Close to Death

Stickers are a motif of the Horowitz and Hawthorne series and this novel in particular. Hawthorne identifies stickers as “the crimes that are like no others because there’s an intelligence behind them” (360). He says that these crimes are the product of “the genius, the killer who’s not going to get caught, who sits down and works it all out” (359). He continues, “That’s where I come in. That’s sort of my specialty” (360). The cases that Hawthorne takes Horowitz along on are always stickers; it is Horowitz’s ability to solve them that keeps the police reluctantly hiring him when they find, as Khan does, that they are “out of [their] depth” (101).

The stickers, and Hawthorne’s ability to solve them, illustrate Hawthorne’s unique perspective. Khan knows Hawthorne by reputation alone as “a hard-working, solitary, difficult man who somehow always manage[s] to pull the guilty rabbit out of the blood-soaked hat” (101). Hawthorne realizes immediately when Khan contacts him that “[the case] [i]s a sticker if ever there was one, and frankly, the local plod ha[s] as much chance of solving it as […] well, [Horowitz]” (93). This quote highlights another fundamental aspect of Hawthorne’s character: He is successful in part because of his confidence in his abilities, as well as his unabashed knowledge that his skills exceed those of the police and of Horowitz as well.