About this ebook
A Los Angeles homicide detective must catch a serial killer in this breathtaking crime novel from the New York Times–bestselling author of L.A. Confidential.
Lloyd Hopkins was not yet a cop when the Watts riots ripped Los Angeles apart. A member of the California National Guard, he had dreams of trading in his khaki uniform for blue—of serving and protecting instead of learning to kill. Called in to patrol the streets of South Central Los Angeles during the riots, he discovered that safeguarding his city often meant shedding blood. Seventeen years later, Hopkins wears plainclothes. He has everything he had dreamed of as a young soldier: a wife, a family, and a detective’s commission. But the city’s finest homicide detective is about to be tested. Twenty women are dead, and to find their killer, this good cop must learn to think like a madman.
From a modern master of the noir novel, James Ellroy's bestselling, acclaimed crime fiction captures the seamy side of Los Angeles like no other author since Raymond Chandler.
Lloyd Hopkins was not yet a cop when the Watts riots ripped Los Angeles apart. A member of the California National Guard, he had dreams of trading in his khaki uniform for blue—of serving and protecting instead of learning to kill. Called in to patrol the streets of South Central Los Angeles during the riots, he discovered that safeguarding his city often meant shedding blood. Seventeen years later, Hopkins wears plainclothes. He has everything he had dreamed of as a young soldier: a wife, a family, and a detective’s commission. But the city’s finest homicide detective is about to be tested. Twenty women are dead, and to find their killer, this good cop must learn to think like a madman.
From a modern master of the noir novel, James Ellroy's bestselling, acclaimed crime fiction captures the seamy side of Los Angeles like no other author since Raymond Chandler.
Ratings and reviews
4.7
3 reviews
Tracy Hatfield
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May 18, 2014
Genius
About the author
With his outsize personality and distinctive prose style, James Ellroy (b. 1948) is one of the finest modern authors of hard-boiled fiction. His mother was murdered in 1958, and in his twenties Ellroy moved from job to job, finally finding steady work as a caddy, an experience which formed the backdrop for his first mystery, Brown’s Requiem. Among the many honors and accolades he has received for his work, the Mystery Writers of America named James Ellroy a Grand Master in 2015.
He drew a cult following with his first books, which included the Lloyd Hopkins trilogy of police novels, and found widespread fame with 1987’s The Black Dahlia, a meticulously researched account of Los Angeles’s most famous unsolved murder.That novel and 1990’s L.A. Confidential, both of which were adapted for the screen, cemented his notoriety as an author of historical crime fiction. Ellroy lives and works in Los Angeles.
He drew a cult following with his first books, which included the Lloyd Hopkins trilogy of police novels, and found widespread fame with 1987’s The Black Dahlia, a meticulously researched account of Los Angeles’s most famous unsolved murder.That novel and 1990’s L.A. Confidential, both of which were adapted for the screen, cemented his notoriety as an author of historical crime fiction. Ellroy lives and works in Los Angeles.
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