Tue 17 Dec 2013
Archived Review: CHRIS WILTZ – The Killing Circle.
Posted by Steve under Bibliographies, Lists & Checklists , Characters , Reviews[4] Comments
CHRIS WILTZ – The Killing Circle. Macmillan, hardcover, 1981. Pinnacle, paperback, 1985.
I like private detective stories. Ordinarily, the first in what promises to be a new private eye series is a matter for rejoicing. Add a plot that begins with a set of missing books, rare editions of William Blake, and the vividly moody back-ground of New Orleans, and what we get this time is, well, a book that just doesn’t live up to its potential.
The detective is named Neal Rafferty, and his biggest problem in life is that his father doesn’t understand him, and his love life is in trouble too. He’s quit the police force under fire, and they don’t like him too well either.
The plot is nicely twisted, although heavily tangled at times in massive coincidence. Rafferty meets a girl he can respond to, of course. The problem here is that the converse does not seem to be wholly true.
What lets us down is the writing. The art of subtlety seems beyond Wiltz’s capabilities. Most of the story she tells is stiff, formal, perfunctory and placid.
Rating: C minus.
[UPDATE] 12-17-13. I ended this review in its first appearance rather smugly with a PostScript commenting on the fact that all the while reading this book I was under the impression (false) that Chris Wiltz was male. Further comment in this regard unnecessary. A re-do on this one might be in order.
The Neal Rafferty series —
1. The Killing Circle (1981)
2. A Diamond Before You Die (1987)
3. The Emerald Lizard (1991)
4. Glass House (1994)
Chris Wiltz has written one other work of crime fiction, that being Shoot The Money (2012), described by one source as a “racy gumbo of suspense, comedy, and ‘sisters-in-crime.'”
December 17th, 2013 at 3:29 pm
I still own my copy of the hardcover edition, but the cover is extremely plain, and I decided that the cover of the paperback was a lot more colorful, so I used that one instead.
I don’t know if I’ve ever seen the paperback edition. Pinnacle was known for its huge line of men’s adventure paperbacks, and I suspect that any attempt to go “mainstream” in terms of the crime fiction they published simply was not distributed very well.
December 17th, 2013 at 3:53 pm
I’m not sure if I read one of these or just knew the name Neal Rafferty. Sadly, if I did read one, it didn’t make much of an impression. The genre was starting to get saturated with private eyes in this period, just before the implosion that thinned the ranks out.
December 17th, 2013 at 3:59 pm
I read one of these (I think A Diamond Before You Die) and didn’t look for any more. I don’t remember anything about the book, but based on Steve’s review, I suspect that Rafferty was another self-pitying PI — there seem to have been a lot of those around back then, and maybe now, too.
December 18th, 2013 at 7:09 am
I think I got a couple of these free on Kindle a while ago – the main attraction for me was the New Orleans setting – but haven’t read them yet. I might push them even further down the list now.