Rating: 
Summary: a uneven effort; surely not Crumley's best?
Review: 'The Final Country' is my first novel by James Crumley. Since it is an award-winning mystery, complete with accolades from amazon.com (on their Best of 2001 list), I thought I couldn't go wrong with it. Wrong. No, the book isn't awful. It's more like a mess with some interesting bits strewn about.As for the story, well this is hard to explain. We have an aging private investigator from Montana fighting all sorts of nasty people (druggies, tramps, law enforcers) in Austin, Texas. Lots of strange characters, which is one of the book's strengths, caught up in a completely ridiculous plot. The book is also compromised by its absurd violence, on the order of a Quentin ('Kill Bill') Tarentino film. Yet Crumley's prose is rather decent, complete with crisp (and often hilarious) dialogue. Bottom line: a hit-and-miss sort of book. But for this reader it was mostly a miss.
Rating:
Summary: a uneven effort; surely not Crumley's best?
Review: 'The Final Country' is my first novel by James Crumley. Since it is an award-winning mystery, complete with accolades from amazon.com (on their Best of 2001 list), I thought I couldn't go wrong with it. Wrong. No, the book isn't awful. It's more like a mess with some interesting bits strewn about. As for the story, well this is hard to explain. We have an aging private investigator from Montana fighting all sorts of nasty people (druggies, tramps, law enforcers) in Austin, Texas. Lots of strange characters, which is one of the book's strengths, caught up in a completely ridiculous plot. The book is also compromised by its absurd violence, on the order of a Quentin ('Kill Bill') Tarentino film. Yet Crumley's prose is rather decent, complete with crisp (and often hilarious) dialogue. Bottom line: a hit-and-miss sort of book. But for this reader it was mostly a miss.
Rating: 
Summary: Believe it: The legend lives and he's on his game!
Review: Ask most of the young crime writers in America who they revere and the name Crumley will fall off almost every tongue. In a genre that rewards the fast and the dirty, where publishers throw money at sloppy writing and half-assed plotting, Crumley is a beacon of quality and thoughtfulness. The man cares about the language. What a radical notion for a writer of detective novels. In The Final Country, as in any of his books, you'll find sentences both sleek and rangy, but always beautiful, thought out, worked on. And those sentences come together to form a Voice as consistent and engrossing as any on the contemporary scene - inside or outside the genre. But wait, as the pitchmen say, there's more. You also get a plot as ingeniously assembled as Lamborghini Diablo. A red one. That runs on nitroglycerin. And this books moves as fast as the Diablo. But don't worry, Milo's got his arm around you the whole way, rapping up a coke-fueled storm that, should you listen, will give you a few gem about how an ethical man lives in a foul world. Listen: as long as James Crumley can draw breath and pick up a pen, TV just doesn't stand a chance.
Rating:
Summary: Another Crumley Masterpiece
Review: Crumley is back (finally!)with another magnificently intricate tale featuring Milo Milodragovich, the crusty, humorous, cynical, superbly violent, but now aging, P.I. from Montana who migrated to the mythical Gatlin County, TX (suburb of Austin)in the "Bordersnakes" (1996) novel. Milo (now wealthy)is still all-cattle-and-no-hat as he sorts out a Texas size imbroglio of murder, lust, greed and betrayal. "Final Country" is another Crumley treasure. You'll find there the lyrical quality to rival Chandler, the grit to rival Hammett, violence beyond Stark or Lansdale, and the unique Crumley philosophy of individualism and virtue. Crumley is one of the very few authors working in the P.I. genre who produces literary works with the quality of detail that will pleasure the reader not only on the first reading, but also on re-reading or even re-re-reading.
Rating:
Summary: Hangover
Review: Crumley's hero Milo can out drink, drug and fornicate others decades younger. A story too long, with too many names and a "drawing room" conclusion that ends with a not unexpected disclosure, are still not enough reasons to ignore this very talented writer.
Rating:
Summary: Bottom Of the Barrel
Review: Here we have a story of bottom dwellers looking into the affairs of folks somehow even lower that they are. Not a pretty sight! But, what an enjoyable one. Crumly manages to potray men and women who find themselves in a world of chaos and filth, tainted with sex, booze, drugs and violence. Milo, Betty and friends are the closest to heros you will find lurking in these shadowy pages, but, you wont be able to resist them. I wonder if it is as much fun to write this stuff as it is to read it. If you are a die hard fan of hard boiled PIs, this is definitely your type of book.You will probably feel a lot better about your life after spending a little time with Milo and gang.
Rating:
Summary: A book of thirds
Review: I enjoyed chapters 1-4 as the writing style was similar to Dancing Bear. Crumley did a fine job of aging Milo and exposing his silly vanities, which culminate in the canyon fight scene. Milo survives the encounter, due not to his skill but to pure luck. So, how does an old private eye rejuvinate himself? By snorting lots of pharmaceutical grade cocaine of course and not sleeping for 20-30 hours at a clip. What I dislike most about the story is that Crumley omits clues from the story that will allow the reader to solve the mystery. Indeed, to solve the mystery, Milo hires a couple of people to research the internet for several weeks for the solution (by scouring semi-secret databases), which he then dumps on you in a big denouement in the final 5-10 pages of the book. You know the scene: all the suspects are gathered to her Milo's findings, which culimates in a machine gun fire. Crumley, through Milo, acknowledges that he is using a tired cliche, as he trots it out. To his credit, Crumley did manage to avoid using a hand grenade as a plot device. I rank this the third or fourth best of the Milo stories (Dancing Bear and Wrong Case being #1 and #2).
Rating:
Summary: Emphasize the HARD in hardboiled.
Review: James Crumley always delivers and this is no exception. Falling somewhere between Jim Thompson and James Ellroy, Crumley creates a dark descent into a chaotic hell. Not for the squeamish, but hard-edged, life-weary readers will not be disappointed in this or any James Crumley novel.
Rating:
Summary: Not for me
Review: Maybe it's me, but I just didn't get this book. Lured by good reviews from credible sources, evocative cover art (on the British edition, not the U.S. one), the book's award and the writer's reputation, I dived in for an entertaining escape & emerged impatient & disappointed. What saves the book are some good scenes, some decent description of place & some well-drawn characters. But for me the experience was more like reading a series of creative writing vignettes than a novel. The novel lacks a center, a heart. There is a confusion of characters who lack much more characterization than names & therefore are hard to separate. One character (Molly) changes abruptly from one personality earlier in the novel to another later on to the degree that it was difficult for me to see her as the same person (though I liked Molly No. 2). I found the plot confusing, hard to follow & too sketchy. I didn't know nearly enough about many of the people who turned out to be central characters in the plot's resolution. I specifically did NOT find (as The London Times promised) "lyrical descriptions of an almost vanished West" but rather a fairly average sense of place. On the other hand, Milo & bisexual Betty are interesting characters & the book does have a certain feel to it, so I'm thoroughly ambivalent. Given there's enough reading for several lifetimes out there, I'd recommend choosing something else.
Rating: 
Summary: Hammett is still the best!!
Review: Men will enjoy this book, perhaps some women, but I'm not one of them.
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