{"id":5143,"date":"2016-01-06T06:57:32","date_gmt":"2016-01-06T11:57:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=5143"},"modified":"2016-01-13T21:45:21","modified_gmt":"2016-01-14T02:45:21","slug":"the-crossing-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=5143","title":{"rendered":"****The Crossing"},"content":{"rendered":"
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(photo: readerwalker, creative commons license)<\/p><\/div>\n

By Michael Connelly, narrated by Titus Welliver <\/a>\u2013 What a pleasure it is to enter the Los Angeles airspace of Harry Bosch and his half-brother Mickey Haller. Teaming up his two protagonists from the Bosch and Lincoln Lawyer series was a brilliant move by Connelly, and I\u2019ve enjoyed every story of the two of them, fighting crime and for justice. In this latest double-outing, Connelly does not disappoint.<\/p>\n

In The Crossing<\/em>, Bosch takes the lead. He\u2019s retired, not by choice, and rattling around his garage doing not very much. Haller approaches him about serving as an investigator on a difficult case he\u2019s undertaken: a man accused of a brutal murder based on supposedly irrefutable DNA evidence, but Haller is convinced his client is innocent. Bosch is doubtful. Worse, if he agrees to help the defense he\u2019s \u201cgoing over to the dark side\u201d in his own eyes, and it will be seen as a betrayal by all his former police department colleagues. Still, reviewing the case files does raise a few unanswered questions and, as we might expect, Bosch\u2019s investigatory instincts soon overrun his reservations, and, with nothing more than the box for a luxury wristwatch to go on, he’s off. But meanwhile, a couple of rogue cops are up to something, and the brothers are in their sights.<\/p>\n

Seeing Bosch and Haller work in their respective roles\u2014investigator and courtroom advocate\u2014lets Connelly show off his characters\u2019 different skill sets and keeps the reader (listener, in this case) well entertained. It\u2019s instructive to hear Haller\u2019s reminders that, while Bosch may be on a search for the truth, the client must be their uppermost concern.<\/p>\n

As to the effectiveness of the audio version, Welliver\u2019s excellent reading, combined with Connelly\u2019s clear writing style, made it easy to keep track of the characters and the story. Welliver is super-prepared for this reading, as he played the character of Harry Bosch in the eponymous Amazon television series that premiered in 2015. An interview with Connelly and Welliver is included in this Crime Fiction Lover preview<\/a> of the television series.
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