|
6.
AOTW: Which authors, past or present, do you consider to be masters at creating and sustaining serial characters?
George Pelecanos: Michael Connelly. James Sallis. Walter Mosley. Shira Rozan. James Crumley. Ross Macdonald and John D. MacDonald. Chandler in a very subtle way. I like where Laura Lippman is going with her Baltimore-based character, Tess. I can't name everybody whose work I admire, I guess, but it's like pornography: you know what it is when you look at it. You can identify a real writer the first few pages into a book.
Ian Rankin: Simenon's Maigret (even though Simenon kept forgetting what first name he'd given his central character!); I like it when characters change/mature in the course of a series. I don't like it when the detective remains seemingly unaffected by the death and misery around them...
Ridley Pearson: Everyone handles it differently, and I appreciate that. Some series characters never age, and rarely advance emotionally or physically. Others evolve with the calendar. Michael Connelly is doing great things with Bosch. Carl Hiaasen has an entourage that I always enjoy remeeting.
Carolyn Hart: In addition to the authors participating in this roundtable, I would cite Phoebe Atwood Taylor, Richard and Frances Lockridge, Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Nero Wolfe, Margaret Maron, Mary Daheim, Sue Grafton, Sara Paretsky, Joan Hess, Nancy Pickard, Dorothy Cannell, Jo Dereske, the late Anne George, and, truly, so many more.
Nevada Barr: Arthur Upfield (Inspector Boneparte), Dorothy L. Sayers, Tony Hillerman, PD James, Elizabeth Peters with Amelia Peabody, Ellis Peters with Brother Cadfael. There are many.
Robert B. Parker: Rex Stout, and Raymond Chandler.
|
