George Pelecanos is a writer I turn to at least once a year, when I know I want to be entertained and taken back to Washington DC. This novel took a little longer than some of his others to get going, but once it did I was back in a familiar world and worrying that something bad wasn't going to happen to good people and hoping one or two others would get their comeuppance. Not so much music or food as some of his other work and perhaps not the kind of cuddly book to be reading at Christmas, but George Pelecanos is the best at this kind of novel.

I read this book several years ago, before I even knew about or watched “The Wire”. I watched an episode of “The Wire” with my brother and I was hooked. Then my brother, who is not a big reader, informed me that the tv show is written by an author of “some great books”. I took that statement seriously because if my brother knew that Pelecanos was one of the show’s writers and an author, then the books had to be at a minimum impactful. When he does read mystery is his go to genre, which is mine as well, so I was eager to check out the books because the show is fantastic. I realized that I had read one of Pelecanos’s books; it was this one. So I binge watched “The Wire” for several weeks and then went back and read a few of this author’s other books. My brother was right, Pelecanos can write a great book. All of this happened a few years ago. I recently came across “The Night Gardener” on my Kindle and decided to read it again. It still is a good story. It’s a stand-alone and the writing is top notch. My only complaint is that Pelecanos tried to put the story together with too many sub-plots. He can write police procedurals. He can touch on cultural issues that affect POC and how poverty impacts many who live in urban areas.He can write on drugs, gangs, murder, and general beefs that are common in the streets of Washington DC. Not the big name streets of DC surrounding our countries centers of power. He isn’t writing “political” thrillers, he writes about the happenings in the invisible parts of DC. The areas of poverty that are hidden away from tourists. The topics and real lives and circumstances that happen right next to where the leaders of our country meet for policy debates, broker power deals, and sway politicians with lobbying money. Pelecanos writes issues that go on unseen to the powerful because these books don’t take place on K Street, Pennsylvania Avenue, or Logan Circle. This story takes place in places just blocks away from the million dollar homes and international embassies; out of sight and out of mind to the rich and powerful. The author tries to weave together many of these types of narratives but it takes away the readers’ focus on the main plot. Who is killing teenage girls and leaving the bodies on the streets and in a community garden? The multiple drug deals and gang activity described adds more confusion rather than stitch the multiple sub-plots into the complete tapestry of a story.

This book is written from the POV’s of the 3 main characters. Gus Ramone is a former Internal Affairs investigator now working homicide for the city's Violent Crime branch, his old partner, Dan "Doc" Holiday, and a legendary detective named T. C. Cook. This new case involves the death of a local teenager named Asa whose body has been found in a local community garden. The murder unearths intense memories of a case Ramone worked as a patrol cop twenty years earlier with “Doc” and Cook. The old series of murders, all involving local teenage victims, was never solved, but nine have ever stopped agonizing about the "Night Gardener" killings. This new case draws the three men back together on a grim mission to finish the work that has haunted them for years. All the love, regret, and anger that once burned between them comes rushing back, and old ghosts walk once more as these characters try to catch the killer who has stalked their dreams and now seems to have come back. “The Night Gardener is a novel that is a perfect union of suspense, character, and unstoppable fate.” Even though this isn’t my favorite by Pelecanos, it still rates pretty high and I would definitely recommend anyone looking for a gritty police procedural or a noir murder mystery doesn’t have to go far because it’s all here in “The Night Gardener”. 4 solid stars.

A fair bit of how Pelecanos writes annoys me. I guess it's meant to be hard-boiled, but I wonder if for once maybe someone could just light a cigarette, rather than having to "put a match to a Camel."

What I do like keeps me coming around to read one of his book every so often. For one, his sense of place in DC is very specific and very real -- I see the community garden where they find the corpse at the start of this book from my train window every weekday morning. I can see just where things happened. Secondly, I like the intense relationship with music that many of his characters have. I have a pretty intense relationship to music, so I can relate. And Pelecanos novels definitely read, and are a good choice when I want something that will give me a good ride without having to work too hard for it. I read this right after Infinite Jest, and it was a great change of pace. But if I lived anywhere other than DC, I doubt I'd bother with him much.

I have never read any books by George Pelecanos, I have never watched The Wire, and I'm not a big fan of Crime fiction. Although, I did enjoy this book. The writing is fresh and exciting. There was alot of action and drama, but there was also a great deal of character development. The topic of race has been used before, but it is always poignant. Overall, it was definitely worth the read.

3.5

Inspirational. I mean, if this guy can be a successful writer, anyone can.

Well written, but I just never really cared that much what was going on. I think part of the problem is that it starts off seeming to be a serial killer mystery, and then for the most part, switches gears to a family drama involving cops, ex-cops and their families. By the time I realized what the book was really about, I just couldn't adjust.

I listened to the audio version of this book, twice in fact. Huge mistake, really huge. I rewound the audio so many times the first go around that I didn't even know what I had read at the end. George Pelecanos decided to read his own work and that is what did me in. He read it in a monotone dead-pan voice that not only put me to sleep but was annoying also. On my second listen to this book, I did it in 30 minute segments using the app's sleep timer. I was then able to truly grasp the story and connect with the characters. It proved to be a most entertaining book the second time around. I had read another work of Pelecanas some years back and enjoyed it immensely. This one was just as enjoyable on my second listen. The story line was intriguing and the characters were amazingly fascinating and realistic. What made this book more interesting was the fact that it took place in the Metro area where I reside, that area that encompasses Virginia, Maryland and DC. The places, street names, attitudes and neighborhoods were all familiar to me. I commuted to and worked in the District of Columbia for over thirty six years. The story was hard hitting and an all to familiar one. Death and violence on the streets of DC. The main protagonist worked together many years back on a serial killer case that was never solved. In present day, Gus Ramone is still on the force, a homicide detective now and the other, "Doc" Holiday is retired having left the force under a cloud of suspicion on morals charges and is now self-employed as a chauffeur. Gus lands on a new case that hints of the former unsolved murders of three teens. Doc awakened from a nap n his vehicle and needing to relieve himself, happens upon the latest victims body but hesitates to call it in. He checks the victim's ID and then leaves the area to call it in from a payphone in another area. The victim reminds him all to well of the serial murders years back. Grudgingly working together with the legendary retired detective T. C. Cook who handled the serial murders, the trio must piece together what happened to the latest victim but the question still remains, Who killed the three teens twenty years ago? Is it the same person? I highly recommend this book BUT please read it and DO NOT listen to the audio version.

A typical gritty tale of Washington, D.C. In 1985, the body of a 14-year-old girl turns up in a Washington, D.C., park, the latest in a series of murders by a killer the media dub "The Night Gardener." T.C. Cook, the aging detective on the case, works with a quiet, almost monomaniacal, focus. Also involved are two young uniformed cops, Gus Ramone, who's diligent, conscientious and unimpressed by heroics, and Dan "Doc" Holiday, an adrenaline junkie who's decidedly less straight. Fast forward 20 years to 2005. Detective Sergeant Ramone, now married with kids of his own, investigates the murder of one of his teenage son Diego's friends. The homicide closely resembles the earlier unsolved Night Gardener murders. Holiday, now an alcoholic chauffeur and bodyguard, follows the case on his own and tracks down Cook, long retired but still obsessed with the original murders called the Palindrome Murders. Most definitely worth reading! Pelecanos is an amazing writer.

If I could give this book 0 stars I would.

There is little to no story to be had here, just a snapshot into the life of far too many characters paired with subplots that add nothing to the main "story" (I use the term story loosely). The narrative is boring and the characters have little to no development throughout the book. A gaining of mutual respect between two formal rivals is what accounts for "growth" in Pelecanos' book, though there's no real reason as to why.



Several smaller grievances I have are that there are too many characters in the story who's name starts with the letter "R". I don't know why this annoyed me so much but it did. If you're trying to create a narrative with a lot of players involved, I personally feel that, it's better writing to have names varied to help differentiate between storylines. The second petty annoyance I had was that Pelecanos the way leans too heavily on his knowledge of Washington D.C. geography, mentioning where streets intersect and how far they are from other areas of the city. I'm sure this paints a great picture for people familiar with the area but it is very lazy and lackluster for those of us who aren't from there. Pelecanos relies too heavily on the assumption that the reader will already have in depth about the part of town he mentions and get a picture of the scene he's trying to paint. In the future Pelecanos should concern himself less with showing off how much he knows about the DC area and focus more on actually writing a compelling narrative. Finally, Pelecanos' dialogue leaves much to be desired. It reads as if it was written by a middle schooler from a wealthy suburb who's only experience with hearing law enforcement and POC speaking comes from watching too many cheesy 90's crime dramas.

I honesty don't understand how this book is rated as highly as it is. There are so many authors out there who pull off what Pelecanos was attempting with more finesse and skill. The only thing I can think of is that maybe people see Pelecanos is affiliated with The Wire and leave glowing reviews because their either blinded by his other work or don't want to look foolish and like they missed something profound in this dime store paperback. You didn't. It's simply not well written.

The Elmore Leonard-ish gangster subplot doesn't fit particularly well with the more subtle, haunted primary storyline, but this is still a good trip to Pelecanos' D.C., with interesting characters and the usual accurate local color.

Stephen King recommended author and book. He says: "Pelecanos, best known for his work on HBO's The Wire, is perhaps the greatest living American crime writer. He proves it again in this story of how 20 years changes three cops when an old serial killer of teens seems to become active again. The ending is guaranteed to tear your heart out."