Fourteen long-ass crime books for the long days ahead

Molly Odintz is the Associate Editor for CrimeReads. She grew up in Austin and worked as a bookseller at BookPeople for years before her recent move up to New York City for a life in crime. She likes cats, crime novels, and coffee.

At CrimeReads she tagged fourteen enormous crime books, including:

L.A. Confidential, James Ellroy
Page Count: 512

It’s amazing that this one ever made it into a logical film adaptation. They had to cut SO MUCH guys. The novel itself gets a bit convoluted in parts, but everything comes together in the end, for an epic tale of crime and corruption in 1950s Los Angeles full of some of the most memorable characters to ever appear in a novel. Oh, and for anyone who hasn’t seen the movie, L.A. Confidential follows several members of the LAPD, some more corrupt than others, as they hobnob with Hollywood stars and try to figure out who’s really running the city.

L.A. Confidential is among Wayne Holloway's top ten books about Hollywood.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue