Harry Bosch, King of the Cold Cases

The Burning Room - Michael Connelly

With retirement looming just over the horizon, you could probably forgive Harry Bosch for just coasting. That would only prove that you don’t know Harry Bosch! Though there’s less than a year left before he has to leave LAPD’s cold case files unit behind for the last time, Harry hasn’t slowed down a bit. Now partnered with a young hotshot, Lucia “Lucky Lucy” Soto, Bosch has just picked up a new hot-cold case: a murder that took place ten years ago, although the victim just died this week. Lead poisoning, you know…

Long thought to be the result of a gang-style drive-by, the bullet that finally led to the death of Orlando Merced turns out to have been fired from a rifle instead. That changes everything about the way the veteran cop conducts his investigation – and sure enough, a new angle yields a new theory. Bosch and Soto decide to run with it.

But Soto has solving a different cold case in mind, one with a personal connection. Once Bosch finds out her reason, he joins the young woman in her quest. It’s a quest that will ultimately have a different resolution than either one had expected.

Fans of Michael Connelly have come to expect tight, reportorial style in his police procedural mysteries, and The Burning Room will not disappoint. The seventeenth novel in the Bosch series (9 Dragons) finds Harry (real name Hieronymus - no kidding) in familiar territory: as always, he’s disdainful of most superiors as political animals first and cops second, and finds the work ethic of some fellow detectives less than satisfactory. His new partner’s methods and dedication, however, eventually meet his undeniably high standards - that's not always been the case

Although Connelly’s narrative is spare and linear, there’s very little that’s linear about the two cases Bosch and Soto work in The Burning Room. Solving cold cases has obvious disadvantages – fading memories and vanished witnesses or suspects – but the long view also allows the investigators to see new patterns and new perspectives, not to mention forward leaps in technology. Bosch leverages both of these advantages to bring his cases into the present; and Lucy Soto proves to be an up-and-comer as a partner. Kudos to Connelly, by the way, for not falling into the "Kinsey Millhone trap" and finding some bizarre reason to connect the two cold cases in the end. Now, if Bosch could just get that anti-authoritarian streak under control. If he can’t do that, it could spell the end of a long career. A word to the wise, Harry.

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