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A police procedural

My recent reading includes a novel by James Patterson and Marshall Karp, RED ALERT (2018).

James Patterson


James Patterson (portrayed here) is a great Master, and Karp is his protege, in the art of the police procedural, a subgenre of crime fiction in which the emphasis is NOT on the whodunnit guessing game, or on the brilliant ratiocination of the protagonist. The emphasis is on the setting and the particulars of how the catch is made -- a work in this genre can delve into forensic science, the particulars of search warrants, interrogations, etc. The plot exists as a convenient device for getting the reader (presumed to be of the laity) into that world, so that the act of submersion is the end in itself.

RED ALERT involves two NYC  police detectives, Zach Jordan and Kylie MacDonald. Zach is the first person narrator, Kylie is his partner.

The following passage shows us how the genre or subgenre works:

"There are two ways to search a suspect's apartment: get a warrant, which would take hours, or con the tenant into giving us permission, which in Janek Hoffmann's case would take seconds. Kylie took the lead."

There follows an 18 paragraph discussion of how the prime suspect at this point in the story, Hoffmann, is tricked into consenting to a warrantless search. At the climax of this passage, Hoffmann has not only allowed a search, he hands over his cell phone for the detectives' inspection.

Much later in the investigation, we learn that whoever is really behind the murder at issue is also a blackmailer. And our heroes, Jordan and MacDonald, lose track of $100,000 of cash that was supposed  both to pay off one of the bad guy's extortionate demands and to allow his capture. Now it's gone. The bad guy outsmarted them (so it probably isn't dimwitted Hoffmann after all.)

Yet attention turns again to a procedural issue. What are the internal ramifications for Jordan and Kylie of the loss of that large portion of the District Attorney's office budget? The detectives tell their superior, Delia Cates, that she shouldn't think it necessary to "fall on a sword" to protect them.

She [a black woman] replies in a nice little speech, ending thus: "I don't have to fall on swords. There are plenty of white men in white shirts who are happy to throw me on the nearest one if they think it will help a horse they have in the race."

Cates also volunteered that she first drafted an explanation to the DA that said simply, "Dear Mick, Shit happens." But she didn't send Mick that early draft. "The version I ultimately sent said the same thing, but benefited from time well spent during my youth in the writing program at Columbia."

Well done, Patterson and Karp.   
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