Sean Chercover

I was stunned to learn Sean Chercover is not native to Chicago -- in Trigger City, he captured the tempo, the rhythm, the flavor of the city, with all its grit and glory -- and wrote a damned exciting mystery/thriller novel in the process. When's the next one due, Sean?

Tough-guy detective stories have always been a hit-and-miss proposition for me. I tend to either love them or be left totally cold by them, and – much as I wish I could – I’ve never been able to predict, in advance, which ones are going to fall into which category. Every new author or series is an experiment: a complete shot in the dark. It’s led me to some very pleasant surprises—Lee Child’s Killing Floor, Don Winslow’s California Fire and Life—but left a trail of unfinished show more “meh” books I couldn’t make myself care about.

Big City, Bad Blood is one of the latter. It’s got a lot going for it: sharply drawn Chicago locations, deftly drawn supporting characters, and competent renditions of classic private-eye set pieces. Meetings with a local mob boss, conversations with a reporter-friend, and a brief, brutal encounter with two hired goons on a dark sidewalk are all done in the best old-school PI tradition. You could imagine them happening (with slight adjustments for language and period detail) to Sam Spade in 1930s San Francisco, Philip Marlowe in 1940s LA, or Mike Hammer in 1950s New York. Yet, for all that, it utterly failed to grab—much less hold—my attention . I lasted 4-5 chapters, and set it aside.

The problem, I think, may be that carefully rendered “old-school” feel. Tough-guy characters like Travis McGee, Elvis Cole or Spenser translate the spirit of the mid-century PIs to the times and places in which their stories are set. Ray Dudgeon feels like an attempt to translate a whole character, intact, out of the forties and into the 21st century. Big City, Bad Blood is clearly set in the present, but Ray and his exploits feel awkward and out-of-place there, like a black-and-white clipping from a 1946 issue of Life pasted, incongruously, into a richly colored color photo of today. show less

Sean Chercover captured me with Big City, Bad Blood, a marvelous debut deserving of all its accolades and awards. Trigger City manages to raise the bar, returning to Ray Dudgeon in the aftermath of the BCBB, suffering, uncertain, and faced with an investigation that highlights Ray's own inner darkness. This was a book I couldn't put down and which stays with me now. If he keeps this up, Chercover is going to become one of the all time greats.

I started reading this book and after just a few pages, thought to myself, “Oh no! It’s a MOB book!” Mob books and movies are definitely not my favorites. As in, I would not knowingly pick one up. LOL But I kept reading for a few more pages, and the next thing you know, I was coming up for air at the end of chapter nine. This is the best hardboiled PI mystery that I’ve read in a long time, mob book or no. PI Ray Dudgeon is a likable, if doomed character with a set of very interesting show more friends and acquaintances, some of whom are affiliated with the Chicago “Outfit” as we’re told the Mafia are referred to there. Excellent book. Fast-paced, well-plotted and with well-fleshed characters, it’s hard to believe that it’s a first novel. show less