The Burning Room

Last updated
The Burning Room
The burning room - bookcover.jpeg
Hardcover edition
Author Michael Connelly
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish/Spanish
Series Harry Bosch #17
Genre Crime novel
Publisher Little, Brown and Company
Publication date
November 3, 2014
Media typePrint, e-book
Pages400 pp.
ISBN 978-0316225939
Preceded by The Black Box  
Followed by The Crossing  

The Burning Room is the 27th novel by American crime author Michael Connelly, and the seventeenth novel featuring Los Angeles Police Department detective Harry Bosch. The book was published by Little, Brown and Company on November 3, 2014.

Plot

Harry Bosch and his rookie partner Lucia Soto are assigned the case of Orlando Merced, a mariachi performer who was shot in a crowded Los Angeles square and was paralyzed from the waist down. The shooter was never found, and Merced survived for ten years before dying from complications from his wounds. When the bullet is finally removed from his body, Bosch establishes that Merced was shot with a hunting rifle, and that the crime was not a random act of gang violence as originally suspected, but a targeted hit. This new evidence leads Bosch to one of the city's most powerful businessmen and a controversial former mayor with aspirations of becoming governor.

Meanwhile, Bosch notices strange behavior from Soto and begins to suspect that she has gang affiliations and has infiltrated the LAPD. After catching her carrying out an off-the-books investigation, she reveals that she is a survivor of a notorious apartment fire that killed nine children, but remained unsolved after a key suspect disappeared without trace. Bosch fabricates a connection to the Merced case to protect Soto, and the two investigate the fire parallel to the Merced case. The trail leads them to a series of robberies across Greater Los Angeles that the FBI believe were used to fund a white supremacist militia group, and ultimately to a witness hiding in a convent on the Mexican border.

Over the course of the story, Bosch wrestles with the knowledge that his retirement is imminent and makes it his mission to train Soto to take over in the Open-Unsolved Unit. Ultimately, he is caught breaking into the Robbery Homicide Division offices as part of the Merced investigation and is placed on indefinite suspension pending an investigation. With less than a year until his retirement, he leaves Open-Unsolved knowing that he may never return.


Related Research Articles

Michael Connelly American author of detective novels

Michael Joseph Connelly is an American author of detective novels and other crime fiction, notably those featuring LAPD Detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch and criminal defense attorney Mickey Haller. Connelly is the bestselling author of 31 novels and one work of non-fiction, with over 74 million copies of his books sold worldwide and translated into 40 languages. His first novel, The Black Echo, won the Mystery Writers of America Edgar Award for Best First Novel in 1992. In 2002, Clint Eastwood directed and starred in the movie adaptation of Connelly's 1997 novel, Blood Work. In March 2011, the movie adaptation of Connelly's novel The Lincoln Lawyer starred Matthew McConaughey as Mickey Haller. Connelly was the President of the Mystery Writers of America from 2003 to 2004.

<i>The Big Nowhere</i>

The Big Nowhere is a 1988 crime fiction novel by James Ellroy, the second of the L.A. Quartet, a series of novels set in 1940s and 1950s Los Angeles. James Ellroy dedicated The Big Nowhere "To Glenda Revelle". The epigraph for The Big Nowhere is a passage from a novel; "It was written that I should be loyal to the nightmare of my choice. Joseph Conrad Heart of Darkness".

In law enforcement parlance, the term murder book refers to the case file of a murder investigation. Typically, murder books include crime scene photographs and sketches, autopsy and forensic reports, transcripts of investigators' notes, and witness interviews. The murder book encapsulates the complete paper trail of a murder investigation, from the time the murder is first reported through the arrest of a suspect.

Harry Bosch Fictional detective created by author Michael Connelly

Detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch is a fictional character created by American author Michael Connelly. Bosch debuted as the lead character in the 1992 novel The Black Echo, the first in a best-selling police procedural series now numbering 21 novels.

<i>The Overlook</i>

The Overlook is the 18th novel by American crime writer Michael Connelly, and the thirteenth featuring the Los Angeles detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch.

<i>Echo Park</i> (novel)

Echo Park is the 17th novel by American crime-writer Michael Connelly, and the twelfth featuring the Los Angeles detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch. It was published in 2006.

<i>The Narrows</i> (Connelly novel)

The Narrows is the 14th novel by American crime author Michael Connelly, and the tenth featuring the Los Angeles detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch. As Bosch crosses paths with FBI Agent Rachel Walling, the novel ties story elements left unresolved in The Poet and those from Blood Work and A Darkness More Than Night together into the Bosch mythos.

<i>The Closers</i>

The Closers is the 15th novel by American crime author Michael Connelly, and the eleventh featuring the Los Angeles detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch. This novel features a return to an omniscient third-person style narration after the previous two, set during Bosch's retirement were narrated in from a first-person perspective.

<i>City of Bones</i> (Connelly novel)

City of Bones is the twelfth novel by American crime author Michael Connelly, and the eighth featuring the Los Angeles detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch. Published in 2002, it was named a Notable Book of the Year by the New York Times.

<i>Angels Flight</i> (novel)

Angels Flight is the eighth novel by American crime author Michael Connelly, and the sixth featuring the Los Angeles detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch.

<i>Trunk Music</i> (novel)

Trunk Music is the sixth novel by American crime author Michael Connelly, and the fifth featuring the Los Angeles detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch.

<i>The Last Coyote</i>

The Last Coyote is the fourth novel by American crime author Michael Connelly, featuring the Los Angeles detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch. It was first published in 1995 and the novel won the 1996 Dilys Award given by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association.

<i>The Concrete Blonde</i>

The Concrete Blonde is the third novel by American crime author Michael Connelly, featuring the Los Angeles detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch. It was published in 1994.

<i>Nine Dragons</i> (novel)

Nine Dragons is the 14th novel in the Harry Bosch series and the 22nd book by American crime author Michael Connelly. It was published in the U.K. and Ireland on October 1, 2009, and worldwide on October 13, 2009.

<i>The Drop</i> (Connelly novel)

The Drop is the 24th novel by American crime author Michael Connelly, and the fifteenth novel featuring Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) detective Harry Bosch. The book was published on 22 November 2011.

<i>The Black Box</i> (novel)

The Black Box is the 25th novel by American crime author Michael Connelly, and the sixteenth novel featuring Los Angeles Police Department detective Harry Bosch. The book was published on 26 November 2012, "in part to honor the 20th anniversary of the character".

<i>Bosch</i> (TV series) American drama television series

Bosch is an American police procedural streaming television series produced by Amazon Studios and Fabrik Entertainment starring Titus Welliver as Los Angeles Police detective Harry Bosch. The show was developed for Amazon by Eric Overmyer, and the first season takes its inspiration from the Michael Connelly novels City of Bones (2002), Echo Park (2006), and The Concrete Blonde (1994). It was one of two drama pilots that Amazon streamed online in early 2014, and viewers offered their opinions on it before the studio decided whether to place a series order. Season 6 was released on April 16, 2020, following a five-day #BoschStakeout marathon and live tweet during the COVID-19 pandemic. The seventh and final season was released on June 25, 2021. An as-yet-untitled spinoff series for Amazon's IMDb TV was announced on March 3, 2021, featuring Welliver along with much of the Bosch creative team.

Murder of Michael Nigg Unsolved 1995 killing in Los Angeles possibly connected to O.J. Simpson case

Michael Nigg was an aspiring actor who worked as a waiter at a Beverly Hills restaurant. He was shot and killed during an apparent robbery attempt in Hollywood. The Los Angeles Police Department later arrested three suspects but soon released them for lack of evidence. No other suspects have ever been identified, and the killing remains unsolved.

<i>The Wrong Side of Goodbye</i>

The Wrong Side Of Goodbye is the 29th novel by American crime author Michael Connelly, and the nineteenth novel featuring Los Angeles Police Department detective Harry Bosch. It was published in 2016.