City of Echoes (Detective Matt Jones Book 1)

The story begins with Matt Jones who is excited about his new job as a homicide detective in Hollywood. The evening before his first day on the job, he is waiting in a restaurant for his friend, Hughes, to celebrate. His friend is late. After ordering a beer, his cell phone vibrates in his pocket. His supervisor, Lieutenant Bob Grace, calls him into his office and says "You were supposed to start tomorrow, Jones. I know that's how we left it. But I'm in deep s--t, and I need you tonight." Matt sends a quick text message to Hughes. "Dinner off. Call me."Matt wonders why the Lieutenant told him nothing about this assignment except "You'll see why it's so f----d up when you get there." Matt arrives at the scene and understands why Grace is so rattled. A murder had been committed in a parking lot directly across the street and within fifty yards of an LAPD community station. The victim had not been identified until Matt picks up the victim's phone and sees a text message "Dinner off. Call me."Matthew Trevor Jones, welcome to Hollywood Homicide! To say more will spoil the story with all sorts of spoiler alerts. Suffice it to say that the story is a complex, realistic, twists and turns story that will keep you up all night worried about what will happen next. It is not a strict white hat versus black hat cop story. The bad guys and the good guys all have their virtues and vices.For those who want to know, there is some swearing but not much. There are also some romance scenes that I personally think could have been left out but these nit-picks are minor compared to the overall strength of the story line. Hence, my rating of 4 stars.The ultimate questions are:Did I like the book? Yes, definitely.Would I buy another book from this author? I already have. Near the end, a character is introduced named Lena Gamble. I have discovered that the author, Robert Ellis, has an earlier 3-book series about Lena Gamble. I have bought the first one which cost me an expensive $7.99.Should you buy this book? Only if you like well-written, complex, realistic, keep-you-guessing, chills-down-your-back thrillers starring a cop in Los Angeles!Cautions: There are some foul words and graphic scenes in this novel.

Great to see that Amazon is offering six kindle first picks for August but the sample of “City of Echoes” hooked me a few weeks ago so it was my automatic pick.The product blurb provides an accurate plot outline and about as much as you can say without spoilers so I won’t add much to it here. Although not in the same league, much of the book had the feel of classic LA noir like Raymond Chandler (my favorite). Instead of Chandler’s good guy private eye, Philip Marlowe, you have good guy cop/Afghanistan war vet, Matt Jones. Like those classic novels, there are several twists and turns with many things- and people- not as they seem. And it may be set in modern day but there is still corruption and the claustrophobic tension and paranoia of not knowing who to trust. Setting aside a day to read the kindle first book is a gift to myself every month, but at about the sixty percent mark I had to take a break from the tension for a while. But I will say that first half of the book definitely fell in the “can’t put down category”.On the down side, “City of Echoes” did deviate from classic noir novels with the inclusion of a serial killer (I’m really tired of those) as well as more violence. And although Matt is an interesting and likeable character, there was a lack of secondary character development including some behavior that didn’t ring true. I had an overall impression that it was all just too much- too many murders, over the top bad guys, some not too believable twists and turns. Although I didn’t think it was egregious, there is a substantial amount of foul language that may bother some people.Once again I wish Amazon had a ten point rating system. During the first half of the book I would have called this a solid 7 with only a couple of unrealistic behaviors of Matt and his partner keeping it from an 8 :) But the book sagged a bit after that becoming more chaotic and unrealistic. But I still liked it overall and will definitely be looking for the next Matt Jones story.

Good book with excellent characters. Like the local color as I live in Glendale and are very familiar with the locations from Hollywood to LaCanada mentioned in the book. Yes there is a Starbucks with terrible parking on Pacific ave and there is a Jack in The Box close by that it is easier to get coffee in. The placement in the book is reveresed but the author must know the area.I hate simple mistakes in books. I often find silly errors like reading Elmore Leonards books you catch him a couple times saying this or that character took the safety off a Smith and Wesson Revolver. They don't have safety. Writer ignorance.In this book, as I recall, the author makes a big deal out of murders being perpetrated by someone shooting a Glock 10mm handgun, Quite a powerful gun but the author also makes a big deal several times out of saying it was a shiny gun that reflected light in a surveillance video. No. Lock pistols are black finished and the frames and grips dead flat black polymer. Never has and never will be a shiny Glock. Other manufacturers make stainless steel pistols handsome are polished and even rarer are nickel plated pistols but all one has to do is go on the GLock web site and look up the gun to see what I'm talking about. Even You tube video. Cops like them because they are reliable, can have large capacity magazines and are easy to shoot from the standpoint that the safety is built into the trigger pull. Sloppy research. I guess I don't like running into this because it messes with the suspension of disbelief when involved in a story. Not hard to get right if you put a minimum of effort into it.If you don't care, just read a good book. Ellis is an excellent writer

A bit wordy for my tastes, I couldn't seem to connect with the characters. Still, a good read.

Excellent read...crisis after crisis and then, what an ending!Ellis nails this novel with must-read hooks...you cannot put it down!

It was a great read. it kept me up at night reading.

Never have I read such a messed up story line as this. Even his own father was an enemy. Would not read another of Ellis books

A few months ago, I read the first Jo Nesbo/Harry Hole mystery. That book read as if the author wasn’t sure as if there would any more books in the story, so Nesbo threw all the stories at the book in the hope that some of those threads stuck for the next book. This book is the same. It read as if the author was almost a bit ADHD about it and he was thinking “Oh I’ll have this... and that... and this... and that...”.This book starts with a detective being transferred to Hollywood Homicide, and the evening before he is due to start his old detective partner is murdered. He’s given the case (because that makes complete sense), and he sets off on the investigation. During the investigation there are faulty investigations, iffy bosses, dubious partners, suspect work colleagues, PTSD, reminiscences about the war in the Afghan war, and unwanted attraction between detectives and suspects. This leads to wild goose chases, and the fact that the book could have been finished 3 or 4 times and the reader would have been quite happy. Every time the reader thinks “Phew it’s solved!”, he or she’s then going to “Hang on wait, what the..., there’s 50% (or 40% or 30%) of the book left, what’s going on?”.Anyhow, if you can put up with that, you’ll enjoy the book. Personally, however, I found myself thinking, “Oh this is why I never finished this book for 9 years.”