David Swindon's 'Crime Song' is the 2nd in his Frank Marr series, and likely the last I'll read. Swindon can write and tell a story, but when your 'good guy' has an insatiable appetite for drugs and a tendency to get himself involved in all sorts of bad situations because of it, it's tough to find a rooting interest. He mines the same sort of material as does the great George Pelecanos (both geographically and story-wise), but where Pelecanos' characters often have tough backgrounds and pull some shady shenanigans, the Marr character takes it to the extreme. One of his few redeeming qualities is that he occasionally feels bad for guys who are murdered because of something he did.

The plot of Crime Story is strong. Marr, a young 'retired' (not voluntarily) cop, works as a private investigator in the DC area. He's working on keeping an eye on his college aged cousin, to whom he used to be close but who now lives out of state, during his college career in the city at GWU. The kid's a screw up, a low level drug dealer whose idea of work-study is selling illegal substances to fellow students and other youngsters. He's hanging with the wrong crowd, but Marr is giving him a wide berth. Unfortunately, returning to his home after some surveillance, he finds the police on site investigating a break in and murder. The victim is his cousin. Marr begins his own investigation, leveraging his past contacts in the police ranks. He finds some leads, follows them while also snorting and drinking an incredible amount of drugs and liquor, and eventually pulls it all together at the end.

I have no illusions about how big city police departments operate at the individual level (I live in the Chicago area, so....), but I really don't think someone like Marr would be allowed to free-lance as he did in a murder investigation. I may be wrong. I also don't think anyone getting as effed up on a daily basis as Marr could function mentally and physically well enough to pull off what was described in this story. I could be wrong there as well.

As I said, Swinson can write but his main character is a loser with no redeeming qualities. Do yourself a favor and explore some of Pelecanos' novels. Same milieu, better writing and characters. ( )