Median Gray
by Bill Mesce Jr.
GENRE: Crime Fiction
PUBLICATION DATE: 08/04/2020
DESCRIPTION:
New York City, Summer 1963. Rookie beat cop Jack Meara is bleeding out on the dirty floor of a tenement hallway - next to the body of another cop. The eyes of the shooter burned into his memory. Meara watches and waits to see the shooter brought to justice, but, instead, "Tony Boy" Maiella climbs up the Mob ranks, slipping off indictments as easily as his designer overcoat. But on the eve of his retirement, Meara decides on one last kamikaze-like try to even the scales of justice. New York City, 1983 Rookie detective Ronnie Valerio finds himself unknowingly pulled into the wake of Meara's quest. A go-go palace bartender is being stalked, a body turns up in a neighborhood dumpster, machine guns blaze in the night, a New York bookie turns up dead in the Jersey Pinelands and the only thing they all have in common is, in one way or another, they all tie back to Jack Meara. How far does a cop go to even a score? How far does a brother cop go to shield him?
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Bill Mesce Jr. is an award-winning author and playwright as well as a screenwriter. He is an adjunct instructor at several colleges in his native New Jersey.
REVIEWS:
“Equal parts Ed McBain, George V. Higgins, and Barney Miller. You can’t go wrong.” –author/screenwriter Nicholas Pileggi, GoodFellas, Casino
“Mesce conjures up wonderful, hard-boiled prose to tell a fast-paced urban story of crime, regret, pain, and redemption. The book is knowing and raw nerved.”—David L. Robbins, New York Times bestselling author of War of the Rats
“It’s the New York I remember from my days on the street in all its gritty, sooty, crazy glory.”–Ret’d NYPD “French Connection” detective Sonny Grosso
“Mesce takes you on a blistering ride-along down mean New York streets with the most irreverent detectives this side of Richard Price. And with dialogue so true it feels wire-tapped; Price had better watch his back. This one’s a winner.” –David Breckman, co-executive producer of TV’s Monk and The Good Cop
COMPARATIVE FILM/BOOK:
The works of Joseph Wambaugh and Richard Price, in terms of getting inside a cop’s head, but for style, George V. Higgins who, since he’s not around anymore, has left an opening for stories reliant on colorful, authentic-sounding dialogue.
PRIMARY VENUES/LOCATIONS WITHIN THE BOOK:
New York City - first chapter Summer, 1960s, majority of book is set in NYC Summer 1980s
BOOK EXCERPT:
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