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A review by usbsticky
The Sins of the Fathers by Lawrence Block
4.0
A old time/old style private eye procedural written in the 1970's and shows it! For some reason you can tell it was written in the 1970's and not just because of the monetary amounts it mentions ($200/month to rent a one bedroom apartment New York city) but the style of writing.
Spoiler/Summary: An ex-NYPD detective works as a PI. He is "hired" by the father of a dead young woman who was murdered by her roommate who subsequently committed suicide in his holding cell. Since the murderer has already been caught, the father only wants to know about his daughter's life subsequent to the murder and what led up to it.
As a mystery book, it's a bit ho-hum. There's not much excitement or mystery, it's basically a by the book PI protocol: the PI uses footwork, investigates and follows up clues to solve the "mystery". I like it because I like the style of writing and the characters. It's a bit quirky, including the protagonist's rationale for what/why he does but I enjoyed the narrative and the procedural work. Most of all I guess I enjoyed reading about what it was like the in 70's - almost seems like a different world. I'll definitely check out book #2 in the series.
Edit: After finishing the entire series I read it again. I'd totally forgotten the plot so it was all new to me. What I liked about it was that it was a character driven book. Block spends a lot of time building up his characters. Scudder is definitely not a 1 dimensional character and his interactions with the other characters are well done and interesting to read.
Scudder solves the mystery with his trademark doggedness. He follows and follows up any avenue of investigation that he can find and that's how he does it. In his interactions with people he often makes them uncomfortable and uses psychology to make them say what they don't want them to say.
He does drink a lot but it doesn't seem Block is making it an issue in this first book. The reveal usually isn't that great with the Scudder books and it's the case in this first book as well but overall a nice and fairly quick read.
Spoiler/Summary: An ex-NYPD detective works as a PI. He is "hired" by the father of a dead young woman who was murdered by her roommate who subsequently committed suicide in his holding cell. Since the murderer has already been caught, the father only wants to know about his daughter's life subsequent to the murder and what led up to it.
As a mystery book, it's a bit ho-hum. There's not much excitement or mystery, it's basically a by the book PI protocol: the PI uses footwork, investigates and follows up clues to solve the "mystery". I like it because I like the style of writing and the characters. It's a bit quirky, including the protagonist's rationale for what/why he does but I enjoyed the narrative and the procedural work. Most of all I guess I enjoyed reading about what it was like the in 70's - almost seems like a different world. I'll definitely check out book #2 in the series.
Edit: After finishing the entire series I read it again. I'd totally forgotten the plot so it was all new to me. What I liked about it was that it was a character driven book. Block spends a lot of time building up his characters. Scudder is definitely not a 1 dimensional character and his interactions with the other characters are well done and interesting to read.
Scudder solves the mystery with his trademark doggedness. He follows and follows up any avenue of investigation that he can find and that's how he does it. In his interactions with people he often makes them uncomfortable and uses psychology to make them say what they don't want them to say.
He does drink a lot but it doesn't seem Block is making it an issue in this first book. The reveal usually isn't that great with the Scudder books and it's the case in this first book as well but overall a nice and fairly quick read.