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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Hardboiled at its best, February 18, 2003
After serving three years in prison for an assault he can't remember committing, Mitchell is out and about in London. An old mate sets him up with a flat and a job run by a loan shark and Mitchell gets beat up and finds he isn't crazy about that life. Then he gets set up as a live-in handyman for an ex-actress with money and cars and sex and everything seems to be going great -- except blokes from the loan sharking end have it in for him. Mitchell also has a crazy sister, Bri, and soon meets and falls in love with a beautiful and smart woman, Aisling, who returns his love. But with Mitchell enraging half the folks he meets and the rest turning up dead, both he and the people he loves are soon in danger. Can his increasingly violent methods keep them all alive? LONDON BOULEVARD is one of the best books I have read this spring. Tough, gritty, written in an almost diary-like style, this is one of the few novels I truly had trouble putting down. I was sitting up in bed at one in the morning thinking, "Just a couple more pages, that's all," and before I knew it a couple more had turned into several more chapters. Ken Bruen has created a sordid tale of love and violence that is criminally easy to read. His characters aren't particularly loveable, but they aren't supposed to be. His pacing, plotting, dialogue all sizzle and leave the reader hungering for more right down to the slam bang finish. My one complaint with this book, which has nothing to do with the author and his work, is the publishing press's horrible job. Periods are missing, commas and quotes are backwards, at one point a whole ten to twelve line blank chunk has been inserted in the text, the list goes on. I cannot believe a publishing company, even a small one called Do Not, could get away with this sort of mess. In short, if you like hard boiled, fast paced, and tough talking little novels, LONDON BOULEVARD is a winner I couldn't recommend more highly.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
No Sunset Blvd, but pretty good anyway, June 4, 2006
This review is from: London Boulevard (Bloodlines S.) (Paperback)
I should say first that Sunset Blvd (which this book is an "homage" to) is my favorite movie. I was really excited by the premise of this book for that reason and in the beginning I really enjoyed it. The writer has a really engaging, fresh, readable style that I liked a lot and the book is true to noir form. And the beginning of the book is really great fun. Unfortunately, though, what was fun in the beginning started to look a little trite after awhile (how many other noir books can the main character mention? yes, we all read them and catch the references, but after a certain point it gets a little ridiculous to have the bad guy quoting Ellroy and such all the time). Also, you spend a lot of time in the middle waiting for the other shoe to drop, plotwise. And, I'm not sure the extra "fleshing out" of certain aspects of Sunset Blvd. make the story any more fun, especially when the author is really kind of just copying certain parts of the Sunset Blvd. story and explaining them more. Having said that, though, I still really liked the premise, the author's style, and the characters. It's definitely a solidly good, three star book. It's just not *quite* as good a book as it seems to think it is, and much of it is just a little bit TOO much just ripped right out of Sunset Blvd. itself, so I was a little disappointed. I think it is definitely worth reading, though - I really like Bruen's style and will definitely read him again - I can see that maybe when he isn't riffing on another plot he's even better. Overall I think this is a very enjoyable novel with good characters and the only problem is that it takes itself just a little too seriously.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Dark but compelling., April 9, 2005
This review is from: London Boulevard (Bloodlines S.) (Paperback)
There is something about Bruen's writing which is unique and compelling. His characters are not likable, but we're drawn to them. His writing is spare and sharp. His books are dark and somewhat disturbing, but irresistible. His books are not for everyone, but they certainly are on my must-read list.
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