Couldn't put it down. ( )

According to the KCLS blog, the author wrote some episodes of The Wire. The Wire! And, friends, this is just as absorbing and trenchant. It made me slightly afraid to visit the Lower East Side when I visit New York (I mean, not really, but kinda). Even though it's not a whodunit, it still grips you, keeps you guessing. I couldn't help picturing Matty as McNulty. And he even stuck the name Stinkum in there! Awesome. ( )

It took a while to figure out what I thought about this one. I love Richard Price's prose, his dialogue, and the way he depicts the city (especially in this one, which takes place in places I used to live). The first third of the book had me totally involved. Then it just kind of coasted, in a straight-line trajectory that was so unlike Price's usual piling on of complications that it felt like a deliberate exercise in how to frustrate everyone's ideas about crime novels. The police procedural part keeps moving along even though there's not much to resolve, and the people keep doing pretty much what they started out doing; it's clear that none of them are really going to learn anything from this, and solving the case is not going to help. The energy of the book is all in the inner floundering around of the main characters, and in the details of petty crime in different social classes, and the portrayal of a particular slice of lower Manhattan that's been conquered by gentrification without actually becoming a better place to live. It's well worth reading for those things, just don't go looking for a story. ( )

This came to me on recommendation from a friend, and it was absolutely great. Price builds some great characters and writes some A dialogue. (Price wrote for The Wire, and his prose is really reminiscent of David Simon's prose in The Corner/Homicide) If you're looking for a tense mystery with a heaping helping of social commentary, this is it. ( )

Whoa, started very slow and very jumpy. I hate bouncing from scene to scene as a style. This began that way, then settled down and now, 150 pgs in, I'm totally riveted. The writing and especially the dialog is very good.

It takes place nowadays in the hippest part of the Lower East Side of Manhattan, a murder mystery, though we know pretty much everything (I think!), and we're just following the police investigation (good and bad cops, DAs, etc.) and the vagaries of fairness and justice. ( )