|
Dennis Lehane
|
|
||
|
Genre
|
|||
|
Media
|
Book
|
||
Publisher | Doubleday | ||
ISBN | 978-038561534 | ||
|
Reviewer
|
Peter
|
Synopsis
Danny Coughlin is Boston Police Department royalty and the son of one of the city's most beloved and powerful police captains. His beat is the predominately Italian neighbourhoods of the North End where political dissent is in the air - fresh and intoxicating. On the hunt for hard-line radicals as a favour to his father, Danny is drawn into the ideological fray and finds his loyalties compromised as the police department itself becomes swept up in potentially violent labour strife. Luther Lawrence is on the run. A suspect in a nightclub shooting in Oklahoma, he flees to Boston, leaving his wife behind. He lands a job in the Coughlin household and meets Danny and the family's Irish maid, Nora, who once had a powerful bond. As the mystery of their relationship unravels, Luther finds himself befriending them both even as the turmoil in his own life threatens to overwhelm him. Desperate to return to his wife and child, he must confront the past that has followed him and settle scores with enemies old and new. Set at the end of the Great War, The Given Day is meticulously researched and expertly plotted, it will transport you to an unforgettable time and place.
Review
Lehane was a well established thriller writer before he wrote The Given Day, set in an America coming up for air just after the First World War and just before prohibition and the roaring 20s.
The action in a thriller tends to emphasize the here and now, as we frantically turn the pages to find out how the ending can give coherence to the plot.
The title itself suggests the kind of immediacy that keeps modern newsrooms humming, and could even be the title of a 60-Minutes-type current affairs show.
It's mostly set in Boston, 1919-20. A city literally torn apart by terrorism, the flu pandemic, and labor unrest. Sound familiar? The novel also adds the lure and power of celebrity in the form of Babe Ruth, during a pivotal time for American baseball.
The terrorists here are fanatical activists fighting to establish an international communist revolution. On the other side, we have a police force starting to take on a political role with the involvement of a young John Hoover.
And caught in the middle, the struggle to improve the rights and conditions of the American working man, here represented by a fledgling professional police force. Lehane's descriptions of their working lives amid shocking conditions and treatment is particularly vivid.
The cast is based around two main characters. Luther Lawrence, a member of the black underclass in an America is on the run from Oklahoma, caught between gangsters and the corruption of police force desperate to fight any movements it can't control. In this case, the beginnings of the Black power moveent in America.
Danny Coughlin is the son of one of the most powerful police captains in the city. He gets drawn into the hunt for violent activists in return for his detective's shield. He eventually turns away from trying to suppress the labor movement, and tries to establish a police union.
Lehane has created the best of both worlds, with the meticulous research adding momentum and depth to a consummate page-turner.
If you enjoy what we provide, please consider making a donation.
