Title: The Line Up: The World$prime;s Greatest Crime Writers Tell the Inside Story of Their Greatest Detectives
Author(s): Otto Penzler
Publisher(s): Quercus Publishing Plc
Pages: 352
Year: 2010
Format: EPUB
Language: English
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The random article:
Cole offered his bottle of water, but I had my own. We drank, washing away the steep hike up from Griffith Park before I gazed out at the city. I never got tired of the view from that high place. The City of Angels spread south below us in a flat plain all the way to the Channel Islands and Santa Catalina. Skyscraper islands broke the surface to mark downtown, the Miracle Mile, Century City, and the Wilshire Corridor. Behind us, the San Fernando Valley ran north into a head-on collision with the Verdugo, San Gabriel, and the Santa Susana Mountains. The top of Los Angeles was a good place to talk. We did that sometimes. Often. Like we were doing that day.
Cole said, “Want to ask you something.”
“Listen, if it’s about the Dodgers tickets… ”
I had great season tickets and laid off ten or twelve games to Cole every year. Gratis. He used my seats to trade for information. In Los Angeles, choice Dodgers seats worked better than a court order.
Cole raised a hand, stopping me.
“Not the Dodgers. I’ve been wondering about our relationship, me and you. I want to ask you something.”
“If you want more games just say so.”
He wanted more Dodgers tickets. I can read him like a book.
“Don’t get pissy. Even if I did, you’re making more dough off my cases than I do. Look at how many e-mails you get through the website, people asking how come I always work for free.”
“You don’t work for free. Peter Alan Nelsen paid you a load.”
“And how long ago was that, LullabyTown ?”
“Jonathan Greene paid you up front in Sunset Express. So did Jody Taylor in VoodooRiver . Besides, I’ve only chronicled ten of your cases…”
Cole widened his eyes, making a big deal.
“Chronicled. Am I being chronicled?”
“I only cover your interesting cases. Our readers wouldn’t care about the boring dogs you work to pay the bills.”
“So my day-to-day is too dull to be chronicled?”
“If it’s not the tickets, then what?”
Cole had more of his water, then tucked the bottle into a pocket on his cargo shorts. He considered the city for another moment, then took off his sunglasses to look at me.
“Why me?”
“Why you what?”
“You could chronicle cops or lawyers or architects, but you chronicle me. I’ve been wondering why.”
Cole had never asked that before, though I often thought about it. He was right: I could have written any type of fiction, from dark fantasies to so-called literary fiction to Westerns. The choice was mine, but I had chosen to write about Elvis Cole, a private investigator who lived and worked in Los Angeles. I had my reasons, and weighed their values and importance again with each new book.
I said, “You represent hope.”
Cole stared at me with an expression that said he got it but maybe didn’t agree with it. Or like it. I tried to explain.
“Why didn’t you become a police officer?”
“That how we’re going to play this? I ask a question, you answer with a question?”
“Bear with me. It’s true I could write other things, but it’s also true you could have chosen a different line of work. You’re relatively bright-”
“Thank you too much.”
“You could have become a police officer.”
“Too many bosses. Way I work now, it’s like being a writer. I don’t have to salute. I’m not staring up the ass of a command structure.”
“Ha. Writer.”
“Think about it-if I worked Hollywood Robbery, all I would see are robberies in Hollywood. Devonshire Sex Crimes, nothing but sex crimes in Devonshire. Me being freelance, I can do whatever I want. Like you.”
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