Cure for Wire withdrawl


I've been missing the show lately. "Friday Night Lights" has become my recent Netflix fave but it doesn't quite cut it. Watching Season Three has been good but I've already seen it. How do you have a new experience with something that's over?

I decided to read one of the novels by the show's trio of high-caliber novelists (Richard Price, George Pelecanos, Dennis Lehane): "The Night Gardener" by Pelecanos. Part of the attraction was to counterbalance such riveting titles in my graduate program like "Twenty-five years of State Budgeting Practices" and "The Politics of Bureaucratic Structure."

It was an amazing read (much better than the Harlan Coben novel I read next). It's easy to see how his name was on some of the best episodes of the show. It wasn't just hard-boiled, neo-noir Chandler-in-the-Beltway detective fiction; I found it to be extremely insightful into race relations. The way people talk and interact will seem familiar to anyone who lives in a diverse urban community. He's to D.C. what Simon is to Baltimore.

Many of the characters and cop-talk reminds me of "The Wire." Some characters talk and you think - "That's Bubbs! McNulty! Landsman!"

Anyways, I recommend you check it out. If you have read any "Wire"-like novels, post a comment and refer them.