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Customer Reviews of Final Justice

What I wasn't expecting was a book that's written with the main characters being the same ages as they were before, but the book's action taking place in the present. Griffin has skipped ahead through nearly 30 years of time but clearly states several times throughout the book that only a few months (possibly up to six) have passed since the action of the seventh book ended.

This means that characters now are constantly using cell phones, which are common nowadays but were nonexistent when the series left off in book 7 -- and which they never used in the books up to and including the seventh. It means characters drive cars and trucks that are mentioned by explicit make and model and that exist only now, but were unheard of (even undreamed of) in the 1970s (think SUVs).

I also found jarring the fact that many key players from previous books are absent, without explicit explanations for the changes. For example, Jerry Carlucci, the mayor of Philadelphia through the first seven books, is gone. He's mentioned once or twice, but he's no longer the mayor. I remember a brief mention that indicated he may have been elected to the US Senate, but in the previous books he was always concerned with RE-ELECTION, not with election to an entirely different level of government.

Similarly, the police commissioner is gone (a bit more easily explained, as that's a political appointment and the commissioner serves at the mayor's pleasure); the district attorney is gone; and a few other characters suffer similar fates.

Finally, the book is [filled] with errors of continuity. Matt Payne's elimination from the Marine Corps is explained in this book as a problem with his ear; in the first seven books, it was a problem with his eye. He was only promoted to detective a short time before his promotion to sergeant in the eighth book, and the series has made it plain that such promotion opprotunities rest on passing of examinations that are held only every couple of years, and that not everyone qualifies even to take those tests each time. So Payne's somewhat stellar rise through the ranks goes against the procedures and standards Griffin has described in the series up to and including the seventh book.

One character who was explicitly removed from the police force is back in this book: Wilson Carter. In the fifth book, he left the police force; now he's a sergeant and there's no indication he was ever out of the Highway Patrol.

All that said, I found the book to be an engaging read. Griffin's style always engages me, and though I do often find a lot of his dialog difficult to believe (I doubt people really talk like the characters in his book), I usually finish the books within a day or two. This one took me a week because I read it during a vacation, and only a few dozen pages at a time. And it ended very abruptly, which I'm sure is meant to set up another book, but it left me unsatisfied.

Real Heroes Do Exist
Like most people, I prefer books about areas in which I have personal experience, but my lack of experience with Police work does not prevent me from enjoying this excellent book, Final Justice, in this great Badge of Honor series. The author again shows us that there are as many heroes in the police department as there are in the military. Final Justice again highlights the skills of newly minted Detective Sergeant Matt Payne, using him as one of many examples of the intelligence and dedication of the members of the police department. The author always talks about the good and bad of every organization, revealing the humanity and the problems of someone who is dedicated to public service. Mr. Griffin writes about people he knows, and he tells you marvelous inside stories about what happens behind the scenes. This is another great story with dedication as its base. This author knows people and he knows how to make them come alive. He does it so well that many of my friends forget that his books are fiction, so they expect every fact in the books to be completely accurate.

I like fiction that teaches me something, at the same time I get a great story. A friend of mine calls this 'faction'. I get this from Mr. Griffin's books, directly and indirectly. I love his books because Mr. Griffin is a great, natural storyteller, and he forces me to research what is real and what is not. I have purchased 100-200 non-fiction books to check out his characters. His stories always point out how many heroes we really have in America. For me, some of his books are five plus, and some are five, but they are never less than that.

You will enjoy this book at least as much as all of the author's other books, because it is a great story about the good guys versus the bad guys. The good guys work very hard, creating a lot of strain and stress on their personal lives. I wish all authors could write stories this good. As a Navy Brat, a draftee and an Army Reservist, I identify more with Mr. Griffin's books about the military, but these police books are equally enjoyable. This author's books are the only ones I reread on a regular basis, and I give them as gifts to others who are doing a great job, or in the hope that they will emulate the good guys.

We need more authors writing about the heroes in this world, to continue to encourage people to do these tough jobs, in spite of the personal adversity they face daily.

Not everybody gets along . . .
Most of the mystery writers we frequently read, Elizabeth George, Crais, James Crumley, DeMille, feel free to discuss the petty irritations, resentments and sometimes out and out disregard for the people surrounding the main characters. Not so with the Griffen series (any Griffen series.)

Here is the criteria for all of the characters central to the plot, as I understand it to be. The heroes are surrounded by a group of 'special friends' of different races, Church habits, drinking habits, wives, and (oddly enough) ranks in the Department, Marine Corps or the Army. These 'friends' all get invited to the same mansions for elegant, servant-staff served parties, and reaffirm that they all see life the same way the hero does. There is order and then there is retribution.

Here's the key: intelligence, sexy wives or girlfriends ('she looked just as good walking away from me as she had walking to me'), a love of Scotch or other alcohol, loyalty for procedure, and an agonizing amount of simultaneous inner thoughts written in italics while someone else is speaking.

The Griffen books are the most sexist books in print while at the same time being unrealistic in what conversations people who work with eachother will tolerate in eachother. The closest friends are Black, Irish, 'wasp'ish, whatever that is now, Jewish, Middle Eastern, (ditto 'whatever that is now'), Italian, Episcopalean, Catholic and Methodist. All the wives know eachother and more remarkably, like eachother, drink heavily, and know (in this case) as much about police procedure as the husbands/boyfriends do. Everyone drinks an enormous amount of booze. And along the way they solve terrible crimes.

If you want a taste of how people really get along, I vote for George Pelecanos. He writes brilliantly of the anger, resentments, confusion and dislike we find for people in our every day walk through the nine to five. Read 'Shame the Devil' or 'Soul Circus.' That's real. This is not real.

I found more obscene language frivolously spoken in "Final Justice" than in the other Griffen novels. Additionally, Griffen, like any popular writer, has a cult-like following. I'm certainly one of the members, having read all of the series. So if you're going to radically alter the timeline of the series, like three decades, didn't Griffen think someone was going to notice? Didn't he want to offer up an explanation? Or did he just feel that his fans would read it anyhow and didn't deserve an explanation?

I guess we didn't. I read it.