A big bag of wind of a book. Although I'm listening to the audio edition.
Adam Grupper is an excellent narrator but even he can't make this book interesting. Just a lot of low life tales and no real story. Once in a little while there is a clever one liner but not enough real humor to say it's funny or laugh out loud. I listened to Hollywood Crows which was a little bit better.
Olive is a bit dated. The dumb broad should be a thing of the past. A real lame character. I've never met any female as dumb as Olive in my long life. Maybe one but that was years ago. Olive is just a prop for other even lamer one liners, boring.
I will not bother with this author anymore.

This is Wambaugh at his best. An incredible cast of fascinating characters. A very well plotted story and completely satisfying read. Loads of humor and suspense!

I cannot add much to the five star reviews other than to say that I grew up on Waumbaugh's novels (and on the Waumbaugh inspired "Police Story") and it is good to see him return to his LAPD roots with such a bang. Come on Joe, crank it up. Even your worst is better than most.

Hollywood Station is a quick read and has some fine passages but over all it reads like a collection of stories told by policemen at the end of a shift over a few beers.

I really enjoyed the Onion Field and the Chiorboys that I read years ago and had expected the book to be better.

It's not that this book was all that bad. Its just that some of his other books were so much better.

Hollywood Station is a collection of short stories containing the same primary characters. It is slices of life in the Hollywood Station of the LAPD, allowing us to experience both the unusual (but usual for Hollywood) incidents and the condition of being "on the job." We get a real sense of the lives of the individual officers as well as life in the station. Realistically portrays the comradery and sometimes sophomoric behavior of the officers at Hollywood Station, as well as compassion and bravery. I thoroughly enjoyed each chapter, finding the whole to be entertaining, realistic and well written.

Wambaugh has a long history of good books in his portfolio. I've read them all. Unfortunately, Hollywood Station is a tedious chapter-after-chapter rehash of a few themes. For example, how many times do you want to read that there is too much oversight of the "troops" of the LAPD, that there is too much paperwork, that they are overworked, and that the brass is bad while the cops on the beat are good? If you read this novel, it will become grating very quickly that Wambaugh doesn't trust his readers to get his message unless he repeats it throughout the novel.

How did Lord Voldemort get from Harry Potter into Hollywood Station? I can see one allusion but many?

And what is it that Wambaugh is suggesting...That after Rodney King and Rampart Station, that oversight swung too far in the other direction? Perhaps it did, and perhaps a cop gets overwhelmed by seeing the bad in people all the time, but every cop I know knows that if you expect a criminal to be justly punished, then you don't lose your cool even when most of the public, in your particular case, might understand your feelings and actions. Because every cop I know knows the rules of use of force and none of them want to see a criminal escape justice because of his actions during an arrest. And, every cop I know is proud of this knowledge and this ability to control his emotions.

This is the worst of what Wambaugh's done in this novel. But also bad is that he's lost his sense of humor. Most of his books use humor to make his points: about the public's facination with and near-total misunderstanding of a cop's life, about political manipulation of crime statistics and police behavior depending on whether the pols are in or out of office, and mostly, that cops have an appreciably bizarre sense of humor that nearly offsets what they have to put up with. This is the "inside story" that we have come to expect from Wambaugh's books. This is what is missing in Hollywood Station.

Wambaugh admits that his dialogue comes from working police professionals, but he has lost his detachment and has instead bought into the upside-down-pyramid metaphor for the police bureaucracy in LA that the "troops" believe exists. That's okay. What's not okay is his overt bashing us over the head with that issue constantly. What's not okay is his having lost the ability to give us memorable humorous scenes to make that point.

Wambaugh needs to decide if he's a writer or a bitter old cop who needs to retire for younger, more professional, prouder and more knowledgeable police officers who know how to conduct themselves with the public.

Meet the characters that live and work in Hollywood Stations jurisdiction; the cops and the crooks. Read their quirky and dismal stories. See how they mesh, compliment and/or complicate each other's lives.

The street bum, a has been trumpet player, two druggies stealing from mail boxes, cops responding to a call about loud music find a body and a dying murderer; it boggles the mind. And that ain't all. There are prostitutes and dog clubbing cops, mixed with the complex of policemen and criminals, new and seasoned.

You will never read an author who's more able to depict true life on the streets and behind closed doors. The feelings, darkly humorous stories and scenes of horror the police face every day. The reasons they are what they are.

It may not seem like it, but all the stories--all the cops and bad guys/gals come together in the end. It's not a racy story of make believe, but a solid story about people--not all good and not all bad, but all doing the best they know how. A fitting novel to have dripped from Joseph Wambaugh's pen.

Review by Wanda C. Keesey (author Lost In The Mist, release May 2008)

This book was just OK. Not what I'd hoped for when I noticed a new book by Joseph Wambaugh.