The Doc Ford Series is one of my favorites. Well-written with full characters and often subtle in touch. The first 10 or so I highly recommend to all our customers. Night Vision, the latest one, however, was awful.
The Preston/Child Pendergast series had its moments (Still Life with Crows being a favorite), but I lost a bit of interest in the last 2. Indeed, Pendergast lost his veneer of mysterious agent and went boilerplate. I’ll give it one more shot.
I still go back to John D. MacDonald for some great Florida reading. Also, I recommend a look at the James Rollins Sigma Force novels. Pretty good action/adventure/mysterious happenings books.
We're on the same page. That's what I meant when I said the books had dropped off when Pendergast when into the vengeance mode (over his wife). They became boilerplate. Actually, once his brother appeared, the books went a little (here, I'm doing my best Seinfeld "Kramer" hand motion) "out there."
It's interesting that the small-town goth from Still Life reappears in the latest book, although she served such a small role that her appearance was wasted, in my opinion, and her mature character was shallow.