Fair Warning, Michael Connelly 2020
I have read nearly all of Connelly’s Harry Bosch books, thrilling to the twists and turns in his believable and tense plots, but this is the first of his books featuring Jack McElroy that I’ve read. McElroy is an investigative journalist who has focused in the past on murder stories but is now working at Fair Warning, a consumer watchdog newspaper. McElroy finds himself first a suspect and then an investigative reporter digging into the death of a woman he had picked up at a bar. Connelly provides some fascinating details into the methods of investigative reporting, as McElroy looks deeper into the murder of Tina Portrero and soon exposes her death as part of a pattern of a serial killer, preying on women he identifies through a dark site on the internet connected to a DNA testing company. It’s a fast-moving, tense, and well constructed novel, but I still like Bosch better. If you’re looking for a quick (though at 396 pages, it’s not that quick) and thoroughly engrossing read, Connelly is your man. One trigger warning is that this is not a good book to read in bed before you try to fall asleep!
