Ken Bruen's London Boulevard

reviewed by David Gow

Reading London Boulevard, you get the feeling Ken Bruen has picked up his crime writing skills through sheer enthusiasm for the genre. You just don't get this good without enjoying it.

An unashamed enthusiasm too; Boulevard's protagonist-narrator Mitchell makes constant mention of his literary forebears—even quoting them regularly- and the book sees him find time to visit bookshops and even attend a James Ellroy reading. We learn that during his prison term he devoured not just novels but poetry and philosophy too. While it may be fantasy to believe that hardened criminals are fans of Rilke, Jim Thompson and James Sallis, in the case of Mitch it does lend his character a wry self-awareness that is very appealing.

'I went to Waterstone's and bought Derek Raymond's 'The Devil's Home On Leave'.
It fit.'

'With the coke I was up, pacing. Went to the bookshelf and picked out James Sallis.
Poetry
Loss
Addiction
Perfect.'

Stylistically, apart from the short sentences, the thing that most struck me about this book was the way Bruen deals with dialogue attribution. In Boulevard, where attribution is required, the attribution always comes before the actual dialogue.

Her face was glowing, she said,
'They're for your BMW'
'What?'
'I took delivery today. I hope you like red'
I hate fucking red, said,
'My favourite.'

Most modern crime writers stick fairly closely to the no-adverb rule, but this trick (new to me) of strictly pre-emptive dialogue attribution is so effective at maintaining pace that I'm amazed I haven't noticed it before. The plot holds only very loosely to that of the similarly-named Hollywood movie, and has a much wider cast of characters. However, Mitch's relationship with the delusional aging actress Lillian Palmer remains as the driving force of the story, and his strange emotional imprisonment by her makes for even tenser reading than the book's more violent moments.

But to say that Bruen has merely changed the period and setting of a classic movie does not really do him justice. What we see in London Boulevard is the coming together of many different classic stories, whose universal themes will always appeal to readers. We have seen how Mitch turns to stories to illuminate his own experience. The success of this book—apart from sheer entertainment—is that it is itself another glance at the human condition, exploring the oldest problems in the newest kind of ways.

###

Copyright © 2004 David Gow

DAVID GOW works as a shop assistant in Edinburgh.
Contact David