The Wagon and Other Stories from the City

I bought this book based on the great review in the Wall Street Journal and read it from cover to cover on a single weekend...something I usually don't do. The well described experience of collecting bodies throughout Chicago piqued my interest at first, but I must say that all the other stories, including the description of the loss of privacy thanks to the permanently installed cameras increased my respect and my understanding for the rarely covered cop perspective a lot. At times the author reflects too much about his own shortcomings und underplays his positive impact on the city and his true strengths such as playing his leverage and reflecting on great writing. I also wish I could get closure on how his colonoscopy turned out. And I wonder what its like when homeless people live at a YMCA (surely not the case in Boise, Idaho). But hopefully Mr. Preib has the strength and the willpower to tell us more interesting stories about his life and his encounters in Chicago. I would surely purchase them again in a heartbeat.

Preib writes with an authenticity few writers could bring to this task. Hands down, this is one of the best inside looks at policing you'll find. The nice bonus is that Preib is a truly gifted writer. I hope this is the first of many books from him.

I met Martin Preib casually nearly two years ago and perceived him to be quite the passionate thinker. Such an unassuming and remarkable mind... That being said, this book completely blew my expectations away. Preib patiently takes his time in depicting the real midwest in this semi-memoir piece. Yet it is also an important read for police skeptics and supporters alike. Read it, and then read it again.

Dear Officer Preib, I would like to commend you for your book and wanted to encourage you to continue your dream and passion of writing! You were able to articulate many of the feelings that I share about Chicago. Born and raised; my father a Chicago Police officer, and I grew up hanging out playing softball with them all at Grant Park... only after getting married to my husband, who is a firefighter, did we move to Mount Prospect about 10 years ago. It's close enough to drive to the city every day - but it sure seems like another planet sometimes. (We live in an orderly neighborhood, on a cul-de-sac, filled with old folks obsessed with perfecting their lawns. After reading your book, I asked my husband if he missed alleys... he thought I was nuts. The missing alleys seem to remind me the most of how different our lives are now, however odd that sounds.) I clearly remember as a child being mesmerized by the sheer, overwhelming beauty of snowflakes drifting through the light of a streetlamp in a rare quiet moment along Melvina Avenue. And many summer nights walking up and down Montrose Avenue, restless, wondering about the stories of each building and person I passed. Who were these people, what are the stories of their lives? The ever present murmur of traffic from living off Montrose - comforting, yet obnoxious and intrusive at the same time. For years I took the el downtown to college and never lost the amazement of certain moments - smells, strands of music from the street musicians, the beauty of pigeons taking flight through a shaft of sunlight falling between the dirty, grimy buildings. I still feel a yearning to return to the city, however, I know that the city that I love and remember and feel called to is elusive -the neighborhoods, security and friendship we experienced as children simply does not exist anymore. On a side note, I was also a cop for a while... and I also wrote case reports using vocabulary and sentence structure that I later was told caused more than one sergeant to chuckle. Your stories are authentic and a joy to read. Thank you again for letting me wander my city, at least for a few hours, from the comfort of my home. Keep at it. God bless.

Just finished reading "The Wagon" by Chicago Police Officer Martin Preib. It is indeed an unusual book. Most definitely a memoir... not presented chronologically, but neatly dovetailed together into a most interesting life narrative. I find his writing ebbs and wanes throughout the book, from introspective, philosophical and metaphorical to straight forward "cop story" sections that would be more typical of what one might expect from a cop on the street. A byproduct no doubt of the book being written in sections over a long time period. Never-the-less, overall, I find it to be an exceptional book, one of the few that I will re-read very shortly to gain a keener insight into his meaning, or he terms it, his "form." I have a habit of reading myself to sleep at the end of the day and this book requires a more alert, brighter mind. It is not just another cop book. I think it is head and shoulders above that. Only 164 pages, but not what I would call a quick read. Pay attention, there's a lot to think about buried in those pages. An earlier version of Chapter Two was previously published in the Virginia Quarterly Review in the summer of 2005. It is a good preview of the book. The link is below. [...]