Change. It seems so simple, but if you read lots of series detective books, change is not a common theme. Travis McGee is always Travis McGee. Nero Wolfe and Archie are always Nero and Archie, no matter how many decades separate their first and last adventures. Hillerman’s characters change from book-to-book. They grow, they succeed, they fail, they get weary of the evil they confront on a daily basis. Finally, they grow old and retire. They find love, or give up trying to find love.
The other thing I like is that with ever book there was rarely a predefined focus. Some were Leaphorn books, some were Chee books, many a mix of the two. The evolving relationships between the main characters, and the requirements and circumstances of the crimes, created a fresh dynamic for each book, which went a long way to keeping the stories from getting stale.
Looking back though, what hooked me first and probably with Hillerman was his first chapters. The last line of the first chapter of most of his novels should required reading for how to get a reader excited about the rest of the book. Gigantic juicy literary worms that we little reader fish just can’t resist.
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