Paperback, 480 pages
English language
Published Oct. 6, 1997 by Orion mass market paperback.
For LAPD homicide cop Harry Bosch -- hero, maverick, nighthawk -- the body in the drainpipe at Mulholland Dam is more than another anonymous statistic. This one is personal.The dead man, Billy Meadows, was a fellow Vietnam "tunnel rat" who fought side by side with him in a nightmare underground war that brought them to the depths of hell. Now, Bosch is about to relive the horror of Nam. From a dangerous maze of blind alleys to a daring criminal heist beneath the city to the tortuous link that must be uncovered, his survival instincts will once again be tested to their limit.Joining with an enigmatic and seductive female FBI agent, pitted against enemies inside his own department, Bosch must make the agonizing choice between justice and vengeance, as he tracks down a killer whose true face will shock him.
Like many, I came to the novels through the Amazon series, and, in retrospect, that might have been some sort of mistake: The novel is, from today's point of view, a routine police procedural, and it's kind of hard to find the kind of appeal in it that might have attracted the audiences back in 1993. But that's not the book's, let alone the author's fault.
In the end the story was a bit too tangled. But still a good and entertaining book.
