Harry Bosch #01 - The Black Echo

Michael Connelly graduated from the University of Florida in 1980 and became a journalist. He placed as a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, which earned him a position with the Los Angeles Times as a crime reporter. After seeing Robert Altman's The Long Goodbye, based on Raymond Chandler's novel, Connelly pursued mystery writing. His first novel, The Black Echo, was published by Little, Brown in 1992, and won an Edgar as Best First Novel.

The Black Echo introduces Connelly's beloved character Harry Bosch, a Los Angeles Police Department homicide detective. The character has appeared in 24 of Connelly's novels and spawned an Amazon Prime series that ran seven seasons. As of the time of this writing, a prequel series is set to air on MGM+. 

Bosch served as a tunnel rat in the U.S. Army's 1st Infantry Division during the Vietnam War. This fact is prevalent throughout the novel, as Bosch realizes his newest homicide case involves Billy Meadows, a former member of Bosch's military unit. Bosch had helped Billy with substance abuse and housing. Bosch arrives at the scene of the crime to find Billy's corpse stuffed in a tunnel. His department suggests Billy's death is just drug-related, but Bosch, like any good paperback detective, suspects there's more to the story.

Like any good series opener, Connelly provides a detailed history of his lead character, delving into Bosch's upbringing, his military service, and the most recent abrasion with the department, a conflict that demoted the detective from Robbery-Homicide Division to Hollywood Division's homicide bureau. With this demotion comes the obligatory disgruntlement with authority, and a new resolve that pushes the character into every crevice of the case. Bosch's upheaval with the department's Internal Affairs is a prominent portion of the book's plot.

Billy's murder investigation leads Bosch to team with an FBI agent named Wish. The two form a working relationship that conflicts with another federal agent, Rourke, who is a suspect with ties to both Billy and expatriates from the Vietnam War. Bosch and Wish extend their working relationship into an intimate affair, which adds a unique complexity by the book's finale.

The Black Echo didn't knock my socks off. At 375 pages, the book proved to be a slow burn with lots of dialogue between characters. Nearly the first 100 pages is simply Billy's body being discovered and Bosch being introduced to the case. There are long, plodding pages of Wish's backstory and the typical day-to-day routine of the investigation. It's an intriguing case, and the various threads of the plot took me where I needed to go, but the journey just seemed overstated. By 1992, the 180-page fast-paced detective yarns had doubled to pad the pages, which bogged down what would otherwise have been a mesmerizing read. The Black Echo is good, not great.

Get the book HERE.