[In "Black Marble" Joseph Wambaugh] has created a detective, Andrei Mikhailovich Valnikov, who is almost as touching, variable and bravely idiotic as Nabokov's Professor Pnin….

Valnikov isn't one of Wambaugh's familiar "centurions," "choirboys," or "blue knights." He's the "black marble," the loser, the bad-luck piece. (p. 11)

As the misadventures of a sad, unlikely cop, "The Black Marble" is a very funny book. The problem with the novel is that it strays from Valnikov much too often. Joseph Wambaugh hasn't found a story that can contain his fat, haunted detective. The plot seems silly next to Valnikov's "sad runny eyes."… Wambaugh captures the world of dog shows with a beautiful sense of detail. He gives us schnauzers "creamed with cholesterol," seedy trainers and exhibitors who "never saw their animals except at dog shows like these." But the characters around Valnikov are a pile of weak grotesques. Most of them...