Cheap Hail, Hail, the Gang's All Here! (87th Precinct Mysteries (Paperback)) (Book) (Ed McBain) Price

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Customer Reviews of Hail, Hail, the Gang's All Here! (87th Precinct Mysteries (Paperback))

TO, TO CONFUSING!!
Hate to be a wet blanket but this one is totally confusing to me. This is the 25th MaBain book I have read. I think I have given all of them a five star except two. This is about 24 hours in the life of the 87th Precinct. There are several cases and several policeman all involved at one time. You read about one case for a page or two, then another one for a page or two, until you go through all of them then you start over again. I like the detectives and I like the 87th Precinct, I did just not like this format. I guess my brain is not large enough to maintain it all and keep it straight. Will continue to read them as not likeing only two out of twenty five is pretty good.

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A Great introduction to McBain
This was my first 87th precinct novel, and it definitely has me looking forward to more. This actually reads more like an episode of NYPD Blue, than a mystery novel, but it is a solid introduction to a group of characters I was not familiar with. The book is short and flies quickly. It is a 24 hour segment, covering both the night and day shift and 3-4 crimes that the detectives deal with and solve during their shift. If this seems like a cliche at all, realize that this was written before Hill Street Blues, or Homicide, or NYPD Blue so this format is years ahead of that television trend and is before Joseph Wambaugh's similar style. I highly recommend this book. It'll go quick and will have you in search of more McBain books.

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Recommended for first time readers of Ed McBain.
After producing 87th Precinct crime novels regularly for fifteen years, Ed McBain issued this one in 1971. He uses a variant on the usual formula. Crimes investigated by most of the sixteen detectives on the Police Squad in one twenty-four hour period are presented. Robbery, prostitution, paedophilia, suicide, drug offences, assassination, murder, missing persons, ghosts - all these things come to the attention of the regular officers that feature in McBain's books. The cross-cutting and the editing techniques now so familiar to viewers of TV police procedural programs are here initiated by McBain.

As usual, McBain displays unerring skill at presenting scenes and characters vividly and economically. Especially realistic is the dialogue.

Readers who wish to be introduced to an Ed McBain crime novel are recommended to start with this one. Shorter than most, but tightly-packed, it provides the reader with quick access to the realism, sleaze and sensation that comprise the McBain formula.