Down by the River Where the Dead Men Go

Rating:
Summary: atmospheric, immensely readable - standard Pelecanos stuff
Review: 'Down by the River...' is so much like other other Pelecanos novels: great feel of inner city Washington, a nostalgic look at wasted young men who turn into wasted not-so-young men (..sex, drugs, rock & roll), and a rather interesting crime story on top. However after reading several of his books I fear Pelecanos is falling somewhat into the John Grisham mold - that is, his stories often seem too similar. You read one, you've read them all. Fortunately for Pelecanos it really doesn't matter what the story is about; one loves getting lost in his wasted Washington environment. Folks from urban America, especially those aged between 30 and 50, will really relate to the characters in his books.

Bottom line: another successful installment from the Pelecanos "factory". Fans will rejoice.

Rating:
Summary: A classic of the genre
Review: Hardboiled P.I. fiction doesn't get much better than this. Pelacanos's hero, P.I. and bartender Nick Stefanos, is an alcoholic which is dramatically demonstrated by his harrowing bender as the book opens. In his stupor he sort of, kind of, witnesses a murder and becomes obsessed about solving it. Though not obssessed enough to quit drinking. Along the way, he hooks up with fellow P.I. Jack LaDuke, who has a mess of psychological problems of his own. The two form an unlikely pair, and as Pelecanos's riventing story unfolds, you know the ending will not be pretty.

This was my first book in this series, and I definately plan to read more. Fans of Andrew Vachss's Burke series, in particular, should eat this stuff up.

Rating:
Summary: I Love This Book!
Review: How do I love thee Nick Stefanos, let me count the ways - Death. Despair. Drunkeness - These are a few of my favorite things the reader will find in pretty much every Pelecanos protagonist. If you stick to the Stefanos titles then you won't be disappointed however with recent titles, Pelecanos seems to be allowing himself to be sucked into the predictable cookie-cutter stories Grisham is better known for.

Rating:
Summary: I Love This Book!
Review: How do I love thee Nick Stefanos, let me count the ways - Death. Despair. Drunkeness - These are a few of my favorite things the reader will find in pretty much every Pelecanos protagonist. If you stick to the Stefanos titles then you won't be disappointed however with recent titles, Pelecanos seems to be allowing himself to be sucked into the predictable cookie-cutter stories Grisham is better known for.

Rating:
Summary: A very entertaining book, but not one of Pelecanos' best
Review: I've now read all of George Pelecanos' novels and I loved them all, including this one. If there's a better crime thriller author out there, I haven't found them. Gritty seems to be the operative word in describing his work and this story is no exception. His stories are all set in Washington D.C., with lots of great word pictures of places there and lots of music references. It's an outstanding formula and Pelecanos works it very, very well.

Having said all the preceding, I will say that I'd rate this as clearly one of his lesser works. If you haven't read the other books with Stefanos et al, I don't believe this book really gives you all the character development you'd like from a stand alone novel. This book is fairly short and maybe that's why I felt that the characters and the story were a little short changed relative to other books by the author.

To sum it up, definitely read Pelecanos and you'll almost surely want to read this book and all his work, but don't select this as the first of his books - go with The Big Blowdown, A Firing Offense or Nick's Trip.

Rating:
Summary: A very entertaining book, but not one of Pelecanos' best
Review: I've now read all of George Pelecanos' novels and I loved them all, including this one. If there's a better crime thriller author out there, I haven't found them. Gritty seems to be the operative word in describing his work and this story is no exception. His stories are all set in Washington D.C., with lots of great word pictures of places there and lots of music references. It's an outstanding formula and Pelecanos works it very, very well.

Having said all the preceding, I will say that I'd rate this as clearly one of his lesser works. If you haven't read the other books with Stefanos et al, I don't believe this book really gives you all the character development you'd like from a stand alone novel. This book is fairly short and maybe that's why I felt that the characters and the story were a little short changed relative to other books by the author.

To sum it up, definitely read Pelecanos and you'll almost surely want to read this book and all his work, but don't select this as the first of his books - go with The Big Blowdown, A Firing Offense or Nick's Trip.

Rating:
Summary: An unusually strong Chandlerian novel...
Review: Nick Stefanos isn't the nicest guy in the world, but he tries to be a decent person, and when something goes wrong, he feels guilty. This is the third novel in the series, and we meet Nick as a bartender.

To give you an idea of the nature of Stefanos, this novel opens with him going on a pretty bad drunk, passing out by a river, and hearing the murder of a young black man. He feels guilt, just for being there.

This novel's strengths lie largely in the central character and the rendering of modern-day, low-rent Washington D.C. I grew up in the area, and I have to say, Pelecanos nails it on the head. Stefanos is also a very sad character which you feel for.

The plot is pretty well-done; you can't figure out what's going on on page ten, you actually have to read the book. Still, Vachss has been in this territory, and his Burke is a bit stronger and more world-weary than Stefanos. However, this is a pretty good detective novel that I enjoyed a great deal. Worth reading, a fun work.

Rating:
Summary: Typically Hard-Bitten
Review: Nick Stefanos returns in the third book of the series. If Nick had a small drinking problem in "Nick's Trip", it's developed nicely into full-blown alcoholism by this book. It was while on a bender one night that Nick passes out in a public park, only to be wakened in the early hours by a man being shot to death and dumped in the water. Due to some strange feeling of guilt or responsibility over the murder, Nick feels he should investigate what went on.

Once again George Pelecanos has produced a typically hard-bitten look at the seedier parts of Washington D.C. and paints the picture of a lonely man who can't seem to quite get his act together. The big development in this book is that Nick picks up a partner, a fellow private investigator who doesn't smoke and doesn't drink. He is probably the perfect foil for Nick's excesses, but he is a bit of an enigma with some closely guarded secrets about his personal life.

Just a word of warning while you are reading this book. Don't get too close to the pages or you'll run the risk of waking up the next morning with a doozy of a hangover, the Old Grand Dad and Bud does get a bit of a workout.

Rating:
Summary: The best novel by an exceptional author
Review: Pelecanos' hip pop-culture references cannot sustain this clichéd novel. The boozing detective angle has been mined for all it's worth and the author adds little to the genre. His romantic relationships are particularly uninteresting, and his sexual exploits (under the influence of alcohol?) are patently absurd. While the descriptions of DC and its denizens are amusing to a native, Nick Stefanos lacks the hardboiled charm of Marlowe and doesn't measure up to the PC smugness of your average cat detective

Rating:
Summary: Pelecanos at his best
Review: This is the last and most cynical novel in the Nick Stefanos trilogy. Nick has now travelled far down the dark road, and his struggle to get some peace of mind is more then ever tangled up in his love for a drink, some good music, and the warmth of a womans body. It's also in one of his more delerious nights that the story gets started. Nick happens to witness a murder when he's lying half unconscious in a pile of himself and his vomits; which is going to be the start of a dangerous ride that leads right into the drug and porn industry of Washington DC.

Down by the river where the dead men go is an excelent hard-boiled novel in all its ways. But what makes Pelecanos unique toward other writers, in this genre, is all his references to pop music, and film. This he uses in a very subtle way to describe his chracters and where in the subcultures of Washington DC's street life they belong. It is this total awareness of popular culture combined with his perfect feeling for street dialogue that makes Pelecanos not just a great crime writer, but a great writer in all terms of judgements. And it is in this third novel that he best manages to combine his feeling for pop music, and dialogue with a good and intriguing story.