Sweet Thing
A Novel
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3.5 • 4 Ratings
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
In this DC-set standalone from "one of the best dialogue hounds in the business" (New York Times Book Review), Homicide Detective Alex Blum must answer a terrible question: 'how far would you go to love the wrong woman?'
In a red brick house on a tree-lined street, DC homicide detective Alex Blum stares at the bullet-pocked body of Chris Doyle. As he roots around for evidence, he finds an old polaroid: the decedent, arm in arm with Arthur Holland, Blum's informant from years ago when he worked at the Narcotics branch.
But Arthur has been missing for days. Blum’s only source: Arthur’s girl, Celeste—beautiful, seductive, and tragic—whom he can’t get out of his head. Blum is drawn to her and feels compelled to save her from Arthur’s underworld. As the investigation ticks on and dead bodies domino, Blum, unearths clues with damning implications for Celeste. Swallowed by desire, Blum’s single misstep sends him tunnelling down a rabbit hole of transgression. He may soon find the only way out is down below.
Set in 1999, Swinson, a former DC cop, offers a look back at a rougher, grittier, bygone DC replete with seedy strip clubs, pagers beeping, and Y2K anxiety. It’s here we’re taken inside sting operations, fluorescent-tinged interrogation chambers, and rooms that have seen irreversible mistakes. At once authentic, gritty, tragic, and profound, SWEET THING asks how far can you fall when the world teeters on the edge?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Set in the final days of 1999, this terrific standalone from Swinson (City on the Edge) finds Washington, D.C., homicide detectives Alexander Blum and Kelly Ryan called to investigate the murder of a low-level heroin dealer named Chris Doyle. While searching the crime scene, Blum finds a Polaroid of Doyle with Arthur Holland, a confidential informant from the detective's previous stint in narcotics. He pockets the photo and, while trying to find Arthur, discovers his old C.I. has been missing for days after a conversation with his fragile, heroin-addicted girlfriend Celeste, of whom Blum feels immediately protective. When Blum and Ryan team up with narcotics detective Frank Marr (from an earlier Swinson series), they turn up evidence that points straight to Celeste, and before long, Blum crosses a line to protect her, spiraling downward until he's in the middle of a desperate plot involving a drug kingpin, a corrupt cop, and a strip joint. Drawing on his experience as a D.C. cop and writing in clipped, terse prose, Swinson transforms the turn of the millennium into a distant noir-tinged era that feels both tougher and simpler than the present. This is sure to please fans of George Pelecanos and Richard Price.
