 2 August – 6 September 2021

I chose to read The Black Echo because, like Shetland, the Harry Bosch books have been made into a TV series. Also like the Shetland novels, I really disliked the first volume of Harry Bosch stories. But this time I am not sure I have the heart to give it another go. The story is so full of clichés! I dislike the main character (including his name, Hieronymus Bosch, really) and the characterisation of Los Angeles does not go much further than names of streets. No sense of the place whatsoever and place – and a little bit character –  is the reason I read crime fiction.

The story too is predictable, so much so that I seriously considered abandoning reading two chapter from the end.  Perhaps I am being unfair, it is only the first in a series of currently 21 books and there is much to set up, but there is nothing here that draws me back into this universe.