Cypress Grove (James Sallis, 2003)

I'm reading at "ramming speed" now, so get ready for a lot of end-of-year book posts. James Sallis has been on my to-read list for way too long. A year or two back I read Long Legged Fly, the first in the Lew Griffin series. This is the first of the Turner Trilogy. I'm not sure if he's planning on expanding beyond three volumes, but everything seems to indicate he's tied everything up (the series has been dormant since 2007 and was recently repackaged omnibus style). It was James Sallis's book reviews that referred me to one of my favorite authors, Jack O'Connell. I can't thank him enough for that, so I figured it sort of made sense to read his books too, especially since O'Connell has been pretty quiet these days.

Sallis is as much a poet as a mystery author, so the pacing of the prose and the organization of the narrative is unusual. I had to reread certain passages because they didn't lend themselves well to my "ramming speed" pace. Some other readers were put off by the non-chronological every-other-chapter flashbacks. I am far more forgiving; it's all part of the poetic expression. Joe Turner is a fascinating character and I look forward to continuing to read his story.

On a side note, Sallis is the author of Drive, which was recently made into a movie. Hopefully this will continue to raise his profile as an author, which I feel is richly deserved.

Typically in a year I'll read more mysteries than any other genre, though of late it hasn't been quite as dominant. In summary, these were the mysteries for 2014:

• The Gods of Guilt by Michael Connelly - the fifth (depending on what you count) Mickey Haller book, now being branded as "Lincoln Lawyer novels".
• Case Histories by Kate Atkinson - the first of the Jackson Brodie mysteries, recently made into a mini-series aired on PBS.
• Ovid by David Wishart - a novel of ancient Rome, a series better known in the UK
• The Germanicus Mosaic by Rosemary Rowe - another novel of ancient Rome, but set in ancient Britain (of course), and also a series better known in the UK
• Cypress Grove - see above