Red Hook

Artie Cohen is a worthy addition to the pantheon of cynical and brilliant urban detectives both in love with and in rebellion and rejection against his city. For Artie it is New York: not the glitter, but the grime, the ethnic Russian enclaves, the crime worlds and the worlds of working artists and writers. Nadelson suffuses this book with the gripping sense of dread matched only by Arkady Renko's Russia or Smiley's Berlin at their darkest. The diffused sense of distrust: who is a friend? who is a murderer? is someone - worst of all - both? is electrifying and effective. Balanced against this drama is the pull of a new marriage, new family, a hope of normalcy and faith in a wounded city. We admire Artie, we fear for him, we hope he makes healthy choices - and most of all: we immediately order the rest of his saga!