Search - Blue Blood

I expected more from this book. The author couldn't decide if he was writing a biography, a history of the NYPD, or his family history. I gather that he is still a detective in the NYPD, so maybe he had to censor his writing. Strangely there is not a lot of personal information here either. It is mostly anecdotes about his job. Some are about before his time in the Dept., like the French Connection story, which has been told and retold elsewhere. I stuck with the 560 pages because I thought there had to be a point to this story by a Harvard education policeman. That said, the part about the Trade Towers and 9/11 was touching, and personal.

Here we have a housing cop retelling his days/nights on the beat in the projects of N.Y., projects being a rough place to patrol in general. I liked the way he wrote his tales and I could feel and see the energy in his words. Parts will make you laugh and others make you cry as when he came upon the grandmother in the back bedroom of one tenant. It made me sick to my stomach and I could not fathom what kind of animals would do this to anyone, not to mention their own family, no less. If you like cop stories and I love them, you will not be disappointed here. Lots of action and detail.

I really enjoyed this book. This is the kind of cop you hope to have on every police force! It was revealing and poignant all at the same time.