i first read crime in tel aviv, hanging out at a friends in 2008. around me conflict was escalating and it was dangerous to walk around. bombs were falling, suicide bombers were everywhere, bars, clubs and buses were getting blown up, even the shopping mall where i had just bought a very nice pair of italian boots would be hit in a few years by a spate of suicide bombers inspired by the promise of 72 virgins. even a dolphinarium was successfully targeted. so i was kinda going out and about sporadically but also spending a lot of time in cafes reading. i can't recall how i came by the book, i think i found it in one of the hundreds of bookshops hidden in the city, but it was irvine welsh and i was already a huge fan. crime is the first novel with ray lennox as the main character although he has been featured in a previous one, 'filth' as a secondary detective. i remember reading it and being amazed at the story, it was gritty and a crime novel unlike anything welsh had written before. most of it takes place in florida, far away from lieth and edinburgh. i remember the way he conjured florida, and it's people so well. the sun, the women, the seedy under current. it was funny and shocking, the way he described observations and there was dialogue that was perfect. it was an easy read but a complex story and i read it fast.

i picked it up a few days ago and gave it a re-read, planning to read the two sequels 'long knives' and 'resolution' and this time 'crime' is even better than the first. ray is such a wreck of a man, typical protagonist from welsh's cast of corrupted and imperfect character's and it's impossible not to feel a vast amount of sympathy for him and his post traumatic state as he slips back into his flirtations with addictions, escape and death only to find himself in the impossible position of redemption.