What You Break

Starred review from November 21, 2016
Shamus Award–winner Coleman delves deep into the wounded psyche of his ex-cop lead, Gus Murphy, in his outstanding sequel to 2016’s Where It Hurts. Gus, who’s still struggling with the sudden death of his 20-year-old son, John Jr., kills time working as a courtesy-van driver shuttling between a ratty Suffolk County hotel and Long Island’s MacArthur Airport. Meanwhile, the hidden past of his friend Slava Podalak, the hotel’s night bellman, has resurfaced with a vengeance, and Gus becomes a witness to murder. In addition, Gus’s confidant, Bill Kilkenny, a former priest, asks him to help the wealthy Micah Spears find out not who butchered his granddaughter but why. Spears makes Gus an offer impossible to resist—funding a youth sports foundation in John Jr.’s name. Coleman doesn’t pull any punches or settle for pat character arcs in presenting a realistically flawed Gus, who realizes that his morality “was not so much a search for the truth as a set of rationalizations that let sleep at night.” Agent: David Hale Smith, Inkwell Management.

December 1, 2016
Two new cases threaten to break an unofficial Long Island private eye who really doesn't need to be broken.Smooth, feral energy czar Micah Spears wants John Augustus "Gus" Murphy to take enough time from his duties working security at the Paragon Hotel to look into the death of his adopted granddaughter, Linh Trang. Spears doesn't need to know whodunit--the Suffolk County cops already have a suspect, Asesinos gang member Rondo Salazar, dead to rights--but simply why, since Salazar won't say a word to anyone. Gus ("I didn't believe in God, but I believed in sin") instinctively bristles at Spears' request, but their mutual friend, ex-priest Bill Kilkenny, vouches for him, and Spears offers a sizable donation to set up a youth sports foundation in the name of Gus' late son, John Jr. (Where It Hurts, 2016). So Gus takes the case and instantly gets distracted by the arrival of a dubious Paragon guest calling himself Michael Smith. Smith's obviously in with Gus' friend, Paragon bellman Slava Podalak, so when he sees them leaving the hotel together, Gus follows them to a meeting that turns into an execution minutes after they leave the scene. Who is Smith, what hold does he have over Slava, and what does their dark shared secret have to do with the killing of Linh Trang? Gus' conscientious questioning of witnesses and suspects produces such meager results that you know he's going to need help from an unexpectedly benevolent providence to solve either case. "Knowledge of the dead changes nothing," announces the shop-soiled hero in resignation. Maybe not, but it does add a soulful depth to his investigation while readers wait for his two cases to collide.

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December 1, 2016
Coleman writes some of the best prose in modern crime fiction, but it comes at a price. As hero Gus Murphy, former cop and former family man, now hotel security and bar bouncer, goes through his dangerous day, we admire the beautifully crafted sentences, all the while dodging those bullets. Taking cracks to the jaw. Avoiding that car coming up behind us too fast, guns at the windows. Murphy has been hired to investigate a young girl's murder. Not who did itthe scumbag's in jailbut why. There is no apparent motive. Nearly 300 pages later, we, and Murphy, are still in the dark. Instead of solutions, we get the company of a depressive given to reminding us that the world is cold and wondering if there are things other than grief and pain to life. Readers who long to take a Weedwacker to all these neo-Hemingway musings are advised to hang on. The novel ends with a series of stunning set pieces that are sure to be echoed, just as they echo The Godfather. I will call on you one day, Gus . . . . (Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)

September 15, 2016

A three-time Shamus winner and three-time Edgar finalist, Coleman barrels through with the second in a series featuring former Suffolk County, Long Island, cop Gus Murphy. Gus investigates the murder of a wealthy businessman's granddaughter, which leads him to crimes committed decades ago in Vietnam and Russia. Hamptons noir it's not.

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 1, 2016

After his son's sudden death, Gus Murphy was a tortured soul. He credits his recovery to his friendship with ex-priest Bill Kilkenny, so when Kilkenny asks Murphy to meet a friend, he agrees. The friend is Micah Spears, whose granddaughter was brutally murdered. Spears wants answers, but the apprehended killer is silent. Gus, a cop-turned-van driver for a Long Island hotel, gets caught up in a second case when one of his passengers is murdered gangland style. It turns out Gus's coworker and friend Slava, who has a secretive past, had known the stranger previously. Murphy is your average caring guy, who is good at his job and full of faults, whose philosophy is evident and commentary on point. Murphy is not slick, but he is effective. VERDICT Coleman's second series outing (after Where It Hurts) is part police procedural, part human interest story, part philosophical monolog, and totally fun reading. [See Prepub Alert, 8/15/16.]--Edward Goldberg, Syosset P.L., NY

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.