Hard boiled
Fran Lebowitz on reading:
I like hard boiled detectives. I really don't like the English. If I see the word Don and it's not someone's name, I'm out of there. Nero Wolfe is one of my favorites because I love to read about food... John [D.] McDonald is another one of my great favorites. When my first book was published in paperback it was with Fawcett and I guess I told the publisher how much I liked him. I guess she told him because he wrote me a letter and told me how much he liked my book. I was thrilled. They made me an honorary member of the John McDonald fan club, with the badge, certificate, and everything. The Travis McGee's are the best.Full interview here. Public Speaking, the Martin Scorsese-directed HBO documentary on Lebowitz, is here.
I liked Robert Parker before he became a social worker. Elmore Leonard. I even like his bad ones. I think Joseph Hansen's the best living detective writer. The Dave Brandstetter series. The detective is a guy whose father owns something like Metropolitan Life Insurance, a zillionaire. The son is gay and he's the detective. He's a death claims investigator.
Hansen stopped writing them about five years ago but I still think he's far and away the best.