Customer Reviews

City of Fire (Lena Gamble Series)

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Robert Ellis' latest thriller is a powerful story, filled with violence and graphic detail. Ellis builds the tension so high you won't want to read City of Fire late at night, particularly if you're in the house alone.

LAPD Detective Lena Gamble is 29, and alone in the world. Her brother, David, had been murdered five years earlier. Lena has the time and willingness to work on the latest horrific crime investigation. She and Hank Novak, her partner on the Homicide Special Squad, are the officers responsible for the investigation into the murder of a woman found in her bed. Although all clues point to the husband, Lena soon realizes there might be a link to a previous murder. As she starts to make the connections, she realizes they're looking for a serial killer, a man soon dubbed "Romeo."

As fire season starts in LA, the Santa Ana winds fan the flames, just as Ellis builds the book's tension up so much it's almost unbearable. Lena realizes she's not only looking for a serial killer, but at the same time, she's looking for her brother's killer. And, someone in the police department wants to shut down that case, and label it solved. She no longer knows who to trust, and she doesn't want to become another victim.

Pack this book for summer vacation because you won't want to put it down. But don't read City of Fire late at night.

When you read a novel [any novel] set in contemporary Los Angeles, you have to wonder how much work the author has put into getting the background accurate. This recent novel by Ellis is quite well done, with many details of LA. But you know that there is always a temptation by an author to put in the stereotypicals. The sleazy Hollywood music and drug scene. The glittering night view from the Hollywood Hills. And so on.

But what struck me about this novel was a short scene in the northern hillside suburb of La Canada. (There's a tilda over the n, by the way.) The protagonists visit a house there, where the host shows them peacocks that inhabit the neighbourhood. He says some got free years ago and bred. Now they are a fixture in La Canada. This is exactly right. I've visited a place there several times, and you can often see peacocks and their offspring loitering around on roofs. Not a detail you will often run into in books set in LA. It was just a tangential observation that Ellis inserted. Adds an authentic flavour.

Read this book for the subtext--there is a lot more going on here than just great character development and an out-of-control-freight-train of a plot. What Ellis has done is to give us a snap shot of American culture in 2007--complete with a coffee addicted female detective and one sick-sexual-psycho-killer. But wrapped around these unforgettable characters, are layers of information about who we are as a society, how we react, think and manipulate all of our technological devices that enable us to function as higher primates in a modern age. The problem is, we are still animals. Ellis knows this and exploits it to a horrifying degree.

On top of the deftly interwoven social commentary, Ellis has rendered a portrait of Los Angeles that literally puts you on the freeway. The sprawling urban environment becomes a major character, indifferent, moody and combustible. Driving in LA is a daily hassle for those living there and absolutely daunting for a visitor in a rental car--but driving in this book--frequently against the clock--can be a matter of life or death. All that is missing here is a road map for the out-of-towners.

Down the road. . . City of Fire will serve two purposes. It will always remain a highly entertaining, rip-roaring read. But it will also become a succinct time capsule of our immediate age and how we lived and thought in 2007. The same way Dashiell Hammett's gritty crime novels provide a vibrant window on the 1930s. It is one of the underrated aspects of the crime genre--holding up a mirror to society. With City of Fire, Robert Ellis has earned his place as a true master of crime fiction

It has been several years since we've heard from Robert Ellis. A media consultant, Ellis received critical acclaim for his novels THE DEAD ROOM and ACCESS TO POWER, which combined noir mystery and political elements. CITY OF FIRE, his newly published work, is a bit more personal --- a dark and disturbing journey into the product of a twisted mind.

CITY OF FIRE begins with the brutal murder of a pregnant woman in her Los Angeles area home. LAPD Detective Lena Gamble, running a murder investigation for the first time, quickly zeroes in on the victim's husband, and indeed the case against him appears to be open and shut. Gamble discovers, however, that not only is he falsely accused, but that this killing is one in a string of several. She is further unsettled when her investigation suddenly intersects with the still-unsolved murder of her brother that occurred several years previously.

The trail of clues leading from one murder to the next is sometimes contradictory at best and seemingly impossible at worst. It is not until Gamble comes full circle, professionally and personally, that she arrives at a solution that challenges everything she previously had known to be true.

This is an unrelentingly grim work, a modern classic of noir fiction that takes the reader on a journey into the rarely chartered nether reaches of the damaged soul. Ellis also utilizes a forest fire, stoked by the Santa Ana winds, to serve as a backdrop, metaphor and...something else here, providing a sense of underlying urgency to the proceedings, even as it is clear that the killer will strike again and again. Ellis's graphically phrased prose is memorable in itself, but his main strength is his plotting.

As intricate and complex as the story is, Ellis takes great care in leading the reader slowly, so that one never feels lost or hurried even as he pulls his audience closer and closer to the abyss. While one is left wishing that Ellis wrote more often, a five-year wait for a work of this caliber is a fair tradeoff.

--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub

The story is solid and Robert Ellis didn't disappoint me. Although there is no shortage of newly made corpses and some gruesome mutilations, Lena and Hank keep their spirits high. The story itself is well written and the plot is logical with well defined characters. This is the kind of story that you want to keep for when you can read it all in one evening. Should it be a dark, cold October night so much the better.

Raymond Chandler once commented that Hammett, "Took murder out of the Venetian vase and dropped it into the alley..."

With _City of Fire_ Robert Ellis takes murder out of the tedious legion of cerebral killers and clever, purse lipped detectives and gives it back to the people who are really good at it... the vengeful and passionate.

Ellis' book isn't just a 'CSI' look at a pathological big city police force and it's more than a "never saw that coming" plotted mystery.

At its heart, _City of Fire_ is a moral tale of what happens when we can't reconcile our deeds and how betrayal undermines our soul.

By turn's grotesque, funny, shocking, poignant and ultimately emotionally satisfying, this is the new standard crime novelists will strive to reach.

Robert Ellis has masterfully crafted a gripping crime thriller that will send chills down the spine. He takes us on a roaring roller coaster ride of intrigue and suspense, with lots of twists and turns as Detective Lena Gamble cruises the hills of L.A. in search of a psychotic serial killer. Ellis delivers everything the crime novel fan demands: gritty cops, wily bad guys, double-crosses, and buckets of blood set against the backdrop of a world-class city that, coincidentally, is enduring its annual fire season. Character development is superb, and Ellis's extensive knowledge of police procedures and criminal psychology makes this ride as realistic as they come. You won't want to put this book down.

Readers will benefit from reading Ellis's earlier book, The Dead Room, since City of Fire contains some references to it.

Lisa Gamble is given the lead investigator responsibility on a murder of a young woman who was found brutally murdered. The victim's body was left in a manner that looked like it was staged for someone else to see.

The victim had recently had sex and the DNA doesn't match her husband's. When Lisa finds a document with the number seven on it, she looks into similiar cases and comes to believe that the killer is keeping count of his victims. She finds that the DNA matches two other murders where other men were convicted.

The author does an excellent job in letting the reader know about Lena's background and see her personality, such as the way she does crossword puzzles in ink and the fact that she lives in the home of her brother, David, who was murdered. This lets the reader understand Lena's actions and her relentless pursuit of the killer. It also gives an additional reason why the reader may identify and sympathise with Lisa.

The writing captivates the reader's attention and holds it throughout the heart pounding story.

In addition, the author provided a plot twist just when the reader figured that they had everything figured out. This added to the interest and freshness of the story.

Readers will surely enjoy this highly enjoyable book.

CITY OF FIRE serves as the introduction of Lena Gamble, a 29 year old homicide detective just promoted from Hollywood division to the elite Homicide Special section in the Los Angeles Police Department. Gamble's hooked up with a veteran detective, Hank Novak, and working what appears to be a brutal serial case. Still haunted by the cold case murder of her brother five years ago, Gamble begins to find clues that link the two cases. As wildfires close in on the city, Gamble must face both killers. The twist at the end is absolutely spellbinding.

CITY OF FIRE was a Los Angeles Times bestseller and named a top read by People Magazine, USA Today, and The New York Times. The Chicago Tribune called it a "must read." Oline H. Cogdill selected CITY OF FIRE in the Best 13 Mysteries of 2007. And Mystery Scene Magazine describes Robert Ellis as "a master of suspense." This crime novel has been translated into more than ten languages, and received praise from both Janet Evanovich and Michael Connelly, who wrote "CITY OF FIRE is my kind of crime novel. Gritty, tight and assured. Riding with Detective Lena Gamble through the hills of Los Angeles is something I could get used to. She's tough, smart, and most of all, she's real."

I looked this up because I think Robert Ellis is a fresh new voice. And Homicide Special Detective Lena Gamble explodes off the page. CITY OF FIRE is one of the best thrillers I have ever read, and I can't wait to see what happens in Ellis's followup, THE LOST WITNESS.

I picked up City of Fire by chance and I'm glad I did. It has a "Harry Boschy" feel about it, but it was good to have a tough female cop in the lead. I didn't expect the end until I got there. I would like to see this character return for more cases.