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ben_miller's review against another edition
5.0
The hardest of hard-boiled novels--made all the harder by its moments of restraint--a masterwork of grit, suspense, and narrative control, not to mention a wonderful evocation of Los Angeles and a near-definitive dictionary of racial slurs and terms for female anatomy. While it can be tough to swallow in places, that's also the art of it. George Pelecanos points out in the introduction that the reader is free to judge the characters if they want, but the author refuses to.
What makes this book so compulsively readable is not the murder mystery, though that's tantalizing enough: a young woman chopped up and left on a street corner, a la the Black Dahlia. The further we go in this story, the more we realize that the solution doesn't matter. This is a crime from which it is impossible to extract justice, a crime that by its nature can only divide and separate and bifurcate those who come in contact with it.
From the outset, True Confessions defeats our expectations. We're accustomed, these days, to detective stories in which the sad-sack, gruffly likeable investigator doggedly, obsessively pursues the killer. For our detective, Tom Spellacy, solving the case is the last thing on his mind most of the time. He's got other problems. Rather than casing suspicious locales or staying up all night digging through old files, or whatever it is a fictional detective should do, he's eating lunch at the Biltmore and going to the fights and doing little favors for his pals, like moving a priest's corpse out of a brothel. He works the murder during work hours, but mostly he's worried about his wife in the loony bin, his mistress, a mobster he's at odds with, and his brother, the monsignor. Not until the end does he really knuckle down. And Tom does crack it. But it turns out that solving the case solves nothing.
What matters is the relationship between two men, Tom Spellacy and his brother, Monsignor Des Spellacy. A couple of Irish toughs from Boyle Heights who know how to operate in the worlds they've chosen. Tom works all the angles when it comes to hookers, pimps, mobsters, and fight promoters. Des does the same with cardinals, pastors, laymen, and the many crooked businessmen glomming onto the Catholic church.
Almost without you noticing, Dunne layers these characters and crafts something moving out of their relationship. At times the book seems to be nothing more than an almost dreamlike series of conversations, at once philosophical and earthy, rendered with dazzling readability and style. But you've got to have the stomach for it, because these people don't talk nice. If you want a couple of stand-up guys to root for, you're out of luck with the Spellacy brothers. What you get here are complicated, witty, smart, often ugly people at war with their deep affection for and resentment of one another.
And that's the really hard stuff. Not hookers and murderers and corrupt cops. Those things are easy. Family, faith. Brothers. That's hard-boiled.
What makes this book so compulsively readable is not the murder mystery, though that's tantalizing enough: a young woman chopped up and left on a street corner, a la the Black Dahlia. The further we go in this story, the more we realize that the solution doesn't matter. This is a crime from which it is impossible to extract justice, a crime that by its nature can only divide and separate and bifurcate those who come in contact with it.
From the outset, True Confessions defeats our expectations. We're accustomed, these days, to detective stories in which the sad-sack, gruffly likeable investigator doggedly, obsessively pursues the killer. For our detective, Tom Spellacy, solving the case is the last thing on his mind most of the time. He's got other problems. Rather than casing suspicious locales or staying up all night digging through old files, or whatever it is a fictional detective should do, he's eating lunch at the Biltmore and going to the fights and doing little favors for his pals, like moving a priest's corpse out of a brothel. He works the murder during work hours, but mostly he's worried about his wife in the loony bin, his mistress, a mobster he's at odds with, and his brother, the monsignor. Not until the end does he really knuckle down. And Tom does crack it. But it turns out that solving the case solves nothing.
What matters is the relationship between two men, Tom Spellacy and his brother, Monsignor Des Spellacy. A couple of Irish toughs from Boyle Heights who know how to operate in the worlds they've chosen. Tom works all the angles when it comes to hookers, pimps, mobsters, and fight promoters. Des does the same with cardinals, pastors, laymen, and the many crooked businessmen glomming onto the Catholic church.
Almost without you noticing, Dunne layers these characters and crafts something moving out of their relationship. At times the book seems to be nothing more than an almost dreamlike series of conversations, at once philosophical and earthy, rendered with dazzling readability and style. But you've got to have the stomach for it, because these people don't talk nice. If you want a couple of stand-up guys to root for, you're out of luck with the Spellacy brothers. What you get here are complicated, witty, smart, often ugly people at war with their deep affection for and resentment of one another.
And that's the really hard stuff. Not hookers and murderers and corrupt cops. Those things are easy. Family, faith. Brothers. That's hard-boiled.
jakewritesbooks's review against another edition
4.0
I appreciated this book because it has no illusions about what it is. It wears its racism, cynicism, classist attitudes on its sleeve. And yet, there is still a desire to solve this murder amidst the police and Catholic institutional corruption. Inspired by the Black Dahlia murder, the two main characters, also brothers, never descend into stereotype because, as one character says, they don't believe the myths and thus have a hardened, realistic view of the world. And yet, Dunne makes sure that they never descend to pure stereotypes, despite the familiar tropes of alcoholism, infidelity and Catholic guilt being present. The mystery was also good, with a satisfying resolution, at least for me, the reader.
neiljung78's review against another edition
dark
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
A solid detective novel, maybe bit like James Ellroy but without the need to commit to Ellroy’s intense prose pyrotechnics.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racial slurs, Racism, Antisemitism, Gore, Mental illness, Misogyny, Murder, Pedophilia, Police brutality, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, and Violence
stephang18's review
4.0
A cross between a novel, a police procedural and a mystery. Set in LA in 1946. This is the crudest book I have ever read - filled with profanity, racism and sexual terminology. Very irish and very Catholic to the point where I did not understand some of the religious references. Still, a very compelling story about good and evil.
rosseroo's review
5.0
The real-life Black Dahlia murder has been the basis for thousands of pages of speculation, and the inspiration for several novels, including this one. The book opens with a section called "Now" (roughly 1975), in which we meet the two protagonists, Irish-Catholic brothers Tommy and Des Spellacy, as the former drives to a rundown church in the California desert to meet the latter. It becomes clear that Des used to be a bigwig in the Los Angeles Archdiocese before something happened 28 years ago to cast him into this humble exile. The bulk of the story then returns to the postwar Los Angeles of 1947 and the severed corpse of a young woman that is the catalyst for what happens to the two brothers.
Tommy is homicide detective who catches this gruesome case, and although the book is at least partially a police procedural that follows him as him slowly works the murder, Dunne is really just using genre as an outfit to dress up an almost classical story of brotherly resentment, sin, and the limitations of redemption. It really speaks to his abilities as a writer that he's able to pull off a stylish period crime story, complete with rat-a-tat slang, while simultaneously creating two compelling character portraits of self-aware and self-loathing men. As Tommy has to grapple with his superior's ambitions to become the next police chief, so too must Des navigate the exceedingly treacherous waters of Catholic church politics and the practicalities of getting things done. Both brothers are keen-eyed observers of the weaknesses of others, and don't hesitate to use that knowledge in the service of their own agendas.
It's all very compelling -- however it's hard not to read the book and not be constantly reminded of the film Chinatown, which appeared just a few years prior to this book. Set in Los Angeles about a decade before this story, it also paints a very unsentimental and bleak look at the corruption that lies beneath even the most respected of the city's institutions and people. I can't believe that film wasn't a huge influence on this book, just as I can't believe this book wasn't a huge influence on James Ellroy's LA books like The Black Dahlia and L.A. Confidential. Which is not to diminish any of these works, but simply to note how great art can inspire other great art and create a chain of influence. Definitely worth reading if you're into period crime or the larger themes of brotherhood, corruption, and sin. The movie, which starred Robert Duvall as Tom and Robert DeNiro as Des is faithful to the book, but lacks its bite and bile.
Tommy is homicide detective who catches this gruesome case, and although the book is at least partially a police procedural that follows him as him slowly works the murder, Dunne is really just using genre as an outfit to dress up an almost classical story of brotherly resentment, sin, and the limitations of redemption. It really speaks to his abilities as a writer that he's able to pull off a stylish period crime story, complete with rat-a-tat slang, while simultaneously creating two compelling character portraits of self-aware and self-loathing men. As Tommy has to grapple with his superior's ambitions to become the next police chief, so too must Des navigate the exceedingly treacherous waters of Catholic church politics and the practicalities of getting things done. Both brothers are keen-eyed observers of the weaknesses of others, and don't hesitate to use that knowledge in the service of their own agendas.
It's all very compelling -- however it's hard not to read the book and not be constantly reminded of the film Chinatown, which appeared just a few years prior to this book. Set in Los Angeles about a decade before this story, it also paints a very unsentimental and bleak look at the corruption that lies beneath even the most respected of the city's institutions and people. I can't believe that film wasn't a huge influence on this book, just as I can't believe this book wasn't a huge influence on James Ellroy's LA books like The Black Dahlia and L.A. Confidential. Which is not to diminish any of these works, but simply to note how great art can inspire other great art and create a chain of influence. Definitely worth reading if you're into period crime or the larger themes of brotherhood, corruption, and sin. The movie, which starred Robert Duvall as Tom and Robert DeNiro as Des is faithful to the book, but lacks its bite and bile.
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