Burglars Can't Be Choosers - Lawrence Block

   1977; 294 pages.  Book 1 (out of 11) in the “Bernie Rhodenbarr” series.  New Author? : No.  Genres : Hard Boiled Mysteries; Crime-Humor.  Overall Rating : 8½*/10.

 

    Sooner or later, even the most careful burglar gets caught in the act.  Bernie Rhodenbarr is a case in point.

 

    The job seemed like an easy one.  Break into an apartment, rifle a desk, steal a blue box.  Someone’s willing to pay him $5,000 to do that.

 

    The guy who lives there, a patron of the arts, is guaranteed to be out that night, attending a show.  Still, Bernie is taking no chances; he rings the doorbell several times before picking the locks on the door.  There’s no answer, which confirms that no one is home, and Bernie is quickly inside and searching through the desk.

 

    That’s when several bad things happen.  First, two policemen come barging through the door, catch Bernie in the act, and read him his rights.  Second, one of the cops checks the back bedroom—something Bernie hadn’t bothered to do because no one answered the doorbell.

 

    It turns out there’s a corpse in there, with its head bashed in.

 

What’s To Like...

    Burglars Can’t Be Choosers is the opening book in Lawrence Block’s “Bernie Rhodenbarr” series featuring a lovable and adept burglar as the narrator and protagonist.  Despite this being his literary debut, Bernie is experienced in his vocation, well-known to some of the police, and has even served a jail sentence for getting caught once in the past.

 

    The story takes place in New York City, the author’s stomping grounds, and I really liked the Gotham “feel” to it.  As you might in a series where the burglar is the hero, the tone is lighthearted and humorous.  The title reference, at 20%, is one of Bernie’s wry views on life.

 

    Unsurprisingly, Bernie manages to avoid being thrown in jail and quickly begins his own investigation into the mystery.  Who is the unfortunate victim in the bedroom?  Why did someone kill him?  Who and why did somebody set Bernie up to take the rap for the murder?  Why  couldn't he find the blue box?

 

    Bernie’s efforts are hampered by the fact that he’s a wanted man and he can safely assume that the NYPD is watching his apartment.  On the flipside, his lockpicking skills allow him easy entry into just about any place he wants to look for clues.  And, as usual (this is my fifth Bernie book), a sultry female is worked into the storyline and gives him sleuthing assistance plus other added benefits.

 

    The ending is above-average.  The case is solved thanks to two key clues.  One clue is there for both Bernie and the reader to notice and later slap their foreheads for failing to recognize its importance.  The other clue Bernie keeps to himself and only reveals it during the accusation scene.  There are a couple of kewl plot twists, one of which occurs after the perp is identified and the case closed.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Momser (n.) : a contemptible person (Yiddish).

Others: Loid (v.); Bokhara (n.); Gama-Houche (n.; obs.).

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.2/5 based on 1,074 ratings. and 172 reviews.

    Goodreads: 3.82/5 based on 7,173 ratings and 606 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    A funny thing.  The better your building, the higher your monthly rental, the more efficient your doorman, why, the easier it’s going to be to crack your apartment.  People who live in unattended walkups in Hell’s Kitchen will fasten half a dozen deadbolt locks to their doors and add a Segal police lock for insurance.  Tenement dwellers take it for granted that junkies will come to kick their doors in and strong-arm types will rip the cylinders out of their locks, so they make things as secure as they possibly can.  But if the building itself is set up as to intimidate your garden variety snatch-and-grab artist, then most tenants make do with the lock the landlord provides.  (pg. 4)

 

    “I’m relatively new at harboring fugitives but I’ll do my best to harbor you in the style to which you are accustomed.  Is it called harboring a fugitive if you do it in somebody else’s apartment?”

    “It’s called accessory after the fact to homicide,” I said.

    “That sounds serious.”

    “It ought to.”  (pg. 102)

 

Kindle Details…

    Burglars Can’t Be Choosers goes for $8.99 at Amazon right now.  Most of the other e-books in the series are that price as well, with two exceptions; one at $8.49 and one at $4.99.

 

“I thought you never lie.”  “I occasionally tell an expeditious untruth.”  (pg. 119)

    There’s a fair amount of cussing in Burglars Can’t Be Choosers.  I counted 23 instances in the first 20% of the book, most of which are of the “mild” variety.  Later on, at least one f-bomb shows up.  There are also a couple of rolls-in-the-hay, but those are tastefully done.

 

    The typos were few and far between.  Things like orbungling/or bungling and sub-liminal/subliminal.  I strongly suspect these cropped up in the “book-to-ebook” conversion stage.

 

    That’s about all I can gripe about.  Burglars Can’t Be Choosers is a well-written, enjoyable story where both the Mystery aspect and the Humor aspect shine.  I’m not reading this series in order, and I don’t think I’m losing anything because of that.  If you’re familiar with, and happen to like Donald Westlake’s “Dortmunder” series, you’ll love Bernie Rhodenbarr.

 

    8½ Stars.   One last thing.  At around 25% the Latin phrase “de mortuis” is used.  I’d never heard of it so had to look it up.  The full saying is “de mortuis nil nisi bonum”, which apparently is a famous phrase.  I took two years of Latin in school, and if you saw my grades in those classes, you’d realize why I couldn’t suss out the translation without Google’s help.

The Burglar Who Thought He Was Bogart - Lawrence Block

   1995; 372 pages.  Book 7 (out of 12) in the “Bernie Rhodenbarr” series.  New Author? : No.  Genres : Crime Humor.  Overall Rating : 7*/10.

 

    Meet Bernie Rhodenbarr, a burglar extraordinaire.  Or slightly more accurately, an ex-burglar, since he’s retired now, having found a new career as the owner of a used-book store.  It doesn’t pay as well as his old profession did, but the job security’s better and the police don’t hassle him as much anymore.  Bernie has found contentment.

 

    Now a new customer in the bookstore named Hugo Candlemas wants to hire Bernie for his burglary skills, for one night only.  But the pay is extremely lucrative, and the job sounds easy enough: break into an apartment, hunt for a portfolio, find it, and steal it. 

 

    Hugo Candlemas has taken several steps to make the heist as foolproof as possible.  He’s figured out a way to get around the pesky doorman, and assures Bernie that apartment's tenant will be out the entire evening.  What could possibly go wrong?

 

    Plenty, Bernie.  Plenty.

 

What’s To Like...

    The Burglar Who Thought He Was Bogart follows Lawrence Block’s usual recipe for a Bernie Rhodenbarr mystery: an easy heist is planned, things go awry, Bernie and the police both try to solve the crime with grudgingly minimal cooperation, and everything eventually comes to a head with a bookstore meeting of all the suspects called by Bernie once he’s figured everything out.  It's a good recipe.

 

    There are plenty of plotlines to keep the things moving.  Corpses show up along the way; all of the suspects seem to have hidden pasts; and things disappear, including Bernie’s attaché case, his latest love interest, and the coveted portfolio.  When the attaché case does resurface, it has an enigmatic message scrawled on it.  It’s meaning seemed obvious to me, but not to Bernie, and it turns out I was obviously wrong.

 

    The book’s title references Bernie’s current cultural craze: watching oodles and oodles of Humphrey Bogart films at the local theater, preferably with a beautiful female companion accompanying him.  Booklovers will enjoy the many literary nods Lawrence Block scatters throughout the tale, including the novelist P.G. Wodehouse (Jeeves), the poet Winthrop Mackworth Praed (who?), and the loquacious historian team of Will and Ariel Durant, co-authors of an 11-volume, 13,549-page compendium called the Story of Civilization, which Amazon offers in e-book form for a mere $99.99.  There’s even a recurring playful wink at Sue Grafton’s “alphabetical” series with the facetious titles of ‘A’ is for Train, ‘Q’ is for Gardens, and ‘I’ is for Claudius, and it wasn't until writing this review that I "got" those bits of wit.

 

    Along the way we learn that Bernie’s middle name is ‘Grimes’, his favorite charity is the AHDA (American Hip Dysplasia Association), and the patron saint of burglars is St. Dismas.  One of the characters is fond of the word “anon” and the use of the subjunctive case, which meant I liked him immediately.  There really is a small village in New York called Quogue (pronounced "kwog"), but the "Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization" and the short-lived post-WW1 nation of "Anatruria" are both figments of Lawrence Block’s imagination.

 

    As always, the story is told in the first-person POV (Bernie’s), and as always the witty dialogue, Bernie’s charisma, and the plethora of interesting characters – some new, others recurring – kept me turning the pages.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Loid (v.) : to open (a locked door) by sliding a thin piece of celluloid or plastic between the door edge and doorframe to force open a spring lock.

Others: Thaler (n.).

 

Ratings…
    Amazon: 4.4*/5, based on 122 ratings and 58 reviews.

    Goodreads: 3.89*/5, based on 2,628 ratings and 149 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    What can I say?  I steal things.  Cash, ideally, but that’s harder and harder to find in this age of credit cards and twenty-four-hour automatic teller machines.  There are still people who keep large quantities of money around, but they typically keep other things on hand as well, such as wholesale quantities of illegal drugs, not to mention assault rifles and attack-trained pit bulls.  They lead their lives and I lead mine, and if the twain never get around to meeting, that’s fine with me.  (pg. 4)

 

    “What’s on the program, a poetry reading?”

    “Not exactly.”

    “Because I didn’t know you were into that.  I read some of my own stuff a while back at a little place on Ludlow Street.  Café Villanelle?”

    “Black walls and ceiling,” I said.  "Black candles set in cat-food cans.”

    “Hey, you know it!  Not many people even heard of the place.”

    “It may take a while to find its audience,” I said, trying not to shudder at the memory of Emily Dickinson sung to the tune of “The Yellow Rose of Texas” and a lifetime supply of in-your-face haiku.  (pg. 285)

 

“You Assyrian guttersnipe.  You misbegotten Levantine dwarf.”  (pg. 291)

    There’s only a sprinkling of cussing in The Burglar Who Thought He Was Bogart.  I noted only 11 of them in the first quarter of the book, which included only one f-bomb.

 

    I was a tad bit disappointed in the ending.  Yes, it was both twisty and complicated – and that’s always something to look forward to in a Bernie Rhodenbarr mystery.  And yes, I’m happy to say I picked up on the key clue, although I didn’t know what to make of it, whereas Bernie did.  So what's my gripe?

 

    Well, I cringed at the final resolution of all the skullduggery.   Crimes were committed, perpetrators were unveiled, but even though the NYPD was present, no arrests were made.  What kind of object lesson is that?  Yeah, I know.  Picky, picky.

 

    Nevertheless, overall I still enjoyed The Burglar Who Thought He Was Bogart.  I'd call it a good, but not great, addition to Lawrence Block’s Bernie Rhodenbarr series.  It kept me entertained, despite the bit of stumbling at the end.

 

    7 Stars.  One last chuckle about The Burglar Who Thought He Was Bogart.  I chuckled at the “euphemisms for a euphemism” coined by Carolyn.  Instead of “a roll in the hay”, or other, more direct descriptive phrases, she opts for “a flop in the feathers” and “a tumble in the feathers”.  It’s little things like this that have made me a fan of this series.

The Burglar On The Prowl - Lawrence Block

    2004; 350 pages.  New Author? : No.  Book #10  (out of 11) in the Bernie Rhodenbarr “Burglar” series.  Genre : Crime-Humor.  Overall Rating : 8*/10.

    Surveillance cameras are cropping up all over the place these days.  Inside apartment buildings, along all the aisles in department stores, on the city streets, and above many sidewalks.  It’s getting to the point where it’s hard to make a living as a law-un-abiding citizen.

    Heck, you don’t even have to be in the process of committing a crime.  If you’re a not-so-well-to-do person walking around in a well-to-do neighborhood, and your face shows up on a surveillance video, well, people are bound to wonder what you’re doing there.

   Like, for instance, our protagonist, Bernie Rhodenbarr, who's the owner of a used bookstore by day, a small-time, part-time burglar by night, and known to a local police detective for both of those vocations.

    So when someone kills three people during a robbery in an upscale neighborhood, and Bernie’s face gets caught on a nearby sidewalk camera, guess who instantly becomes the prime suspect?  After all, what other reason could a known petty thief have for traipsing around the street there in the dead of night?

    Truth be told, Bernie had another reason to be there, and was completely unaware of the murder-robbery taking place.  He was checking out the neighborhood in preparation for a burglary of his own.  Which is not a very good alibi to give to the police.

    Good luck on wiggling out of this one, Bernie.

What’s To Like...

    The Burglar On The Prowl follows Lawrence Block’s standard pattern for this series: Bernie becomes the prime suspect in a crime, usually while perpetrating his own bit of larceny, and is therefore forced to solve it to clear his name.  His friend Carolyn Kaiser lends some well-intentioned but amateurish assistance, while Police Detective Ray Kirschmann waffles between arresting Bernie and/or aiding him, the latter option being contingent upon Ray getting the credit for solving the case.

    The may sound banal, but it works due to the abundance of wit, the lively pace, and the complex and intriguing plotline.  Bernie’s tasks here are to figure out a.) who killed a rich couple and their doorman (and why?), b.) who robbed Crandall Rountree Mapes (and what did they steal?), c.) who violated a trust in the worst way during a blind date, and d.) why would someone pay $1300 for a $12 book and then get killed for it?

    As usual, Lawrence Block gives nods to a bunch of his fellow authors.  Here he tips his hat to Graham Greene, Leon Uris, Joseph Conrad, George Gissing (who?), Marcel Proust, Edgar Allan Poe, and John Sandford.  The nod to the last one is quite clever: Sandford has a 30-book “Prey” series (Shadow Prey, Winter Prey, Chosen Prey, etc.) so Block “invents” a new title: Lettuce Prey.

    I enjoyed the somewhat dated references to LP’s and Amway.  There’s a sprinkling of Spanish mixed in, including one cussword.  I’d never heard of “milk chutes” before, and the “McGuffin which is really a false McGuffin” literary device made me chuckle.  I liked the several references to the 20th-century history of Latvia; it’s something near and dear to my heart.

    The ending is vintage Lawrence Block.  Bernie presents four different versions of it, which seemed a bit convoluted and confusing, but hey, it made things interesting.  Also, one of the bad guys gets away, and I’m always like that sort of thing.

Excerpts...

    “The man,” said my friend Marty Gilmartin, “is an absolute … a complete … an utter and total …”  He held out his hands, shook his head, and sighed.  “Words fail me.”

    “Apparently,” I agreed.  “Nouns, anyway.  Adjectives seem to be supporting you well enough, but nouns... “  (pg. 1, and the opening lines)

    “Only thing we found in the room was a scrapbook of newspaper clippings, an’ the last I heard they were lookin’ for someone to translate ‘em.”

    “Pardon my Latvian,” I said.  “I assume that’s the language they’re in?”

    “Some’s Russian, goin’ by the letters.  They’re in that alphabet they got, that’s like Greek but worse.”

    “Cyrillic.”

    “No, I’m pretty sure it’s Russian.”  (pg. 224)

When a cop’s not near the suspect he suspects, he suspects the suspect he’s near.  (pg. 118)

    I found The Burglar On The Prowl to be an entertaining read, although it might not be to everyone’s taste.  For starters, there’s a bunch of cussing in it, but that’s also true for the whole series.

    More serious is the blind date infraction.  This apparently offended some readers, and I admit it’s rather edgy.  Still, it’s a real risk in today’s dating scene, so perhaps it will serve as a warning about going home with someone you know absolutely nothing about.

    Personally, my only quibble was that there seemed to be more philosophical “asides” by Bernie as he tries to justify his larcenous proclivities, but this is nitpicking on my part.

    8 Stars.

The Burglar In The Rye - Lawrence Block

    1999; 352 pages.  New Author? : No.  Book #9  (out of 10, or 11, or 12, depending how you count them) in the Bernie Rhodenbarr “Burglar” series.  Genre : Crime-Humor.  Overall Rating : 8½*/10.

    The timing is going to be tricky, but it’s all for a good cause.  Bernie Rhodenbarr, retired burglar, is going to unretire for a bit in order to purloin some highly-sought letters from the reclusive author, Gulliver “Gully” Fairborn to his one-time agent, Anthea Landau.

    It won’t be easy.  Dear old Anthea is a recluse who almost never ventures out from her room at the Paddington Hotel, and Bernie isn’t sure where in her room the letters might be stashed.  In fact, he doesn’t even know which room is hers.

    But where there’s a will, or t least some letters, there’s a way, especially if some money can be made along the way.  And Bernie’s larceny skills are certainly up to the challenge.

    Unfortunately, someone saw him just outside Anthea’s hotel room door.  And someone else can prove Bernie was registered at that hotel under an assumed name.  And someone else must also be wanting those letters, because when Bernie makes it into Anthea’s room, she’s dead, and there are no letters to be found.

    Worst of all, someone’s already called the cops.  They’re at the door, and Bernie’s stuck inside.

What’s To Like...

    The Burglar In The Rye has the usual structure used in the Lawrence Block “Burglar” series, and I mean that in a most positive way.  Bernie gets talked into doing “one last heist”, and this isn't his first relapse.  Things go awry, Bernie gets implicated, and he and the reader spend the rest of the book navigating the many plot twists until Bernie, and sometimes the reader, figure out the whodunit.

    The murder-mystery is well-done.  The clues are there, if you’re astute enough to spot them.  But it’s just as much fun to meet a bunch of zany characters – both new and recurring – and to listen in on the sparkling wit that permeates every conversation in a Bernie Rhodenbarr book.  Lawrence Block also revels in imparting obscure trivia to the reader.  Here, we learn all about Chester Alan Arthur (who?) and the dreaded candiru, aka the “toothpick fish”.  The author doesn’t make this stuff up.  Wiki “candiru” to learn, as Bernie did, why you’ll never want to sneak a pee while swimming in a river again.

    As with any of the Burglar books, the new characters introduced are fascinating studies.  The reclusive Gulliver Fairborn sparkles, but my favorite newbie was Isis Gauthier, the first person I can recall that leaves Bernie flummoxed with her incisive questions.

    It also should be noted that, although the book was published in 1999, Bernie’s best friend throughout this series, Carolyn Kaiser, is gay.  No biggie, I hear you say, but what’s impressive is the way Lawrence Block makes her a three-dimensional character.  Yes, she’s gay, but that isn’t her only raison d’etre.  She owns a dog-grooming business, shares meals and drinks with Bernie, and swaps various insights with him over various relationship issues they both have.

    The Burglar In The Rye is a quick and easy read, told in the first-person POV (Bernie’s).  There is some mild cussing, one instance of aural sex (I’ll let you suss that out), and two, unconnected instances of urination fascination.  Maybe Lawrence Block was on diuretics when he wrote this.  This is a standalone story, as well as part of a series.

Kewlest New Word . . .

Twee (adj.) : Excessively or affectedly quaint, pretty, or sentimental.

Excerpts...

    “The day I moved in he told me he wanted me to stay as long as I wanted, and that he hoped I would never leave him.  But that he would leave me.”

    “He told you that?”

    “He stated it as a fact.  The sky is blue, ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny, and the day will come when you’ll wake up and I’ll be gone.”

    “It could be a country song,” I said, “except that ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny would be tough for Garth Brooks to sing with real conviction.”  (loc. 1085)

    For God’s sake, he’s a self-proclaimed burglar.”

    “Actually,” Carolyn put in, I think ‘admitted’ would be a better word for Bernie than ‘self-proclaimed.’  It’s not as though he goes around making proclamations.  If anything, he’s a little ashamed of being a burglar.”

    “Then why doesn’t he stop burgling?” Isis wanted to know.

    “Just between us, I think it’s an addiction.”

    “Has the man tried therapy?  Or some sort of twelve-step program?”

    “Nothing seems to work.”  (loc. 3414)

Kindle Details...

    The Burglar In The Rye sells for $6.49 at Amazon.  All the rest of the books in the series are in the  $3.99  to $5.99 price range.  Lawrence Block wrote several other, less lighthearted detective series, and those e-books are in the $2.74-$9.99 range.  One of them is the “Matthew Scudder” series, which I am eager to check out.

He was a bear, of course, but not the sort whose predilection for sylvan defecation is as proverbial as the Holy Father’s Catholicism.  (loc. 69)

    There’s not much to quibble about in The Burglar in the Rye.  At one point Bernie, desperately fleeing the police, enters a random hotel room, and stumbles across some extremely valuable rubies, They just happen to play a key part in solving the crime.  Yeah, it’s kinda of a “WTF moment”, but hey, without those gems, the whole investigation would come to naught.  So we’ll let it slide.

    The ending is suitably dramatic, albeit a two-stage affair.  Just about everyone you’ve figured was the culprit gets put under the Bernie Rhodenbarr spotlight, but I doubt you’ll have fingered the actual murderer.  That gets wrapped up at 88%, then it’s time to also resolve the matter of the missing and much-coveted letters.  That may sound anticlimactic, but it actually all works out quite nicely.

    8½ Stars.  I borrowed the Kindle version of Burglar In The Rye from my local library.  They carry the complete series, and it seems like very few patrons remember Lawrence Block.  It may be time to read a couple more of these, before the library deletes them due to inactivity.

The Burglar Who Liked to Quote Kipling - Lawrence Block

    1979; 304 pages.  New Author? : No.  Book #3  (of 11) in the Bernie Rhodenbarr “Burglar” series.  Genre : Crime-Humor.  Overall Rating : 8½*/10.

    Bernie Rhodenbarr is a reformed man.  He used to be quite the burglar, but a stretch in the pen made him see the error of his ways.  He is now content to run a small used-book store.  The profits aren’t as good but he can read on the job and no one is trying to throw him in jail.

    But some people persist in doubting that he’s really changed.  Like the local cop who wants Bernie to steal a fur coat for his wife.  Nope.  Stealing on behalf of a policeman is a sure recipe for disaster.  Then there’s the man who wants him to steal a single book.  Really?  A book-dealer stealing a book?  The irony just drips.

    But he’s willing to pay Bernie $15,000 for the job.  Hmmm.  Well, maybe just one more heist.  For old times’ sake, you know.

What’s To Like...

    You’ll find The Burglar Who Liked To Quote Kipling in the Murder-Mystery section of your local bookstore.  Technically it’s a Cozy.  There’s no sex or drugs in the story, and I don’t remember any cussing.  Heck, even the murder, a bullet to the head, produces very little blood.

    But you should really read the books in this series first and foremost for their wit and humor.  The dialogue always sparkles, and Bernie is a charismatic ex-thief (the "ex-" might be debatable), who’ll remind you of Donald Westlake’s John Dortmunder.

    The two main characters in the series – Bernie and his best pal Carolyn – are both warmly lovable.  Even the local cop has a certain charm about him.  The one-and-done characters, including the baddies, are all refreshingly likable.  And don’t worry about Romance developing between Bernie and Carolyn – she’s gay.

    Lawrence Block manages to insert numerous plugs for classic literature into the text.  Kipling naturally takes center stage here (although I don't recall much quoting of him), including a fascinating and completely fictitious account of a long-lost novel by that author.  The story moves at a pleasant pace, which is a  must for any cozy.  The ending is the standard “gather all the suspects together and then explain who the culprit is” device, but so what?  All the elements of the plotline are resolved neatly, and each book in this series is a standalone tale.

Kewlest New Word ...

Billingsgate (n.) : Coarse, abusive, or obscene language.  (a Britishism)

Excerpts...

    “What the hell do you know about books?”

    “Well, I was always a big reader.”

    “In the jug, you mean.”

     “Even on the outside, all the way back to childhood.  You know what Emily Dickinson said.  “'There’s no frigate like a book.'”

    “Frig it is right.  You didn’t just run around buyin’ books and then open up a store.”  (loc. 166)

    We entered the vestibule.  “You don’t have to come,” I said.

    “Ring the bell, Bern.”

    “I’m serious.  You could wait in the car.”

    “Wonderful.  I can play it safe by sitting in a stolen car parked at a bus stop.  Why don’t I just wait for the subway?  I could cling to the third rail for security.”    (loc. 1496)

Kindle Details...

    The Burglar Who Like To Quote Kipling sells for $4.74 at Amazon.  All the rest of the books in the series sell for either $4.74 or $4.99, which seems quite reasonable.

”When you don’t know what you’re looking for, you have a great advantage, because you don’t know what you’ll find.”  (loc. 1672)

    Although the story is a whodunit, don’t try to solve it before Bernie does.  Some of the critical clues aren’t revealed until that final gathering.  Instead, just trot alongside Bernie as he tries to figure out what's going on, devises clever stratagems, and engages in witty banter.  I found TBWLTQK to be a “just right” mystery – the denouement was neither too arbitrary nor too obvious.

    I read two or three books from this series about 10 years ago, and enjoyed them all.  I don’t know why it’s taken me so long to get back to Lawrence Block and Bernie Rhodenbarr, but it was a nice surprise to discover that my local digital library carries 10 of the 11 books in the series.  I suspect I’ll be reading more of these in the coming months.

    8½ Stars.  Add ½-Star if you’ve read anything by Kipling, and like his stuff.