And after the "good" cops and investigators, it's up to the ones I like the most: the bad guys". Those who have succumbed to vices of all kinds or to corruption and evil without contemplations, with premeditation, treachery and nocturnality. I have also chosen others six of different nationalities, but each darker. And of course there are many more.
For readers black novel that do not stop to think about moral issues and they are not scared of tacos that tend to abound in the dirty mouths of these bad critters - yes, there are some that do. And to those with a pure soul who regret that they have those vices -that there are also-. But those imperfect natures are the essence of these characters.
Two Yankees, two Italians, an Irishman and a Norwegian
What do they share?
They are all more than worthy of reproaches, punishments and contempt, of abomination and rejection. In the real world, they would be in jail and some with a permanent penalty that can be reviewed or directly sentenced to capital punishment if we go to certain Yankee territories. Here they were possibly walking in the street or pulling the blanket from the trullo.
The one who deserves it the most by far, for being one of the most corrupt and criminal cops created lately, is the Dennis Malone by Don Winslow. But, and therein lies its great power of attraction, it is the one that curls the most in that part of the heart that we also feel.
In reality, they all share that power, to a greater or lesser extent: that of represent good but be evil or, at least, succumb to it, or to its fears and weaknesses. They are different reflections of the most rotten, dirty and fragile that we can all have and take out at some point and that we see daily in real life. And it is already known that reality always surpasses fiction.
And the best thing about that attraction: that we can justify them for the same thousand reasons we condemn them. It is more, until we like them and we admire them, at least within the pages of a book. On the street ... Ugh, I've always said it. If it is real and you find that alcoholic wild animal of almost 2 meters that is Harry Hole, you change the sidewalk fixed.
CW Sughrue - James Crumley
I recently discovered CW (Chauncey Wayne) Sughrue on The last good kiss and I've had a lot of fun with it. Researcher private who practiced in the 70s, former Marine, a Vietnam veteran, we know him in his early 40s, with very bad looks and a long and dangerous relationship with him. alcohol and drugs.
It is also amorous, does not like to fly and tends to get into every possible mess involving revelry and lots of beer. The journey he makes in that first title to find an unfaithful husband who is looking for his ex and his current wife becomes delusional when he finds him and they go together to look for a missing girl. Well, the two of them and Fireball, the also alcoholic dog of the owner of a seedy place.
That is also written in first person, another of my literary weaknesses, and oozes humor and a lot decay has gotten Sughrue on my irrevocable kill list. A pity that James Crumley did not have the recognition of the public, despite obtaining it from the critics and winning several awards.
Denny Malone - Don Winslow
Police corruption es BEST I have read in a long time and certainly my reading from last year. A sensational chronicle of corrupt policemen and criminals, drug trafficking and fierce criticism of the most rotten society in which we live.
And its protagonist, the fabulous and more than fearsome DPNY Sergeant Dennis Malone, went straight to the podium of those characters who they devour my soul in seven sentences and a gesture and they stay forever with another piece of my literary heart. The worst of the worst, the most rogue, betrayal and hypocrisy raised to the umpteenth degree. And yet it pierces your guts with emotion and horror in equal parts. In other words, a joy.
It is one of those Compulsory, compulsory readings and by decree law for all lovers of the most black, raw and brutal genre.
Marco Tanzi - Romano De Marco
Tanzi was one of the best policemen in Milan until gets dirtier than hands in corruption cases and ends up in jail. He fulfills his sentence, but ends up on the street, like a plague for his wife, whom he cheated on with his partner and best friend, Luca Betti, and his daughter. It is a bad beast and so it wants to continue, forgotten. But when he learns that his teenage daughter is missing, the beast resurfaces and this time no one will stop him.
Ahead, however, he has a long road of personal redemption that he does not seek Nor does he want to, but he is gaining thanks to his benevolent and compassionate reflection that is Betti.
Rocco Schiavone - Antonio Manzini
Some time ago I read a comment from someone who was complaining about the amount of tacos that are read in the novels of Antonio Manzini, specifically in the last one, 7-7-2007, and especially on the part of tremendous deputy commissioner Schiavone, Roman in forced exile in the police of Aosta. In other words, one reads crime novels and what can be most scandalized is that Manzini has a bit of a tacos. I was stunned, of course.
It was curious that the scandal was not because of the great fondness for that joint that Schiavone does not spare a single morning. Nor by the gang of lifelong colleagues who are the worst in every home, but the best of an unbreakable and unquestionable friendship.
Nor were there any fuss over the exile / punishment of Schiavone from a Rome of which he knew his worst face and where he himself had corrupted himself to the eyebrows. A corruption that nearly cost him his marriage to a wife whom he adored, but who still paid dearly and in a more than traumatic way.
Anyway, what's up many reasons by which Schiavone can scandalize, but the last one is because it says more or less tacos. Which is also Italian, man ...
Jack Taylor - Ken Bruen
Irish. Everything has been said about the oldest vice, the alcohol. But he accompanies everything in this ex-policeman with a too big mouth and too much taste for deprivation, the one who is expelled and goes to private investigation. Too bad they haven't translated more titles of these short, incisive novels, full of very corrosive humor and perfect dialogues. Taylor is the most bleak antihero that I've known in a long time.
Harry Hole - Jo Nesbø
Yes for the end the more. And that, in my humble but vast heart for the most lost law enforcement animals, is for the Norwegian Harry hole. But I will not extend much more with this creature of which I have spoken here and there many times.
I will only highlight what I wrote about him a long time ago: what is the perfection of imperfection throughout. The ultimate creative of a crime novel protagonist. The pleasure of admire the worst and the best alike of the human condition, but enjoy even more by being able to admire its tremendous fragility.
As well someone was complaining recently I wish Hole didn't have «that bad vice of alcohol». But wow And what would Harry Hole be without alcohol? If that were the only one of its faults and weaknesses… In the end, one always has to resort to the clichés and say like in the cinema: «Hey, don't believe it, it's a movie. Well, that.