'Death is my beat.' Those words, spoken by the narrator and hero of THE POET, could also apply to Michael Connelly. He was an award-winning journalist before he became one of the leading crime writers of his generation, the creator of the detectives Harry Bosch and Mickey Haller. CRIME BEAT is a riveting collection of true stories which reveal, time and again, the connection between Connelly the novelist and Connelly the crime reporter. Stories he covered while working the beat inspired his writing, such as a bank heist in which the thieves got into the city's water tunnel system to get beneath the bank, which informed THE BLACK ECHO. These are true stories of cops and killers and are every bit as gripping as a classic Connelly thriller.