Is the Second Bosch Novel as Good as the First?

Spoiler Alert: This article reveals parts of the plot of The Black Ice.

Writing the second crime novel in a series is tricky.

You have to add characters (new suspects and a victim or two) and bring back some characters from the first book. But you can’t clutter your text with too many characters so you have to delete a few or push them to the sidelines. You have to work in the same setting without repeating all your descriptions. You need to deepen the character of your hero. You need an(other) original plot.

But more than anything, you have to answer a nagging question in the back of your own head: Can I do it again? Can I write a book that matches the excitement of the first one?

It’s a question Michael Connelly was able answer with a resounding “Yes” because The Black Ice is a superb novel. He ticked all the boxes mentioned above but the novel is not flawless. Connelly would reach that plateau in his third novel and sustain it for longer than anyone would expect. But The Black Ice is a fantastic sophomore effort.

The novel begins with Bosch answering the call to a death on Christmas day at a seedy hotel in Hollywood, and finding police already investigating an apparent suicide. The detectives – overseen by Bosch’s nemesis, Deputy Chief Irvine Irving – have identified the victim as Calexico Moore, an undercover LAPD narc. Having found a suicide note in the dead man’s back pocket, they conclude that Moore checked into the dive, went into the bathroom, and blew his own head off.

Bosch doesn’t like their conclusion any more than he likes being pushed aside on a case that should have been his. He wants to continue to look into it. When his immediate boss, the bureaucratic Harvey “Ninety-Eight” Pounds, tells Bosch he needs cases closed by New Years to pad the Hollywood station’s stats, Bosch decides to keep investigating Moore’s death.

But Bosch has other cases to investigate as well. I should clarify that it’s not a problem for Bosch so much as the reader. The first quarter of the book suffers from a tangle of crimes and victims, and it is often hard to keep them all straight. (This is a rare example in Connelly’s work of too many crimes and victims confusing the reader. A lot of crime novelists devise complex plots that create nothing but confusion, but not Connelly. This is the only example of him doing so.)

Before Moore was found dead, Bosch was already investigating the death of a gangster called James Kappalanni, aka Jimmy Kapps. He was murdered in Los Angeles after flying in from Hawaii. Bosch had actually discussed this case with Moore before the narc’s death.

Then Pounds assigns Bosch the murder of an unidentified Latino referred to as Juan Doe #67. He had been found dead outside a late-night diner a few nights earlier by none other than Calexico Moore.

Bosch finds out Moore had left behind a file with “Give to Harry Bosch” written on the cover. As well as revealing a new and powerful street drug called “black ice”, the file contains information about a dealer called Marvin Dance, who Moore and his colleagues had busted but not charged weeks earlier.

And finally, the report cites a Mexican drug lord known as Zorillo, who operates from a secure ranch just south of the U.S.-Mexico border.

All of which makes for a hodgepodge of a storyline about a quarter of the way through the novel. The thing that gives the story fresh impetus is a tiny insect called Trypetid, which the coroner found in Juan Doe #67’s stomach during the autopsy. The tiny fruit fly had been destroying California’s orange crop, so the government was breeding sterile Trypetids and releasing them into the wild to eradicate the problem. It turns out these tiny bugs were bred in a facility in northern Mexico, right next to Zorillo’s ranch.

Much like the underground labyrinth in The Black Echo, the Trypetids are an intriguing bit of research that breathe life into this novel. The hallmark of Michael Connelly’s writing is his research into the LAPD police force, and he augments this with information on other fascinating areas that pique his interest.

As Bosch unravels the truth behind the deaths of Calexico Moore and Juan Doe #67, the novel picks up pace. Much like The Black Echo, the pages keep turning in this novel, driven by a thoroughly exciting plot.  It takes Bosch to Mexico where he breaches the EnviroBreed facility where the insects are bred, through tunnels to Zorillo’s compound. There’s even a masterful scene – my favorite of the book – in which Bosch and others are trapped in a downed helicopter as a raging bull attacks the craft.

However, on close examination you’d have to say the plot of Book 2 doesn’t quite live up to that of Book 1.

In addition to the confusion mentioned above, there are sundry problems with the plot. Inside the EnviroBreed plant, Bosch finds a recently cleaned shovel that he instantly decides was used to kill Juan Doe #67. There’s no supporting evidence and it’s an unsatisfying solution to a mystery that was a major part of the story. At the book’s conclusion, Bosch has solved all the mysteries so that he and the readers know what happened, but the cases are not closed officially. Throughout the series, Bosch is always aware of the need for families to know what happened to their slain loved ones. But the families in The Black Ice – especially Moore’s widow Sylvia – never find out what happened.

So did Connelly regress in his second book?

Not on your life.

First of all, Connelly maintains his excellence in describing police procedure and the guts of the LAPD. The author understood early on that the strength of his novels lay in his ability to climb inside the police force and make it real for his readers. Even in the first chapter of this novel, Bosch is at home listening to a police scanner when this message comes up: “One-K-Twelve, Staff Two needs your twenty.” Connelly translates it instantly for the reader. The Deputy Police Chief (Staff Two) needs the location (10-20) of a certain detective from the Robbery Homicide Division (One-K-Twelve). It’s the sort of detail that infuses Connelly’s novels with credibility, and these details are found on just about every page.

Second, the characters are stronger in the second novel. Bosch is more laconic, a bit less of a smartass. He worries less about embarrassing his enemies (such as Lewis and Clarke in the first novel) with childish pranks. The real improvement in characterization is found in Connelly’s handling of Deputy Chief Irvine Irving. He still doesn’t like Bosch, and he still tries to smack the detective down. But he now shows a begrudging respect for Bosch’s abilities rather than just pursuing a vendetta against him. It makes the novels much stronger.

I tend to pair The Black Echo and The Black Ice when I think of the Bosch series, and not just because of their similar titles. They were the novels in which Connelly found his footing. There are sundry flaws in each, though these rookie errors are vastly outweighed by the books’ strengths. It was a time in Connelly’s career when he worked out the kinks and laid the groundwork for an absolutely astonishing output of excellent novels. After The Black Ice, Connelly produced ten Bosch novels over twelve years that are not just excellent, but consistently excellent. I admit I’ve nitpicked a bit in assessing the first two novels, but the flaws in these books are all the more apparent when you consider how hard it is to find flaws in the subsequent novels.

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Hi, I’m Peter Moreira, author of The Haight Mystery Series, and I hope you’ve enjoyed this article. If you want to receive my blogs regularly, please sign up for the mailing list at my website by clicking here. As well as regular blogs about Michael Connelly and other crime fiction writers, you’ll receive The Ashbury Hideaway, a free novella in ebook format. In this prequel to The Haight Mystery Series, Jimmy Spracklin’s teenage daughter runs away to Haight-Ashbury during the Summer of Love. Spracklin knows about the drugs, sexual predators and bikers in Haight-Ashbury, and he has to find her before she comes to harm.  

The Haight Mystery Series is set in San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury neighborhood in the late 1960s. Each book is a whodunnit with hippies. Described as ‘Gritty and Groovy” (Tampa Bay author George L. Fleming) and “Fabulous” (Pamela Callow, author of the Kate Lange series), the Haight books chronicle the investigations of SFPD Lieutenant Jimmy Spracklin into homicides in the hippie enclave. If you’re interested in the 1960s, fond of San Francisco or just love great page-turners with strong characters, check out the series with The Ashbury Hideaway. I hope you enjoy the novella enough to move on to the five novels (so far) in the series.

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