Rating: 
Summary: There's much better out there
Review: This book has been praised by many, including crime writers I admire, but now that I've read the book, all I can say is that I don't understand what all the fuss is about. The story lacks suspense and narrative tension (things just kind of happen, one after another, to the passive protagonist); the characters are disappointingly superficial; and my B.S. meter was in the red zone throughout a large part of the book. It's neither a mystery nor a thriller; it's more of a period road-trip story with a weakly-motivated quest and some shady characters and dealings thrown in. The ending (with or without the last chapter) brought no satisfaction.How anyone can compare this writer to James Ellroy is beyond me. Yes, there's some superficially grim subject matter in The Last Good Kiss, but Ellroy, unlike Crumley, digs into his stories' evil in a relentlessly true and honest way. Further, where Ellroy's writing sings and bops, Crumley's is pedestrian. Perhaps sleazy subject matter was shocking in the '70s, but it sure isn't now. The whole '70s on-the-road shtick gets old fast, too. The bulldog was the best thing about this book. If you want to read fine crime writing that's grim, true, and well written, try Ellroy's The Big Nowhere and the rest of his L.A. Quartet, or anything by Dennis Lehane.
Rating:
Summary: There's much better out there
Review: This book has been praised by many, including crime writers I admire, but now that I've read the book, all I can say is that I don't understand what all the fuss is about. The story lacks suspense and narrative tension (things just kind of happen, one after another, to the passive protagonist); the characters are disappointingly superficial; and my B.S. meter was in the red zone throughout a large part of the book. It's neither a mystery nor a thriller; it's more of a period road-trip story with a weakly-motivated quest and some shady characters and dealings thrown in. The ending (with or without the last chapter) brought no satisfaction. How anyone can compare this writer to James Ellroy is beyond me. Yes, there's some superficially grim subject matter in The Last Good Kiss, but Ellroy, unlike Crumley, digs into his stories' evil in a relentlessly true and honest way. Further, where Ellroy's writing sings and bops, Crumley's is pedestrian. Perhaps sleazy subject matter was shocking in the '70s, but it sure isn't now. The whole '70s on-the-road shtick gets old fast, too. The bulldog was the best thing about this book. If you want to read fine crime writing that's grim, true, and well written, try Ellroy's The Big Nowhere and the rest of his L.A. Quartet, or anything by Dennis Lehane.
Rating: 
Summary: The best Road-Mystery written in the 70s.
Review: This book start with what is, without a doubt, the best first sentance ever written in a mystery. Crumley takes us on two journeys. In the first journey our detective goes on a drunkard's walk in California looking for a missing alcoholic. In the second we accompany the detective as he explores and tries to escape from his own alcoholism. This is Crumley's best mystery. Also worth reading is "The Dancing Bear."
Rating: 
Summary: For those of you who like to look under the rock . . . .
Review: This is an excellent mystery novel. If you taught a University level course on the mystery-noir, this would follow Hammett and Chandler and precede James Lee Burke and George Pelicanos. Additionally, W.C. Sughrue, Crumley's (I hesitate to say hero) lead, places us smack dab in the middle of the post Vietnam, pot-smoking, alcohol drenched seventies. So we get a chance to travel back in time, a time which some of us have forgotten by choice, and recollect how foolish we were. And Sughrue reminds us of all of that, because he readily embraces the release points of that decade: sex; drugs; rock 'n roll. The dialogue is tight, realistic and sensible. I suppose the drawback is that all of the characters are such low lifes. Even the good guys you wouldn't hang around with if you had a choice. Sughrue, unlike Elvis Cole, Spenser and Dave Robicheaux, doesn't do the right thing, really isn't faithful too much and really has . . . . well, no standards. But I have to rate it high. It has no pretenses. It is what it is. A good, tight, straight, melancholy, angry story about angry people in angry times, who weren't very nice to begin with. Worth your time.
Rating:
Summary: The best mystery.
Review: This is the best mystery novel I have ever read. Absolutly. No question. If you like Hammet, Chandler, or Ellroy you won't go wrong reading this terrific book.
Rating:
Summary: No Heros, No Happy Endings
Review: This is the first book by James Crumley that I have read. Believe me I plan to read others. After each reading of
Crumley's book I felt I needed to take a shower. There are
no good and bad characters in this novel. They are all bad, its
just a matter of degree. The novel has a satisifying ending, just not the happy ending so characteristic of contemporary mystery writers. Lost of loose ends, some of the more likeable characters die, some of the more despicable survive.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Read
Review: What a sad read ... Joe Sixpack gets mixed up looking for a famous author who likes to go on drinking binge road trips across the western states. Crumley creates in C. W. Sughrue midwestern Phillip Marlowe who's just as tough and cynical as the LA original. If you've read all of Raymond Chandler's works and are looking for something along that line of style then this book is for you. It has the fem fatales and the damisals in distress. And most of all the romance of the hard-boiled genre in general. The story carries you through at a good pace not stopping along the way with the characters as they live out their so-called lives. With the qualities of a modern fairtale there's no happy ending ... just the gritty Tao-like reality of life in the modern world. While set in the late 70s the writing is timeless as Chandler's Marlowe.
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