Customer Reviews

While I Disappear (Prime Crime Mysteries)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Wright has created a wonderful, atmospheric series with an interesting protagonist. Horn definitely has a past for which he is still paying. He is also very human, feeling guilt for his own past, knowing he is not the hero cowboy, and often leaping to the wrong conclusion. But he also has that sense of right that keeps driving him forward. The books are well plotted and the supporting characters are as interesting as John. Wright puts the reader in post WII Los Angeles when the studio system was still in existence, everyone smoked and men wore hats. I have very much enjoyed both books in this series and look forward to reading the next.

Every once in a while, you read a book that's just dead on perfect. Usually, the author follows this with something more down to earth, not as good or polished. Very occasionally you read a first novel that's perfect, and it's followed by a second novel that's as good as the first. Clea's Moon was brilliant, and While I Dissappear is as good if not better.

John Ray Horn, the main character, is a disgraced former B-movie star who mostly was in bad Westerns, and spent two years in prison for punching the son of the head of his studio. These days, he works as a collection agent for his former big screen sidekick and faithful Indian companion, who now owns a casino just north of LA. The series is set in the just-post-War era, when Los Angeles was booming and Hollywood was in its Golden Era.

In While I Dissappear, Horn runs across a former co-star of his, a dignified intelligent woman who was a much better actress than he, but vanished after filming the movie. Years later she's living in poverty on Bunker Hill in LA, and doesn't want to have much contact with him. A few days later, she's dead, strangled, and Horn of course decides to find out who killed her. Things sort of progress for a while, then go sideways when there's another killing, and of course along the way, Horn has to journey through various parts of Los Angeles, meeting various Hollywood types, a preacher, poor people, and eventually the killer.

This is one of the best second novels in a detective series that I've ever read. I disagree thoroughly with the previous reviewer who complains this book isn't like Chinatown or something: the character is essentially an amateur detective, not a professional, so his judgements aren't consistent or always intelligent. His friends are apparently aware of his temper, and make allowances. While James Ellroy is a great writer, Edward Wright isn't Ellroy: the prose is much less adventurous and more conventional, but more poetic in places, and less choppy; while the story, in contrast, is less dark, cynical, and negative. This isn't something that bears discussion, in my opinion: every writer is different, and the tone of the books will be different too.

I really enjoyed this book, and frankly I haven't met anyone else who's read the book who didn't enjoy it immensely.

I must begin my review by stating that I am biased because I think the author Wright is one hell of a writer (based solely on the Horn series as that is all I have read by him). This novel is nostalgic, with a good mystery, great plotting, believable characters and lots of heart.

John Ray Horn was a somewhat successfull B movie "star" in the loosest since years ago and now does a little looking around for people that need help, aided by his sidekick Joseph Mad Crow, also a former actor (the Indian sidekick to John Ray's cowboy). John Ray is a sympathetic, believable Hero with a grounded set of morals and beliefs, despite the trampeling they often take. Wright is an author who evokes an age, both good and bad, when the world was a little younger and more naive, though not by much. Mystery fans everywhere should find Wright and devour anything he has written featuring Horn and Mad Crow.

I agree with most of what the previous reviewer says although it didn't bother me as much. I just am pleased to have found this new writer who I believe is going to grow into one of the best of the best. Read it-it's worth your time, and it WILL leave you waiting for the next one.

Excellent writing, an intriguing murder plot, and Los Angeles in the early 50s. What else would you want...But wait, all of this set against the backdrop of sleazy Tinseltown and you've got a real winner.

Maybe I would be more of a fan if Wright wrote more like Ellroy. This is his second John Ray Horn novel, following the adventures of a former movie cowboy who now works as a debt collector for his Indian sidekick from the movies, and occasionally finds himself investigating a variety of crimes. There are some dark corners in these novels, but, unfortunately, not enough of them. I really want to like Horn, but Wright is still something of a clunky writer--Horn is not a very consistent character. He's always jumping to the wrong conclusions and alienating fomer friends, who are all too willing to forgive him his mistakes. Wright tries to palm this off as the product of Horn's upbringing by a morally rigid preacher-father, but it reads more like inconsistent characterization. Horn is also just a bit too much of a goody-goody, in keeping with his fomer movie cowboy role, to deal with the sorts of dark crimes he keeps coming up against (here, it's a long-forgotten rape/murder at a wild party back in the silent movie days which turns out to have repercussions in the present day, post WWII Los Angeles). If these books were more like _Chinatown_ in their handling of the dark side of America's fascination with California, they might be more compelling. It wasn't a bad book by any means, but I'm still waiting for Wright to really hit one out of the park.