The late show

'It has been more than ten years since Connelly, one of the world's greatest crime writers, last launched a major new character. Superb storytelling - this cements Connelly's place at the very top of the crime-writing tree' Daily Mail

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CRIME NEVER SLEEPS.

Los Angeles can be a dangerous city - never more so than in the dead of night. Detective Renee Ballard, once one of the department's young hotshots, now works 'The Late Show', the notorious graveyard shift at the LAPD.

It's a thankless job keeping strange hours in a twilight world of tragedy and violence, handing over her investigations as the sun rises, never getting closure.

Some nights are worse than others. And tonight is the worst yet. Two cases: a brutal assault, and a multiple murder with no suspect.

Ballard knows it is always darkest before dawn. But what she doesn't know is how deep her dual investigation will take her into the dark heart of her city, her department and her past...

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Praise for The Late Show:

'Connelly achieves an enormous amount in these 400 pages: he creates a new character who immediately leaps into life; controls a complex, fast-paced plot full of surprises; and continues to enhance his career-long portrait of modern LA' Evening Standard

'The new novel from America's greatest living crime writer is a gripping thrill ride that will entrance you and keep you reading until the small hours' Daily Express

'Although the usual Connelly fingerprints are in evidence here - the real achievement is the creation of his tenacious heroine, Ballard' Guardian

'The Late Show reads like a Bosch novel, as Connelly braids multiple investigations into his plot, driving the story onward ... Ballard is significantly more than a Bosch replacement or clone - an absorbing character on her own terms. Connelly has created yet another potentially iconic tarnished knight of those perennially mean streets' Irish Times

'Classy and clever, with a tenacious heroine' Sunday Mirror

'A characteristically complex tale of murder and police corruption' Mail on Sunday (Thriller of the Week)

'First there was Detective Harry Bosch, then Lincoln lawyer Mickey Haller, and now comes Renee Ballard, ace thriller writer Michael Connelly's first new protagonist in 10 years. A nail-bitingly exciting investigation featuring a finely realised new character from one of America's finest contemporary novelists' Irish Independent