Tales that linger in your mind, that take place in your soul


The gritty 70-year-old cop novel has entered a disturbing transitional phase as law enforcement across the country enters a showdown. The slow timeline of book publishing means we’ll have to wait a few more years to see if and how this genre will evolve.

For now, though, I appreciate Robert Reuland’s attempt to grapple with important issues in his new novel. BROOKLYN SUPREME (362 pp., $27).

Will Way lives and breathes Brooklyn and spends his days as an NYPD union representative helping troubled cops – especially those who shoot and kill black youths like Georgina Lee out of momentary fear. The story unfolds through media outlets, internal investigations, conflicts of interest, unexpected court proceedings, and surprising connections to Way’s teenage years and lost loves.

The resulting panorama, informed by Reuland’s work as a prosecutor and criminal defense attorney, is dripping with cynicism: “It’s not that in Brooklyn Supreme, truth doesn’t matter. What matters is the lie they caught you.”


Kathleen Kent found a different way to contemporary procedural: Devote more energy to the detective’s personal duties and raise the stakes to extra melodramatic proportions. Brooklyn-born, Dallas-based detective sergeant Betty Rhyzyk has also appeared in two previous novels. PAGE (Mulholland, 387 p., $28). Rhyzyk has been through all sorts of physical and mental hells, his body has gone beyond limits, his capacity to love and hate has been fiercely tested.

New troubles include parental responsibility – she and her longtime partner Jackie care for a baby whose young mother has disappeared – plus a narcotics queen with increasingly gruesome ways to get revenge, and the teenager’s wealthy stepfather who won’t let anything go. blocked her quest to get custody of the baby. When Rhyzyk looks like he’s at the end of a rope, another lifebuoy soon arrives that he can light.

I read this book with compelling congestion because it was physically painful to stay away from the story until it was over. Betty Rhyzyk will not soon be forgotten by detective readers, but after a traumatic and violent trilogy she deserves rest and relief from her creator’s challenges.


Surendranath Banerjee endured multiple lawsuits as the half of the crime-solving duo in Abir Mukherjee’s detective series set in Raj-era Kolkata. His name has been slain by his enemies and friends, including his partner Sam Wyndham, his identity erased, his professional instincts ignored. All pale in comparison to what he faced MEN’S SHADOWS (Pegasus Crime, 334 p., $25.95), “The officials I worked for and selflessly served for more than five years were the same officials who will now judge me.”

Suspicion turns to Banerjee when a prominent theologian is murdered and his house is set on fire and someone who looks slightly like a detective is seen nearby. “I didn’t kill him,” Banerjee assures Wyndham.

“And the building? Didn’t you try to burn it?”

“No, I mean Yeah, I may have set it on fire, but I did not. …”

Wyndham believes his partner, but the danger is palpable and real; If Banerjee is convicted of this crime, he could be hanged. To solve the mystery, Banerjee must flee from Kolkata to Mumbai in search of the source of this colossal betrayal and a different future if the detective is no longer on the table.

As with previous series, Mukherjee takes this story forward with firm steps. But there is an even stronger bitter aftertaste, for Banerjee’s discontent is rooted in the scourge of colonial attitudes and cannot be eradicated by a tidy decision.


The short story is a cornerstone of the genre, but time and economy have eroded most of the mystery magazines available. Anthologies have stepped in to fill the void, with unequal results: The best either make an argument or unite around a unified purpose—or ideally both.

NIGHT NIGHT CLOCK (Crooked Lane, 321 p., paper, $16.99), Edited by Abby L. Vandiver (previously reviewed here with alias Abby Collette), presents 20 stories by colorful authors. “These are the sounds that will stay in your mind for a long time. Indwell your soul. Stephen Mack Jones writes in his foreword: Add a new, extra dimension to your peripheral vision and keep walking just below the surface of your skin.

The stories of the likes of Tracy Clark, Raquel V. Reyes, and David Heska Wanbli Weiden reflect the breadth and depth of the talent of this crime writing team.

There are more hits than losses. Two stories stand out in particular: Faye Snowden’s “Chefs,” evoking the style of James M. Cain and Stanley Ellin’s demonic mind; and “The Search for Eric Garcia,” by EA Aymar, are equal parts stylistically creative and emotionally destructive. Vandiver has assembled a group of writers whose careers I will eagerly follow.



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