This week we have so far covered Japanese, Swedish, Malayalam crime fiction writers. Today we are looking at the American crime writing scene. The author is James Patterson and recently I read his book ‘Along Came a Spider’ which introduces us to the detective Alex Cross. The series based on Alex Cross has been running since the 1990s and is ongoing with the latest book which came out in 2019. What is so evident in the book is the life of Alex Cross who is an African American detective who has to face the social inequalities of the times. He is also a psychologist and a family man, and the novel can very well be termed as a psychological thriller. It is a mind game just like a game of chess. The events in the novel are based on a historical event which happened in the year 1932 when the infant son of Charles Lindberg was kidnapped and murdered. James Patterson has made it a point to make his detective humane. This is achieved through the interactions of Alex Cross with his grandmother and family. He is also close to his partner John Sampson. There is one line which is said by Alex Cross describing his long-standing friendship with Sampson. “Sampson knows me better than my own kids “The tribute he pays to his grandmother is also quite poignant - “She made a homicide detective, with a doctorate in psychology, who works and lives in the ghettos of Washington, D.C.”. The book was made into a movie and Morgan Freeman donned the part of detective Alex Cross.
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