Angels Flight - Michael Connelly

**** A formidable and very human detective, who however revels in his own misfortunes

Harry Bosch is undoubtedly one of the best literary detectives I have ever come across. Since the first book of this series, “The Black Echo”, I immediately found myself in tune with him, with his tearing apart the rules to find the culprit, with his weaknesses and his sad past. What makes these novels by Connelly real crime thrillers is the way in which the protagonist is personally involved in the cases he works in, so much so that the cases themselves are a tool of conflict that contributes to the evolution of the character. The problem arises, however, when the series gets longer and, in order to continue to have a protagonist who takes some personal demons with him (i.e. a flawed hero), every time that in a novel his life seems to take a positive turn, in the next one, what he got has to fall apart.

It was what I feared would happen in “Angels Flight”, which is why after I finished reading “Trunk Music”, featuring a happy ending, I hesitated for years before going on. Unfortunately, I had already bought the book; otherwise, I would have stopped at the previous one.

Obviously, my bad feeling has come true.

In “Angels Flight”, we see Bosch dealing with a murder that took place on the Angels Flight funicular. The victim is a black lawyer who is famous for cases against the police.

As always, Connelly expertly mixes fictional events and characters with real ones, giving us a realistic picture of social tension in Los Angeles in the late 1990s. What I particularly appreciate about this author is precisely the care he puts into detail, a sign of in-depth research work and a remarkable understanding of the subject. In this credible context, our Bosch moves, navigating among the press, colleagues who get in the way, intolerance towards the rules and the people who are under investigations. He does it as always with wit, following the evidence and his own intuition, and also risking his neck.

In this novel in particular, investigations lead him to discover inconvenient and unspeakable truths, which tend to lead him astray. The culprit will eventually turn up. I admit that I had guessed their identity simply by ruling out the others. But here the author adds a master stroke, giving us an unexpected and dramatic ending, and at the same time a perfect one.

What I didn’t like about this book, however, concerns the personal sphere relating to Bosch. As I imagined, the balance and happiness he finally achieved unexpectedly (and perhaps too easily) in the previous book are immediately shattered, and eventually he finds himself back to where he started. His character undergoes an involution whose purpose is to make sure he is the same flawed hero in later novels (which I have no intention of reading).

In particular, I did not appreciate the evanescence of an important character like Eleanor Wish, who in the first book of the series was crucial in defining Bosch in the eyes of readers, but who both in “Hard Music” and “The Spider” looks more like a soulless puppet, whose purpose is to bring him up and then make him fall again (poor Bosch!). It’s a shame, because I liked Eleanor, and she deserved a lot more substance.

Angels Flight at Amazon.