Tangled Web UK Review January 2007
Hollywood Station by
Joseph Wambaugh
hbk out January 07
Published by Quercus
at £14.99
One of the founding fathers of the police procedural, and for fourteen years an LA cop
himself, this is Wambaugh's first novel in a decade. He waxes eloquent on the grim and
sometimes hysterical realities of modern day policing in the city of angels. Wambaugh fills
his book with anecdotes that he credits to the many local cops he's nicked them from and
there's a lot of resentment expressed about the procedures and practices introduced to
counteract the corruption and endemic racism of the force that is remembered world wide for
the beating of Rodney King and the 1992 riots. Wambaugh's officers operate with a deep
cynicism about the politics behind the funding and running of the department: 'as far as
flooding an area with cops to deal with a crime trend, the LAPD didn't have half enough cops
to flood anything. They could only leak.' Hollywood Station is a vibrant mosaic of the
colourful, the decent, the gruesome and the downright unhinged in Hollywood. There are
several different threads to the stories that unfurl with a pleasing resolution as Wambaugh
draws together the disparate encounters and links together cause and effect, insight and
happenstance. A real pleasure to read.
(
Cath Staincliffe
author of the popular Sal Kilkenny mysteries and the series creator of TV Blue Murder)
Thousands of New and used Books at your Fingertips...
Support Tangled Web - Buy Your Books Online
