Get our Best Book Club Books of 2025 eBook!

Summary and Reviews of Lost Light by Michael Connelly

Lost Light by Michael Connelly

Lost Light

by Michael Connelly
  • Critics' Consensus (6):
  • Readers' Rating (1):
  • First Published:
  • Apr 1, 2003, 360 pages
  • Paperback:
  • Mar 2004, 416 pages
  • Rate this book

About This Book

Book Summary

Without a badge to open doors and strike fear in the guilty, Bosch learns afresh how brutally indifferent the world can be, but with every conversation and every thread of evidence he senses a larger more ruthless presence than he has ever known before.

Only the money was real. L.A.P.D. detective Harry Bosch was on a movie set, asking questions about the murder of a young production assistant, when an armored car arrived with two million dollars cash for use in a heist scene. In a life-imitates-art firestorm, a gang of masked men converged on the delivery and robbed the armored car with guns blazing. Bosch got off a shot that struck one of the robbers as their van sped away, but the money was never recovered. And the young woman's murder was in the stack of unsolved-case files Bosch carried home the night he left the L.A.P.D.

Now Bosch moves full-bore back into that case, determined to find justice for the young woman. Without a badge to open doors and strike fear in the guilty, he learns afresh how brutally indifferent the world can be. But something draws him on, past humiliation and harassment. It's not just that the dead woman had no discernible link to the robbery. Nor is it his sympathy for the cops who took the case over, one of them killed on duty and the other paralyzed by a bullet in the same attack. With every conversation and every thread of evidence, Bosch senses a larger presence, an organization bigger than the movie studios and more ruthless than even the LAPD. The part of Bosch that will never back down finds as fatal an opponent as he's ever encountered - and there's no guarantee that Bosch will survive the showdown ahead.

CHAPTER 1 The last thing I expected was for Alexander Taylor to answer his own door. It belied everything I knew about Hollywood. A man with a billion-dollar box-office record answered the door for nobody. Instead, he would have a uniformed man posted full-time at his front door. And this doorman would only allow me entrance after carefully checking my identification and appointment. He would then hand me off to a butler or the first-floor maid, who would walk me the rest of the way in, footsteps falling as silent as snow as we went.

But there was none of that at the mansion on Bel-Air Crest Road. The driveway gate had been left open. And after I parked in the front turnaround circle and knocked on the door, it was the box-office champion himself who opened it and beckoned me into a home whose dimensions could have been copied directly from the international terminal at LAX.

Taylor was a large man. Over six feet and 250 pounds. He carried it well, though, with a full head ...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $0 for 0 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

Media Reviews

The Baltimore Sun
Michael Connelly ventures into new territory by having the taciturn Bosch narrate the story. It takes nerve and skill to tinker with a formula as successful as the Bosch series…all of the ingenious plotting and skillful writing that are Connelly's hallmarks.

The New Yorker
Lost Light marks Connelly's most stunning achievement yet, further proof that he is 'the most talented of crime writers'.

Washington Post
Not only is [Lost Light] one of his best, but it takes this important series in interesting new directions...his plot, so seemingly straightforward, builds to a series of surprises.

Booklist - Bill Ott
Starred Review. Connelly manages to rub it raw in a way that others can't quite equal. It's never pretty watching Harry edge toward connection with those he loves and then back away, drawn by the pain of others, but it just may be the most compelling train wreck in crime fiction.

Kirkus Reviews
Starred Review. Connelly manages to keep every new curve not only clear but breathlessly exciting.

Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Connelly hits all the right notes...This exciting procedural is as good as any in the series...that will draw gasps of astonishment from longtime readers.

Reader Reviews

jpj

Has Connelly written a bad book? Probably not. Lost Light gives us Bosch searching out clues to a long dormant case after he retires from the police force. A little bit of romance, a few great characters, and some interesting plot developments lead...   Read More

Write your own review!

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $0 for 0 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Read-Alikes

Read-Alikes Full readalike results are for members only

If you liked Lost Light, try these:

  • Brimstone jacket

    Brimstone

    by Douglas Preston, Lincoln Child

    Published 2005

    About this book

    More by this author

    Featuring bone-chilling suspense and Preston and Child's trademark meticulous research and vivid detail, Brimstone is the duo's—and Pendergast's—most dangerous and gripping adventure yet.

  • The Vanished Man jacket

    The Vanished Man

    by Jeffery Deaver

    Published 2004

    About this book

    More by this author

    A brilliant thriller that pits forensic criminologist Lincoln Rhyme and his partner, Amelia Sachs, against an unstoppable killer with one final, horrific trick up his sleeve.

We have 6 read-alikes for Lost Light, but non-members are limited to two results. To see the complete list of this book's read-alikes, you need to be a member.
More books by Michael Connelly
Search read-alikes
How we choose read-alikes

Books with similar themes


Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $0 for 0 months or $20 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

BookBrowse Book Club

  • Book Jacket
    The Lilac People
    by Milo Todd
    For fans of All the Light We Cannot See, a poignant tale of a trans man’s survival in Nazi Germany and postwar Berlin.
  • Book Jacket
    Lessons in Chemistry
    by Bonnie Garmus
    Praised by Parade and The New York Times Book Review, this debut features a 1960s scientist turned TV cooking star.
  • Book Jacket
    Daughters of Shandong
    by Eve J. Chung
    Based on the author’s family story, comes an extraordinary novel about a mother and her daughters’ escape from Taiwan.

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    Awake in the Floating City
    by Susanna Kwan

    A debut novel about an artist and a 130-year-old woman bound by love and memory in a future, flooded San Francisco.

  • Book Jacket

    The Original Daughter
    by Jemimah Wei

    A dazzling debut by Jemimah Wei about ambition, sisterhood, and family bonds in turn-of-the-millennium Singapore.

  • Book Jacket

    Ginseng Roots
    by Craig Thompson

    A new graphic memoir from the author of Blankets and Habibi about class, childhood labor, and Wisconsin’s ginseng industry.

  • Book Jacket

    Serial Killer Games
    by Kate Posey

    A morbidly funny and emotionally resonant novel about the ways life—and love—can sneak up on us (no matter how much pepper spray we carry).

Who Said...

Show me the books he loves and I shall know the man...

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

B W M in H M

and be entered to win..