Nine Dragons by Michael ConnellyThis is a good police procedural through the first two-thirds of the book, with detective Harry Bosch
investigating the shooting of a grocery store owner in a run-down part of Los Angeles, suspecting
Asian triad connections, and heading off to Hong Kong where the triads have kidnapped
his daughter while telling Bosch to back off his investigations.
Bosch's ex-wife and his daughter live in Hong Kong, and because of his dangerous occupation, his wife says he may never again be allowed to see his daughter, if she is recovered and rescued. How this family situation is resolved is the part where the plot starts to become unrealistic and improbable.
SPOILER ALERT :
Bosch's ex-wife is shot and killed in an attempted robbery in Hong Kong, and this dilemma of his continuing to see his daughter is suddenly resolved - he is the only surviving parent. Another improbable section of the plot -
the mystery surrounding the shooting death of the grocery store owner in LA, where the book began.
What is highly unlikely and unconvincing is that a Chinese American son and daughter would plot to
kill their father just because the father refused to close an old grocery store in LA so that they could open
a 3rd one in a more upscale neighborhood. Motive: the son" got tired of the refusal" and so
had his father shot with three well placed bullets to the chest. In a culture where filial respect has been taught for centuries, this was a pretty flimsy motive for such a heinous crime. I had to shake my head at this one.
I would have given 9 Dragons a four out of five stars after reading the first 2/3rd of the novel, but the last third of the book pulled it down to a 2, IMO.
