I grew up in a world that was smaller. The 1970’s and 80’s were a world without an Internet and smart phones. I was living, mostly, on Nantucket Island. In that time if you didn’t have cable TV, which we rarely did in my family, your view of the outside world came from movies at the movie theater, a single screen in an old garage in the off season, trips off island, or books. Otherwise my world was thirty-six or so miles out to sea and in the winter, there were storms that prevented the ferry from making the trip. In short, my world was small and isolated.
As a child we had Tintin graphic novels, remnants of our former life in Boston. Tintin was my introduction, albeit a flawed one to the concept of international travel and adventure. In fourth grade I had a great teacher who took me from not reading much to reading voraciously, by fifth grade I was reading Encyclopedia Brown books and then Stephen King. I was twelve or thirteen when I read Rick Boyer’s Billingsgate Shoal. I was snorkeling every summer day and spending time around boats Billingsgate Shoal was set in a world similar to mine. I was hooked.
I am a voracious reader and now a writer of mysteries but Billingsgate Shoal was the first one I remember reading. I still pick up a well dog-eared paperback copy every now and then, it is like going home after a long time away. I wanted to be Doc Adams sailing in his Cat boat and solving mysteries. I have picked out of few home town favorites that I like and hope that you will like as well.
Rick Boyer, Billingsgate Shoal
In Billingsgate Shoal, Dental Surgeon Doc Adam is suffering from a healthy dose of career dissatisfaction, and that intersects with the murder of a young man who is a family friend. The story takes place in the summertime around 1982 and offers a great snapshot of Cape Cod at that time. Doc Adams is the not quite common man who starts investigating and ends up sailing from clue to clue. His case takes him from the Cape, to Boston to rural Massachusetts. As a kid it was fascinating to read about places on Cape Cod when I was living on Island.
Dennis Lehane, Gone Baby Gone
It is an undisputed fact that Dennis Lehane owns South Boston, Southie. He owns it the way that Robert B. Parker owned Cambridge and the city of Boston itself and the way that Raymond Chandler owned LA. Lehane’s books are page turners but Gone Baby Gone is the one that is the most Boston to me. It is filled with heartbreak, violence and mystery all delivered against crisp dialogue, that reads as authentic. While Parker was our guide to many of the nicest Boston restaurants, Gone Baby Gone takes us to the places in Boston that aren’t on the Duck boat tour, we go to Southie, the Projects and the Quincy Quarry. The mystery grabs us, the story shocks us and the locations hold us. This is another one that I read and will reread.
Robert B. Parker, The Godwulf Manuscript
When I was nine or so I remember that my brother had a paperback version of this. I was intrigued by the cover art and the title didn’t make sense to me as a nine-year-old. I read it when I was thirteen or so and then tearing through everything I could at my local Athenaeum. In many ways Private Detective fiction was on the ropes in the 1970’s, think of the Elliot Gould / Robert Altman version of The Long Goodbye…exactly. If the blues were reinvigorated by the Blues Brothers, I would submit that Parker did the same for Private Detective fiction with Spenser.
This is the first Spenser novel and Parker’s style and Spenser’s too, haven’t fully evolved. There is no Hawk, no Susan, just Spenser. He is a little darker and less polished but very much the Spenser we all came to love. In this case it is the collegiate world of late 1970’s Boston, a missing manuscript and a tough guy detective who struggles with his capacity for violence. There were other Spenser novels that might have been better or more polished but this one offers a unique look at the character and all set against the backdrop of Boston.
Dick Lehr, Gerard O’Neill, Black Mass
Black Mass isn’t fiction and technically shouldn’t be on this list…except that the story is unbelievable. Lehr and O’Neill’s book are engrossing and it is difficult to put it down until it is done. Even if Black Mass isn’t fiction, the story of James “Whitey” Bulger has inspired plenty of books and movies. It is almost impossible not to read a book or watch a movie that is set in Boston in the 1970’s, 80’s or 90’s and not draw parallels to Whitey Bulger’s story. Others have written about Bulger but nowhere else is the story better told than by Lehr and O’Neill, they paint a portrait of Bulger, his crew and Boston that are riveting. I read this for the first time a few years ago and felt that every Boston Crime story was related to or born from this one. It is indispensable reading for anyone interested in Organized Crime or corruption in Boston.
George V. Higgins, The Friends of Eddie Coyle
If you could only read one book about crime in or about Boston, this would be it. In a very tight 182 pages (in my copy), Higgins introduces us to mid-level criminals in Boston. There are no masterminds here, just a bunch of guys trying to carve out their own piece of the crime pie. The dialogue crackles, the characters seem like people you might meet siting next to you at a dive bar at three in the afternoon. Almost fifty years after it was written it still gritty and absorbing. It paints a picture of low rent criminals that is hard to find anywhere else. It is also an excellent window into a grimy, gritty Boston that has been replaced with high end real estate, luxury cars and Keto diets. There are other great Boston Crime novels but The Friends of Eddie Coyle is the first and the best of the bunch.
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