The Dark Hours
The Dark Hours book cover

The Dark Hours

Price
$11.99
Publisher
Little, Brown and Company
Publication Date

Description

An Amazon Best Book of November 2021: Again and again, Michael Connelly amazes with his penetrating look inside the machinery of the LAPD, all while keeping the human hearts inside the machine front and center. The Dark Hours is another perfect example, as night-shift detective Renee Ballard catches a case on New Year’s Eve that is linked to a case worked by Harry Bosch years ago Meanwhile, she also works on catching a vicious pair of rapists, known as the Midnight Men. Ballard’s job, already made difficult by the pandemic, policing in a post-George Floyd world, and the usual mix of office politics and protocols that tie one hand behind her back, becomes an adrenaline-fueled hunt for the criminals. Ballard and Bosch show the painstaking police work that goes into the “lucky” breaks that crack cases in this dynamite series. —Vannessa Cronin, Amazon Editor --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition. Michael Connelly is the author of thirty-five previous novels, including the New York Times bestsellers The Law of Innocence , Fair Warning , and The Night Fire . His books, which include the Harry Bosch series, the Lincoln Lawyer series, and the Renée Ballard series, have sold more than eighty million copies worldwide. Connelly is a former newspaper reporter who has won numerous awards for his journalism and his novels. He is the executive producer of Bosch , starring Titus Welliver, and the creator and host of the podcasts Murder Book and The Wonderland Murders. He spends his time in California and Florida. --This text refers to the mass_market edition. “One of this month’s best thrillers… Ballard and Bosch are a great combination as they work in and around a police force that Ballard believes too often aims to ‘protect and serve the image instead of the citizens.’”― Richard Lipez, Washington Post “A thoroughly engrossing procedural… The Dark Hours offers plenty of shocking scenes and clever surprises."― Tom Nolan, Wall Street Journal “Outstanding… Connelly is the most consistently superior living crime fiction author. The Dark Hours just reinforces that.”― Oline H. Cogdill, South Florida Sun Sentinel “Extraordinary… [Connelly] is one of the best in the business at writing about investigations and creating intense suspense, but the relationship between Ballard and Bosch—a professional friendship that grows out of two brilliant minds dedicated to the same difficult but important work—is the cherry on top.”― Collette Bancroft, Tampa Bay Times “Connelly is sharp as ever... his stories always manage to explore another piece of the city’s soul."― Crimereads “A masterpiece… Meticulous about actual police procedure, Connelly makes the fundamentals of detective work engrossing while providing plenty of suspense and action.”― Publishers Weekly (starred review) "The fourth Renée Ballard and Harry Bosch novel is the best yet… Ballard has evolved into one of crime fiction's richest, most complex characters.”― Bill Ott, Booklist (starred review) “Stellar… no one who follows Ballard and Bosch to the end will be disappointed. A bracing test of the maxim that “the department always comes first. The department always wins.”― Kirkus Reviews --This text refers to the mass_market edition. “One of this month’s best thrillers… Ballard and Bosch are a great combination as they work in and around a police force that Ballard believes too often aims to ‘protect and serve the image instead of the citizens.’”― Richard Lipez, Washington Post “A thoroughly engrossing procedural… The Dark Hours offers plenty of shocking scenes and clever surprises."― Tom Nolan, Wall Street Journal “Outstanding… Connelly is the most consistently superior living crime fiction author. The Dark Hours just reinforces that.”― Oline H. Cogdill, South Florida Sun Sentinel “Extraordinary… [Connelly] is one of the best in the business at writing about investigations and creating intense suspense, but the relationship between Ballard and Bosch—a professional friendship that grows out of two brilliant minds dedicated to the same difficult but important work—is the cherry on top.”― Collette Bancroft, Tampa Bay Times “Connelly is sharp as ever... his stories always manage to explore another piece of the city’s soul."― Crimereads “A masterpiece… Meticulous about actual police procedure, Connelly makes the fundamentals of detective work engrossing while providing plenty of suspense and action.”― Publishers Weekly (starred review) "The fourth Renée Ballard and Harry Bosch novel is the best yet… Ballard has evolved into one of crime fiction's richest, most complex characters.”― Bill Ott, Booklist (starred review) “Stellar… no one who follows Ballard and Bosch to the end will be disappointed. A bracing test of the maxim that “the department always comes first. The department always wins.”― Kirkus Reviews --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title. Read more

Features & Highlights

  • A
  • Wall Street Journal
  • and
  • South Florida Sun-Sentinel
  • Best Book of the Year“A masterpiece”—LAPD detective Renée Ballard must join forces with Harry Bosch to find justice in a city scarred by fear and social unrest after a methodical killer strikes on New Year’s Eve (
  • Publishers Weekly
  • ).
  • There’s chaos in Hollywood at the end of the New Year’s Eve countdown. Working her graveyard shift, LAPD detective Renée Ballard waits out the traditional rain of lead as hundreds of revelers shoot their guns into the air. Only minutes after midnight, Ballard is called to a scene where a hardworking auto shop owner has been fatally hit by a bullet in the middle of a crowded street party. Ballard quickly concludes that the deadly bullet could not have fallen from the sky and that it is linked to another unsolved murder—a case at one time worked by Detective Harry Bosch. At the same time, Ballard hunts a fiendish pair of serial rapists, the Midnight Men, who have been terrorizing women and leaving no trace. Determined to solve both cases, Ballard feels like she is constantly running uphill in a police department indelibly changed by the pandemic and recent social unrest. It is a department so hampered by inertia and low morale that Ballard must go outside to the one detective she can count on: Harry Bosch. But as the two inexorable detectives work together to find out where old and new cases intersect, they must constantly look over their shoulders. The brutal predators they are tracking are ready to kill to keep their secrets hidden. Unfolding with unstoppable drive and nail-biting intrigue,
  • The Dark Hours
  • shows that “relentless on their own, Ballard’s and Bosch’s combined skills…could be combustible” (
  • Los Angeles Times
  • ).

Customer Reviews

Rating Breakdown

★★★★★
60%
(38.5K)
★★★★
25%
(16.1K)
★★★
15%
(9.6K)
★★
7%
(4.5K)
-7%
(-4497)

Most Helpful Reviews

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This is the Karen of California cop novels

Sorry, no, this book is definitely not "a masterpiece" whatever Publisher's Weekly has been convinced to call it. It is, at best, average Michael Connelly, well back in the middle of the pack in all his legacy of excellent crime novels.

The worst part of reading it is constantly flinching at Connelly's stretching and bending of the narrative to fit what he apparently feels are the political requirements of contemporary society. The book is absolutely drowning in Covid piety. Ballard can't take a step without reassuring us that she's putting on her face mask. Heck, even when she has to lower her mask to drink a cup of coffee she quickly announces to us that she has turned her head away from everyone else. It's not a pretty sight to watch a fine novelist desperately pandering to popular culture the way Connelly does in this book, and I suspect the novel will age very poorly because of it.

Maybe the book's just too California for me, but by a quarter of the way in it was already feeling like the Karen of crime novels. I'm sick to death of being lectured in real life. I sure as hell don't want to be lectured when I settle down with a new cop novel.
608 people found this helpful
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Wokeism Rears Its Ugly Head

I stopped reading after Chapter 8. I've been a big Harry Bosch fan from the beginning, but this is a downhill slid. Ballard is annoying, Bosch is a side story, and Connelly just has to go down the Covid, mask, vax road. And, yikes! Bosch is listening to the king of woke John Legend?
386 people found this helpful
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Mask mask mask

I’m enjoying the book but good lord!! Mask this mask that. I’m tired of this business. I just want to enjoy a book. Now I’ve finished the book. Too much political opinion for me. Mask, insurrection, mask, Trevor Noah, mask and so on. I’ve had enough.
293 people found this helpful
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Political correctness is tyranny with a happy face

I have read all of Connelly’s books with the exception of the last Lincoln Lawyer novel, and I have always enjoyed them. I read the reviews for that one before purchase, and refrained due to the large number of reviewers stating that Connelly had turned political. I hoped he would not do that with Bosch/Ballard. He did. Connelly clearly now has an agenda, and included unverified reports (and a now-disproved one) about J6 as fact, while walking the tightrope to vilify one-half of the country, without actually naming them. Also, it is difficult to read more than 5 pages without being confronted with another statement along the lines of “Ballard raised her mask before exiting the vehicle” or “The other officers were not wearing mask, which frustrated Ballard, though she made no comment”. I read fiction to escape the ridiculous junk going on around us, not to pay for the privilege and waste my time with it being further shoved down my throat. As one commenter previously posted, I feel this book will not age well. I hope he eases up on the politics in future books, but it is probably more likely his path is now set in stone. I won’t know......I won’t buy another Connelly book.
181 people found this helpful
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Good story

I liked the plot and the characters were really compelling. However, the writer doesn’t understand that masks don’t actually work, nor does the vaccine. He has not seemed to grasp that the pandemic was an act of war and all part of getting compliance by the masses for the Marxist take-over of the USA. Connelly does a great job in the novel of identifying the bad guys infiltrating the police force. It would be good if he could realize there are some REALLY bad guys at CNN, our current government and the FBI too.
169 people found this helpful
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Best in the Ballard and Bosch series!

This book is outstanding , Michael Connelly is in top form. I’ve read all the Harry Bosch books, including the shorts, the ones with Haller, and now all the Ballard and Bosch series. This book is very tightly written, drips with suspense throughout, and rings authentic with modern Los Angeles, complete within the setting of the pandemic, and references to masks, the vaccine, and the difficult circumstances between the police and the public, including references to protests and efforts to defund policing, and how all of this impacts the detective’s work environment. As each chapter ends, I’m immediately drawn into continuing on to the next.

I’m not going to give away any spoilers. We are rapidly drawn into a complex web of multiple murders and serial rapes. The story is complex with multiple characters and victims, all expertly and coherently woven together.

This book is more about Ballard than Bosch, she takes the lead and is really the main character here, Bosch appears in Chapter 8. It took me some time to warm to her as a character in this series, but she is presented masterfully and has really developed as the series has progressed. Her life situation is more realistic now, and she is more likable as a character. Bosch, while he has appropriately aged during the series, is presented in good form, not as the aging and almost decrepit man he was in some of the previous novels. His mind is sharp, he is his usual gritty, rough around the edges self, and he is seamlessly blended into the story as the main supporting cast member.

I downloaded the paired audiobook and listened at the same time as I read the book. This is a great way to read this, and I like that Titus Welliver has again been selected as Bosch’s narrator, whereas Christine Latin does a great job as Ballard. Overall, this book is the best in the Ballard and Bosch series to date, highly recommended!
153 people found this helpful
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One of the worst book of Ballard/Bosch series

Perhaps Connelly felt compelled to publish an “real-time” novel quickly. I was looking forward to this book as much as disappointed when finally read it: started with political propaganda, followed by completely out-of-character decisions and acts of main characters, with unrealistic descriptions of Covid-related discussions and workplace scenarios, ending somewhat abruptly, without explaining decisions or methods… Really not the best of series.
89 people found this helpful
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Disappointing

While I sure the author's politics haven't changed, this is the first time he crammed them down our throats. My husband and I have read all the Bosch books and we were fans. While my husband didn't like the first Ballard book, I did, but that changed with this book. So we have a gutsy female detective who is an absolute wimp about Covid. She is totally freaked out if someone doesn't wear a mask, got news Renee, that LAPD cloth mask does nothing to protect you. The vac, probably more likely to give you unpleasant side effects at your age than keep you from getting Covid, again!
I feel like Connelly is just pandering to the
left and BLM which is responsible for the defund the police movement as well as the murder of cops and innocent people.
This is the last Connelly book I will read, but whoo whoo, Michael, maybe you will get invited to the Biden Whitehouse. Sure you'd love that although for many of us that would be a boring fate worse than death.
77 people found this helpful
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Connelly's gone woke. Don't bother unless you're a Democrat.

I've read every book in the Bosch series, and the Ballard series. No more. This book is a piece of woke garbage. If you believe that Covid is the deadliest plague, and that January 6th was the darkest day in American history, this book is for you.
Those of us with critical thinking skills aren't impressed. I don't need to read about Ballard putting on her mask every other paragraph, or more Covid propaganda. Such a disappointment.
75 people found this helpful
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Part Crime, Part Public Service Announcement

I have read every Bosch, Haller, and Ballard book to date. I pre-order every Michael Connelly book as soon as it is announced. I'm a fan.

Sadly, this book missed the mark. As a story, it isn't bad. Unfortunately for Harry Bosch fans, he has been reduced to a cameo in a Centers for Disease Control vaccine PSA, in which Ballard does her best Big Bird impersonation, haranguing a befuddled Harry into getting his first Covid shot. And that's Harry's best scene.

When she's not masking, unmasking, or berating unmasked bystanders, Ballard manages to morph from being a formerly interesting lead character, into a boring, self-righteous drudge. Long-time fans will miss the old Ballard/Bosch chemistry. I'm just glad that Ballard's dog Lola didn't live to see it all go down.
60 people found this helpful