JACK TAYLOR NOVELS BRANT NOVELS CRIME NOVELS Tower Once Were Cops American Skin Dispatching Baudelaire London Boulevard Her Last Call to Louis Macneice The Hackman Blues Rilke on Black MAX & ANGELA NOVELS Tower Winner of the 2010 Macavity Award for Best Novel! US From a rough Brooklyn neighborhood, Nick and Todd forge a lifelong bond that persists in the face of blood and betrayal. Low-level wiseguys with little ambition and less of a future, the friends become players in the destruction of an international crime syndicate stretching from the Kennedy Airport to the streets of New York, Boston, and Belfast, to the alleyways of Mexican border towns. Their paths are littered with the bodies of cops, snitches, lovers, and stone killers. In the tradition of The Long Goodbye, Mystic River, and The Departed, Tower is a powerful meditation on friendship, fate, and fatality. A twice-told tale done in the unique format of parallel narratives that intersect at deadly crossroads, Tower is like a beautifully crafted knife to the heart. Buy the book from Amazon, Amazon.co.uk or an independent bookstore. PRAISE "Divided into two halves, this short, brutally poetic tour of the underside of Brooklyn, Boston and Philadelphia marks the first collaboration between noir masters Bruen (The Guards) and Coleman (The James Deans). Drawing on the classic theme of childhood friends pulled toward different sides of the law, the coauthors tell the story of Nick and Todd in quick concise scenes, sketching backstories and love lives, flipping time and incidents like Tarantino's Pulp Fiction. Running errands under the cold eyes of an enforcer, Griffin, for the Bible-quoting gangster Boyle, the heroes learn fast enough that you live in the rain forest, you get wet. And looming symbolically over their narrow, violent world is the north tower of the World Trade Center. Bruen and Coleman shine, dropping in-jokes, experimenting and displaying all the literary chops that have made their novels such cult favorites among mystery fans."    —Publishers Weekly "Plot plays second fiddle to the specifics of sharply etched characters relayed in a prose style that frequently lands a punch to the gut. VERDICT: These two writers have amassed a mantle full of prizes and bevies of fans; much of the fun they must have had playing off each other comes across in this successful collaboration."    —Library Journal "Tower would make an outstanding gift to anybody in the Witness Protection Program who is feeling nostalgic for the streets. Bruen and Coleman work great together—try to guess where one ends and the other begins. A rough and profane read, with haunting echoes of a Southie of the mind."    —Daniel Woodrell, Edgar Award-nominated author of Winter's Bone "Taking up the storied themes of crime fiction—loyalty and betrayal, temptation and treachery—Tower lifts and elevates them, forging a tale both barbaric and baleful, swaggering and broken-hearted. Brutal, soaring street poetry to take your breath away."    —Megan Abbott, Edgar Award-winning author of Queenpin "Tower is spare, powerful, surprisingly tender. And as seamless a piece of two-author writing as you'll ever find."    —S. J. Rozan, Edgar Award-winning author of The Shanghai Moon