A gripping debut work of crime fiction, from the author of the bestselling memoir about life as a New York City cop, Blue Blood. (“May be the best account ever written of life behind the badge.” —Time)
In Red on Red, Edward Conlon tells the electrifying and suspenseful story of two NYPD detectives, Meehan and Esposito: one damaged and introspective, the other ambitious and unscrupulous. Meehan is compelled by haunting and elusive stories that defy easy resolution, while Esposito is drawn to cases of rough and ordinary combat. A fierce and unlikely friendship develops between them and plays out against a tangle of mysteries: a lonely immigrant who hangs herself in Inwood Hill Park, a serial rapist preying on upper Manhattan, a troubled Catholic schoolgirl who appears in the wrong place with uncanny regularity, and a savage gang war that erupts over a case of mistaken identity.
A literary thriller about the twisted dynamic of a successful police partnership—the tests of loyalty, the necessary betrayals, the intersections of life and work—Red on Red tells an unrelenting and exciting story that captures the grittiness, complexity, ironies, and compromises of life on the job.
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Creators
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Publisher
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Release date
April 5, 2011 -
Formats
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OverDrive Listen audiobook
- ISBN: 9780307876126
- File size: 494123 KB
- Duration: 17:09:25
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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Starred review from February 14, 2011
NYPD detective Conlon, author of the memoir Blue Blood, turns to fiction with this ambitious, sprawling epic of police life. Nick Meehan, a New York City detective slipping into mid-career burnout, takes a special case for Internal Affairs to investigate a suspected dirty cop. Meehan and his new detective partner, Esposito, look into a variety of other cases, including the apparent suicide of a recently arrived Mexican immigrant woman, gangland slayings by rival drug dealers (called "red on red" or criminal on criminal killings), and a serial rapist. In between the crime solving, Conlon examines the personal lives of his two main players, the subtle alliances and loyalties, the emotional tolls, the temptations, the shades of gray inherent to police work. The pace may be slower than the average thriller, but this expertly crafted novel will appeal to readers of literary crime masters such as George Pelecanos, Dennis Lehane, and Richard Price. -
June 27, 2011
Talk about a policeman's lot not being a happy one. NYPD detective Nick Mehan, the protagonist of NYPD detective Conlon's debut novel, is repressed and depressed and, thanks to his situation, not likely to be in for a mood change. In order to get reassigned to a better precinct, he's agreed to partner with a rule-bending investigator named Esposito and report on his partner's activities to Internal Affairs. That job gets tougher when he develops a close friendship with the charismatic, outgoing Espo. Mark Deakins has a field day defining and contrasting the two men vocally. His Nick speaks softly and thoughtfully, with just a hint of self-pity. Espo is brash and full of bravura, but there's a slightly tinny tone to his overconfidence. There is a lot of plot, not to mention police procedure, in this 17-hour tale, beginning with an apparent suicide and including several shootouts, a gang war, mistaken identity, and the hunt for a serial rapist. Deakins has no trouble keeping up with Conlon's relentless prose and adding another layer to the author's carefully crafted secondary characters, but his most notable achievement is his audio portrayal of the two partners as they push the bonds of friendship to the breaking point. A Spiegel & Grau hardcover.
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