Nightshade: A Review

Michael Connelly's New Edition: An Island Murder In LA County 

The king of crime fiction, Michael Connelly, has a new character to add to his growing network of cops and lawyers. Most readers know about Detective Harry Bosch and even Mickey Haller (Lincoln Lawyer). Fewer recognize the name Renee Ballard, Connelly's newest detective who always enlists the help of the experienced Detective Bosch. This time Connelly set his visual, story telling powers on Catalina Island a short boat ride off the coast of Southern California. 

Embarrassingly I’d never heard of it before. I had to fire up the google machine. The scenery is breathtaking--beachy, sunny, warm. It’s basically a Conde Nast poster you would’ve seen at local shopping mall travel agency. There is a local native population and a wealthy cohort of mainlanders that pay exorbitant fees to join yacht clubs.  

Story

The novel centers on the Black Marlin Club and the Los Angeles County detective is named Stillwell. Here’s the background: a woman is found dead in the harbor, stuffed in a sail bag and wrapped up in an anchor. Stillwell (Stil) investigates the club (Black Marlin) where the woman worked as bartender and waitress. Because it’s a murder, the detectives in LA have jurisdiction of the case and are forced by their boss to work with Stil since he’s the local guy. We find out a little about his background and why he was banished to Catalina Island after an altercation with another detective, Ahearn. Both are forced to team up to solve the case which causes understandable friction.

The other case focuses on mutilated buffalo. Buffalo are protected on the island. That’s another thing I had to look up. I guess there are roughly 100 buffalo that roam freely on the island. Brought in for a movie shoot in the 1920s. They were just left behind once the movie wrapped. There is some disagreement on which movie the animals were brought in for. It was either “The Vanishing American” or “The Thundering Herd”. Now they’re part of the ecosystem, as well as a tourism draw for visitors every year.

The author gives us drips and drabs of how and why this eager detective ended up in a lovely, but dead end, corner of LA county. He is also dating the harbormaster, Tasha “Tash” Dano. Both were trying to keep it secret but gave up after realizing the lax nature of the law enforcement politics on the island. Deputies help with a lot of the daily work, but Stil is mostly a one man show. He’s the only law enforcement official within miles that is competent.

Television

I started this book thinking that he wouldn’t get enough content by writing stories about what happens on the island. Remember too, this is a new character and a new series that exists in the same space and time as Connelly’s other characters. I read somewhere that HBO is doing a series based on this crew at Catalina Island even though there are only two books so far. People tell me Bosch on Prime was good. I tried to watch it but couldn’t get over the clean looks of its lead character. Maybe I need to try again. The Lincoln Lawyer series on Netflix featured a Hispanic lawyer who dipped in and out of his accent while speaking English. The “Cisco” character landed flat as well. He looks like a B movie actor in a Harley Davidson leather jacket, someone you might see doing cos play at a comic con.

The most promising so far has been the Renee Ballard series on Prime. I love her. She’s gorgeous and talented but too old to be playing this role. The rest is a mix of sensitive male characters (eww) and “hero” gay couples that make the Cleavers look selfish. That and ‘boss bitches’ make it unlikely that I’ll watch again. It’s a little soapy and soft for my taste. It’s not quite the character from the pages, rough and unsophisticated.  Although to be fair, the newer Ballard books focus on cold cases. I think I’ll stick to the books for now. This is always the problem you run into when a favorite character is reimagined by a daytime TV writer. They shave off the edges and brighten everything up. If there is a silver lining, it’s that more people might pick up the novels and dive into the seedy LA crime universe the Connelly examines so well.

The Catalina Island series doesn't have a fan base yet, it seems too early for a TV show. But there are enough similarities between Stilwell and Bosch to make it work. Stilwell is aggressive like Bosch and skates the line between legal and illegal when he’s on a case. There isn’t much depth yet to his girlfriend Tash. I expect this romance to have problems along the way. She was born on the island and hates the city. He’s a LA cop who takes the ferry back constantly to work on cases and argue with his superiors. He still has one foot in Los Angeles. Along with Tash, readers were introduced a few dodgy locals (Baby Head and Mayor Doug Allen) as well, but we didn’t hear the end of their stories. Clearly these guys are going to be regulars going forward.

Conclusion

There is a scene near the beginning when the mayor corners Detective Stilwell about the body the police found in the water. He doesn’t want the news of the dead girl in the paper. Memorial Day weekend is a big event for the island and an ugly investigation would keep vacationers away. It reminds me of that classic scene from Jaws. Chief Brody gets talked into hiding information about the shark attack, after the mayor insists on keeping it quiet with a tourist holiday upon them. The small town politics of Amity Island from Jaws feels a little like Catalina Island in this series. Can’t wait for more.