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Novelist Connelly Revisits His 'Crime Beat' Days

Connelly worked as a journalist before publishing his debut novel, <em>The Black Echo</em>, in 1992.
Connelly worked as a journalist before publishing his debut novel, The Black Echo, in 1992.

Before Michael Connelly spun fiction about crime, he wrote about the real thing as a journalist. Some of those stories are collected in a new, nonfiction title from Connelly, Crime Beat.

Connelly got his start at newspapers in Daytona Beach and Fort Lauderdale, Fla., eventually getting short-listed for the Pulitzer Prize before moving on to the Times. Among the stories he covered were a Florida serial killer who posed as a fashion photographer to get closer to his victims and Toru Sakai, who was charged in 1987 with killing his wealthy father in Los Angeles and remains a fugitive today.

Connelly went on to author the bestselling Harry Bosch detective series. The next Bosch installment and his 17th novel, Echo Park, comes out in October.

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