Crime round-up: March 4 - Telegraph George Pelecanos, one of the writers of The Wire, has proved his diversity by writing sensitive novels that combine personal crises with cutting social commentary about contemporary America. However, What It Was (Orion, £9.99) is not one of these but a well-written potboiler about vicious criminals and virtuous investigators in Seventies Washington DC. There are times when it reads like a screenplay in which the set dressing - groovy clothes and flash cars - is as important as the plot. Still, it's a mind-blowing trip. John Harvey never received the credit he deserved for his crime series featuring jazz-loving PI Charlie Resnick. Good Bait (Heinemann, £12.99) has his new protagonist, DCI Karen Shields, investigating the death of a 17-year-old Moldovan boy found on Hampstead Heath. The result includes some nasty gangs and terrible gags. Elmore Leonard is the Harold Pinter of the crime novel, a firm believer that less is more. Raylan (Weidenfeld, £18.99), based on the television series Justified, has Marshal Raylan Givens trying to serve a warrant on a dope dealer. No one else could have concocted such an amusing and appalling yarn. Barbara Nadel deserves praise for sustaining the quality of her series starring Inspector Ikmen. Dead of Night (Headline, £19.99) has the long-suffering cop leaving his native Istanbul for Detroit where, trying to find the killers of a Turkish man, he becomes embroiled in gang warfare. The Flight (Mantle, £12.99) is MR Hall's fourth story to feature clever coroner Jenny Cooper. Her investigation of a plane crash in the Severn estuary is as complex and impressive as her debut in The Coroner.