Kinsey Millhone

For our local book club I’m choosing a favourite book to discuss. I’ve chosen not a single book, but a series, the Alphabet books by Sue Grafton. This long running series which started with A for Alibi and has reached W for Wasted are thrillers featuring private investigator Kinsey Millhone.

Although a private investigator in Southern California Kinsey is miles removed from the tough guy private eye of other writers. Although the books are thrillers they show Kinsey is a thirtyish woman engaged in fairly mundane work and living a frugal life. She doesn’t drive a high powered hot rod but for all the early books a humble Volkswagen Beetle.

The character of Kinsey is thoroughly explored during the books so much so that  two fans have written a companion book, G is for Grafton; all about Kinsey as revealed in the series.

The books are set mainly in the 1980’s and events move slowly ( about a third of real time ) so all cover the late 70’s and 80’s. Although the setting is given a fictional name it is closely modelled on real Santa Barbara, a small coastal town situated north of Los Angeles. The town and area are lovingly described.

Kinsey lives in a specially built tiny apartment described as rather like a cruise ship suite. This apartment was designed and built by landlord, Henry Pitts, and is situated alongside his house. It replaces an earlier garage conversion destroyed in a bomb blast in an early book. Henry Pitts is a lively octogenarian who plays a major part in the books as do his siblings. Although necessarily, because of the gulf in ages, the relationship is a father-daughter one it is made quite clear there is definite sexual attraction. Kinsey often remarks that Henry is something like her ideal man, and he is her best friend.

Sex and violence do not play much of a role in the books. Kinsey who has been twice married and divorced has two or three affairs in the whole series all of which have limited effect. Kinsey can be tough but generally violence plays little part in the books. Grafton takes care to put Kinsey in a carefully and thoroughly constructed background. One of the Pitts siblings is married to her favourite restaurant owner , Rosie, who is Hungarian in origin and dictates to Kinsey what food to eat. This is usually something outrageously Hungarian. A fairly typical evening sees Kinsey and Henry eating dinner in Rosie’s restaurant. Otherwise Kinsey prefers very simple foods such as a sandwich she prepares herself or fast food from a burger bar.

Inevitably Kinsey spends a lot of time driving around southern California. These drives are often described in detail. Also detailed is her jogging route; that is when she goes jogging as she often does in the early morning.

Kinsey is not well off and tends to lead a fairly hand to mouth life. During most of the books her daily bread is earned either by working for an insurance company which grant her an office in exchange for investigations or later with a lawyer where she has a similar arrangement.

I like the books which are straightforward and unpretentious. Kinsey is a very believable protagonist with a well described hinterland of relationships.

Separately a former colleague Andrew Markson contacted me via this blog. My email address is Philip.hall@philiphall.co.uk