Ain't Nothin' Personal: 3 (An Emmett Hardy Crime Novel) Paperback – 5 May 2021

Top quality series of books about a cop in a small backwater town. Great characterisations and humour alongside the whodunnits. Looking forward to more!

Chris Kelsey’s police chief Emmett Hardy is back in Ain’t Nothin’ Personal, a novel that manages to be the best of a magnificent trilogy. The follow up to Where the Hurt Is and Butcherville, this novel is another morally complex and entertaining journey. Ain’t Nothing Personal opens with Emmett laid low by heavy drinking and his accompanying suspension as police chief in small town Burr, Oklahoma. A likable and engaging first-person narrator, Emmett is plagued by ruminations that are often darkly humorous. During his final weeks before possible reinstatement, he gets pulled into an investigation of a 25-year-old crime involving the murder of the last black family in Burr. While Ain’t Nothin’ Personal is set in December 1966, Kelsey skillfully weaves a vision that incorporates many of the race issues of the Twentieth Century. He does so through the richly developed characters, from his addled father to his lively horn-blowing buddy Hary to his sharp-tongued girlfriend Karen to the glad-handing sheriff Burt. Like the previous two novels, Emmett is constantly on a journey in his investigations where not only the truth about a crime is revealed but also larger insights emerge. This novel features a memorable expedition into New York’s East Village that manages to belong in this rural Oklahoma novel because Emmett is more cosmopolitan than a reader would initially realize. His personal demons from drink are echoed by the familial and communal demons of the past. Therefore, it is so appropriate that in the satisfying, exciting climax, Emmett is ultimately left with some tough choices; he is constantly making tough choices that are defined by a nuanced moral compass. Simply put, Ain’t Nothin’ Personal is the type of book that makes me hope that Kelsey keeps writing Emmett Hardy novels for years to come.

That's what reading this book feels like. I love the conversational style. And the finale! Thank you for writing. I hope there's a lot more

I enjoyed the first Emmett Hardy novel. Ain't Nothin' Personal is better. Every chapter passes so fast one is surprised to suddenly find oneself at the end. More, Chief Hardy is fleshed out, becoming more complicated. The mystery becomes multiple yet intertwined stories. It just a fun read.

...and all the other characters in this series. Never a dull moment. I have read three books in the series and can't wait to start the next one.

I like the story and the characters but the print errors are distracting. For example, sometimes Emmett’s dog Dizzy is male, sometimes female, sometimes both in the same sentence. Just one example of errors that detract from an otherwise good read.