Cop Hater (87th Precinct #1)

This is a straightforward, uncomplicated and sleazy New York crime thriller with a fair bit of noir and plenty of back alley and bedroom action!

I'm not sure why it's called Cop Hater instead of Cop Killer though?

The atmosphere from 1950s New York is captured perfectly, with great descriptions and stressed out, constantly on-call cops, sticky and uncooperative hoodlums, insecure dams and hapless other halves, in a rather macho crime thriller about a cop-killing spree.

I really enjoyed it.

It's surprisingly poetic and vivid in places with visual and sometimes beautiful descriptions of the neighborhood and underworld paranoia as the homicides ramp up.

Even quite tantalizing:

Set in a period when men were men and wives worried, it's a bit old-fashioned and probably appeals to stereotypical perhaps one-dimensional males?

But I enjoyed it for the character building, authenticity and direct approach after reading too many clever and complex and let's face it boring books that meander all over the place while contemplating the third, fourth or fifth book in the series instead of giving direct value for money.

Cop Hater is well written and uncomplicated and a breath of fresh air for taking the plot full circle, although Sherlock Holmes it is not.

And there's lots more to look forward to with stack of books in this set!