First, I finally finished James Ellroy's ``L.A. Quartet:'' The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, L.A. Confidential, and White Jazz. Astonishing. (Although I admit that White Jazz required some patience on my part; I'm still used to sentences having verbs.) Ellroy has claimed himself to be the best crime fiction author alive, and it's hard to argue with him. His intricate but perfectly synchronized plots, together with ultra-hard-boiled prose, place his work apart from anything else I've read.
[Warning: These books are not for the timid, and it's possible that no one under the age, say, of 40 should read them.]
Second, I most recently finished Walter Mosley's, Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned. It is possible that I've read a better book in my life, but I can't think of one. A story of redemption, one small step at a time, through the eyes of a man newly freed from prison after serving 27 years for a brutal double murder. A beautiful book. A perfect book.
